Thanks to the OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development) for a notice (received via email on June 16, 2023) about their upcoming International Women in Engineering Day on Friday, June 23, 2023, Note: I have information about more events and links to relevant organizations at the end of this post,

Are education policies doing enough to enhance career paths of women in STEM and nuclear science?

23 June, 2023

12h30 (Paris) [3:30 am PDT]

Female scientists and engineers pioneered the nuclear and radiological fields, with leaders and innovators such as Marie Skłodowska-Curie and Lise Meitner, among many others, establishing the foundation of modern nuclear science and technology. 
 
However, reports like The Persistence of Gender Gaps in Education and Skills still show the lack of girls in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) careers. It also highlights the importance of enhancing the educational pipeline to attract, retain and maintain more women in the sectors. 
 
Join us on International Women in Engineering Day, where the OECD Directorate for Education and Skills and the Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) will host an expert panel to look at the latest education initiatives contributing towards attracting more women in STEM and asking the question, “Are policymakers doing enough? 
 
Speakers include:  
– Marta Encinas-Martin, Senior Advisor Global Relations and OECD Education Gender Ambassador 
– Fiona Rayment, Chief Science and Technology Officer, National Nuclear Laboratory (United Kingdom) 
– Tatiana Ivanova, Head of Division, Nuclear Science and Education, Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) 
 Moderated by William D. Magwood, IV, Director-General, OECD Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) 

The June 23, 2023 OECD Education and Skills Today webinar registration page can be found here. For anyone not inclined to participate in a webinar at 3:30 am, the OECD does make them available afterwards. You can find out more about upcoming and previous webinars here on this OECD Education and Skills Today webpage. I clicked on a few of the previous webinars and they seem to run for approximately one hour.

The report mentioned in the press release, “Gender, Education and Skills; The Persistence of Gender Gaps in Education and Skills” can be found here. Reading the HTML version online is free but getting a copy will cost you money. (The report was published on March 2, 2023.)

The OECD’s “Recommendation of the Council on Improving the Gender Balance in the Nuclear Sector” can be found here. After the recommendation was adopted on June 7, 2023, the OECD-Nuclear Energy Agency issued a June 8, 2023 press release about the new policy,

…

The 38 countries that are members of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) have agreed upon a new, focused approach to improve the gender balance in the nuclear sector. They call on national authorities and the industry to take action to increase the representation of women in the sector and enhance their contributions –especially in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) roles and leadership positions.

Currently, women make up just 20% of the nuclear science and engineering workforce in NEA [Nuclear Energy Agency] member countries and represent a very small fraction of upper management. They often experience hostility in their nuclear workplaces and negative career impacts due to pregnancy and family responsibilities. This absence of diversity and barriers to women’s full participation in the sector represents a loss of potential innovation and growth and a critical threat to the viability of the field.

William D. Magwood, IV, NEA Director-General, said:

“The persistent gender gap in the nuclear sector impacts the future viability of nuclear energy around the world. The NEA made it a priority to move beyond simply discussing the issue and to work with its member countries to develop a focused and specific policy framework to make a real difference to improve the gender balance in the nuclear sector. We expect to see that a broad range of organisations stand ready to work with governments to implement these policy recommendations.”

Governments are highly influential in the nuclear sector due to their extensive involvement in nuclear technology activities. The recommendations agreed by OECD countries will help attract more women to nuclear science and technology careers and remove barriers to their advancement in nuclear organisations.

NEA analyses highlight that total nuclear energy production needs to triple by 2050 for governments around the world to achieve net zero emissions. To achieve this, the nuclear sector must grow and diversify its workforce, but this will be extremely difficult unless it attracts more women.

The OECD Recommendation follows the recent NEA report Gender Balance in the Nuclear Sector which included the first publicly available international data on the topic.

Dr Fiona Rayment OBE, Chief Science and Technology Officer of the United Kingdom National Nuclear Laboratory and who chaired the NEA Task Group that oversaw the work, said:

“Nuclear power is primed to enable our energy security and net zero commitments to be realised, however, this requires recruitment and retention of a highly diverse workforce. As such, I am absolutely delighted to see the policy instrument on gender balance has been adopted by the OECD. This builds on the hard work and dedication of the NEA Gender Balance Task Group members, which will have a real impact on improving wider diversity ambitions across the nuclear sector internationally as we look ahead to the future.”

Plus they included this video,

Moving on …

More for International Women in Engineering Day 2023

The big deal is here at the international Women in Engineering Day website. Here’s more from their About page,

International Women in Engineering Day [INWED], brought to you by Women’s Engineering Society (WES) will celebrate its 10th year in 2023 and we’ll once again be promoting the amazing work that women engineers across the globe are doing. This year’s theme is #MakeSafetySeen. INWED gives women engineers around the world a profile when they are still hugely under-represented, with 2021 figures indicating that in the UK only 16.5% of engineers are women. As the only platform of its kind, it plays a vital role in encouraging more young women and girls to take up engineering careers.

You can find a listing of the 2023 INWED events from around the world here. It’s impressive. Sadly, I have to note that Canadian organizations do not seem to be participating this year.

I looked at a few local (to me) organizations, the Westcoast Women in Engineering, Science and Technology (WWEST) and Society for Women in Canadian Science and Technology (SCWIST) and, while both have active STEM programmes, found no mention of INWED 2023.