Girls and non-binary youth explore the engineering field at Conestoga College’s GO ENG Girl

Middle school and high school students will learn about the possibilities of technology Saturday during the Go ENG Girl event at Conestoga College.

Conestoga College and its School of Engineering & Technology in Cambridge invited girls and non-binary students in grades seven through 10 to learn and interact through various engineering activities. The event is sponsored by the Ontario Network of Women in Engineering (ONWIE). The goal is part of a provincial initiative to encourage more women and non-binary individuals to pursue careers in tech.

The students went through various hands-on stations and learned first-hand about the different technical sectors. They also come into contact with female technical professionals, graduates and students.

Participants could also listen in and ask questions to a panel.

Fourth-year engineering student Zoe Talbot was one of the panelists and had also come to Go ENG Girl as a teenager.

“In high school I didn’t really know what I wanted to do. So my dad said to me, ‘Hey, Zoe, there’s a Go ENG Girl event at Conestoga College,'” Talbot said.

Talbot attended in 2018 and said she found it interesting and decided to study Mechanical Systems Engineering at Conestoga College.

“There’s so much you can do in high school. When you go to events like this, it’s really nice to be able to see it in a broader perspective,” Talbot said.