• Question: Dose being a female give you an advantage, disadvantage or both in your daily life ?

    Asked by KieranHesketh to Stacey, Gosha on 10 Mar 2015.
    • Photo: Stacey Cutten

      Stacey Cutten answered on 10 Mar 2015:

      Obviously it’s a very largely talked about subject – women in engineering – so yes, it is a great time to be a woman in my position. There’s only 2 girls on my apprenticeship inluding myself, and there’s 18 of us! I am also the only female on my site.

      If I’m honest, I expected to be treated slightly differently, but I haven’t been! Everyone is so polite and respectful of my presence, and a lot of the men show an interest in what I’m doing. Sometimes there’s the odd joke, but you just have to learn to let it go in one ear and out the other!

      The main advantage it has brought is being a spokesperson for apprenticeships, teachers are looking for young women like Gosha and myself to promote both apprenticeships and getting girls into engineering, and I’m honoured to be doing so!

    • Photo: Gosha Barzowska

      Gosha Barzowska answered on 10 Mar 2015:

      Hi Kieran! Cheers for keeping me busy during the live chat:)
      It is very good question and it is a good timing too because there was an international womens day last weekend!
      I think it is a bit of both. It gives an advantage when it comes to supporting events and doing promotional activities for the company as there are not many girls in Engineering at the moment. For example I am the only girl out of 50 apprentices at Airbus in Bristol. So it helps with making yourself stand out from the croud haha! sometimes is good sometimes is bad as it makes you feel like some kind of ‘celebrity’.
      Other than that I have not experiance being discriminated or advantaged becuase I am a girl! It’s also about self believe – if you know you can, then other will think the same!

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