Celebrating women in engineering
With schools such as Young Women’s STEAM Academy at Balch Springs and Solar Preparatory School for Girls, which offers STEAM education, Dallas ISD is promoting numerous opportunities for young women to seek careers in engineering.
Part of the intention of International Women’s Day in Engineering, which is on June 23, is to encourage girls to go into the engineering field in order to help fill the demand as job opportunities in this area continue to grow.
The global celebration of women engineers began in the U.K. in 2014 and has grown internationally each year to encourage government, education, corporate and other entities to join together to bring awareness to the need of women in the engineering field.
Although still underrepresented, the number of women in engineering grew significantly from 1970 to 2020, according to data from the U.S. Department of Labor. The number of women engineers grew from 3% to 15% and all STEM fields in general saw an increase from 7% to 24%.
Dallas ISD’s STEM and STEAM schools help foster a love of science, technology, math and the arts in young people who enjoy finding solutions to real-world problems and challenges.
Dallas ISD is also home to the largest STEM EXPO in Texas, where students explore, design, and create real-world STEM activities. The Dallas ISD STEM EXPO has over 100 hands-on exhibits and serves as the culmination event for district championships: Science & Engineering Fair, VEX, and First Robotics Competitions, Mathematics Video Game Challenge, Mathematics Bridge Building Competition, Health and Wellness Awareness, and the Tech Fest Digital Media Fair Competition.
Opportunities available to study engineering at Dallas ISD include campuses such as Dallas Environmental Science Academy (DESA), School of Science and Engineering at Yvonne A. Ewell Townview Center, J.P. Starks Math, Science, and Technology Vanguard and Science Academy, career and technical education programs in high schools, career institutes, P-TECH programs and NAF Academies in high schools.
Here are a few ways you can do your part to celebrate and bring awareness to women in engineering.
- Celebrate a women engineer that you know
- Learn more about STEAM and STEM opportunities available at Dallas ISD
- Invite women engineers to speak to students and team members about different opportunities in engineering
For more information about STEM and STEAM programs available through Dallas ISD, visit their respective department pages.