Toulouse: the Ecole Nationale Supérieure introduced engineering professions by targeting high school girls from rural areas
The INP-ENSEEIHT national higher education school organized an awareness-raising trip to engineering professions, on June 9 and 10, for around a hundred middle and high school girls from Occitania.
Engineering schools seek to train students from all over the world and especially women engineers, of whom there are only 22% in France.
This is the bet of the operation called “Women7”, piloted by the National School of Electrical Engineering, Electronics, Computer Science, Hydraulics and Telecommunications (INP-ENSEEIHT), which organized, during two days (June 9 and 10), “an event dedicated to raising awareness of training and engineering professions for girls from rural areas”.
The challenge is easy as the government struggles to put back 1h30 of mathematics in high school. But the appeal launched to the colleges and high schools of Occitanie worked, since a hundred high school girls responded. Some, like Chloé, a second-year student at Decazeville (12), have changed their point of view on the engineering profession.
“A fuzzy idea of the engineering profession”
“I had a very vague idea of this profession and that helped me a lot to see things clearly,” she says. Clémence, also in second, admits to being satisfied to have been able to exchange with “pros”.
“Casing nothing, she says, the teachers know a lot of things, but they have trouble talking about certain professions. The stay in Toulouse on the premises of the school, located rue Charles Camichel, ended this Friday with a visit to the Cité de l’Espace which offers another facet of the engineering profession.
The contribution of Thomas Pesquet
To top it off, star astronaut Thomas Pesquet split a short video answering questions from high school girls participating in Women7.
At the origin of the event, Jennifer Mattalia, from the ENSSEIHT’s communication and business relations department, and her colleague Clément Lévi who are wondering about “how to motivate high school girls from rural areas or from priority areas to pursue studies scientific ? »
“There is still too much self-censorship on the part of young girls in these professions,” says Jennifer Mattalia. “But we are here to show them that it is possible”, sums up the school director Hélène Tap.