Celebrating Women in Engineering 
The woman who advises Jenson Button on how to get the best performance from his McLaren Formula One car is one of a number of female engineers to be featured in an exhibition celebrating Women in Engineering Day at Queen’s.
Bernadette Collins from Enniskillen graduated from Queen’s in 2009 and is now a Performance Engineer with McLaren Formula One racing team. She will feature in a poster exhibition highlighting Queen’s female staff and graduates who are making their mark on engineering in Northern Ireland and around the world.
Other women featured include lecturer Dr Danielle Soban, whose life-long love of planes led her to a career in aircraft design and a passion for mentoring young women in aerospace. Among other graduates are Marie Butterfield, whose Queen’s degree opened the door to a career spanning four global industries and the opportunity to travel the world, and Wendy Patton, who advises on the safe disposal of nuclear waste.
Women of all ages are invited to come along to the free exhibition which will also feature demonstrations of the University’s flight simulator and the Queen’s Formula Racing Car, designed and built by Mechanical Engineering students to compete in the Formula Racing competition at Silverstone.
Those interested in finding out more about engineering can also take part in a Twitter chat with Queen’s graduate Sinead O’Sullivan between 10.30am-9pm on Monday 23 June, using @SineadOS1 and #MAEwomen or follow the conversation at @MAEQUB. As a Queen’s student, Sinead completed a Space Studies Programme at the International Space University in Strasbourg and is now studying for a PhD at Georgia Tech in Atlanta, USA.
Lecturer Dr Beatrice Smyth, an expert in clean energy, spoke about why the University is playing its part in encouraging more women to choose engineering as a career. “Queen’s is one of the leading universities in the UK for supporting the career progression of women in science, engineering and technology. We want to show women, of all ages, that engineering is more than just big buildings and heavy metal.
“Engineering is at the core of understanding how things work. From the clean energies that will power the homes of tomorrow, to the small components that keep airplanes in flight, to designing supercars, a Mechanical or Aerospace Engineering degree from Queen’s can take you almost anywhere. Every student who graduated in 2012, having undertaken a placement year, secured a graduate level engineering job.”
Speaking about her own career choice, Dr Smyth continued: “In school I loved maths, but I didn’t want to narrow my options to just one subject, so I chose engineering because it is such a broad field of study with definite job prospects.”
The Women in Engineering exhibition will run from 10.30am to 5.00pm on 23-24 June in the Ashby Building foyer, Stranmillis Road, Belfast. Admission is free and all are welcome.
Visit Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering for more information on engineering courses at Queen’s.
Photo: (L-R) Wendy Boyd, School Manager; Lecturer Dr Beatrice Smyth; School SWAN Champion Denise Price, who promotes the advancement of women within the School; Professor Mark Price, Head of the School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering; Professor Fraser Buchanan; and PhD student Claudia Mullan.
Media inquiries to Michelle Cassidy at Queen’s University Communications Office on +44 (0)28 9097 5320/5310 or email comms.officer@qub.ac.uk
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