Celebrating IWD 2020 - Each for Equal

“There is much symbolism in celebrating International Women’s Day (IWD). IWD features the colours purple and green. Purple signifies justice, dignity and self-respect. Green symbolises hope and new life.In honour of IWD, I wore green shoes and a purple dress. Perhaps most symbolic, the dress I chose to wear has pockets. Real pockets. Functional pockets. Not fake fashion pockets. Real pockets on women’s clothing symbolize freedom. Power. Equality. To me, that is what IWD is all about #EachForEqual,” said DVC (R&I) Professor Martin AC.

After a general overview by the executive, UOW Impact Maker Dr Belinda Gibbons (Faculty of Business) who has recently been appointed as the Expert in Residence at iAccelerate, spoke of her professional career and her path to academia.

“I left school when I was 16 – much to my mother’s horror! I was a straight A student. I followed all the rules but I found myself at the end of Year 10 staring at a list of subjects in a system that had it all wrong. I didn’t like what the next 2 years of my life looked like and I always listen to my heart – it speaks very loudly.

“So I took an office internship with a large retirement village on the south coast. This was in 1988, the year that IBM released the desktop computer and transformed the office working environment. Given I was the youngest person in the retirement home, I was given full reign to incorporate computers into the practices and procedures of the office. I got to work with the networking technicians, with the software programmers and I just fell in love with the difference that this technology made to people’s lives and how it connected us like never before. I knew I had found my passion,” said Dr Gibbons. 

Fortunately for UOW, Dr Gibbons did return to academia with many years of business knowledge and a deep understanding of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDGs), which she has tirelessly worked to embed into university processes (in teaching, research and reporting). She is now a Senior Lecturer with the Faculty of Business, collaborating with UOW’s iAccelerate as an Expert-in-Residence working with start-up businesses who are learning how to incorporate the UN SDG goals in their own practices and on the Global Challenges Executive for 2020 as the ECR representative.

Gender Equity Conference Sponsorship

Recipients of the Gender Equity Conference Sponsorship program (A/Professors Danielle Skropeta and Aaron Oakley), shared how they will be using their funding to ensure equity of voice and equity of participation at UOW-badged conferences in the STEMM fields. An initiative of the UOW SAGE/Athena SWAN Implementation committee (or SASI) the conference sponsorship is designed to be flexible and meet the needs of the conference organising committee in addressing their gender equity goals.

Crystal33, the 33rd conference of the Society of Crystallographers in Australia and New Zealand (SCANZ), is being held at UOW 14-17 April 2020.
“The conference sponsorship for Crystal33 is being used to support keynote speaker Professor Valeska Ting (University of Bristol) and dedicated childcare for conference attendees,” said A/Prof. Oakley.

While A/Prof. Skropeta is co-chairing the Royal Australian Chemical Institute (RACI) Organic and Medicinal Chemistry Conference (OMC2020) at UOW in July, where families are most welcome to attend.
“A decade ago, chemistry conferences world-wide were heavily male-dominated, at times comprising exclusively male speaker line-ups. Inspired by Jenny Martin’s “10 simple rules to achieve speaker gender balance”, at the combined Organic & Medicinal Chemistry (OMC2020) to be held at UOW this July, we are aiming for at least 40% female speakers (plenary, keynote, invited and contributed), session chairs and committee members, and are well on track to achieve this goal.

“We will hear about Indigenous science, have a panel speaking about diversity issues and a women in chemistry leadership award lecture. Yes – it has taken a little more effort than inviting along the “usual suspects” but the payback is a rich, vibrant and diverse conference that draws from the full scientific community. The grant will be used to offer childcare subsidies to participants with dependent children, with priority given to female students, postdocs and ECRs,” said A/Prof. Skropeta.  

New Associate Deans (Equity Diversity and Inclusion) for UOW

Prof. Jennifer Martin AC closed the event with the announcement of newly created Executive positions at UOW - Associate Deans for Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (AD EDI), for each faculty to be appointed by July 1, 2020.

The formally announced AD EDI academics are Professor Jun Chen (AIIM), Professor Gordon Waitt (SOC), and Doctor Mark Freeman (EIS).  Other faculties, SMAH, LHA and BUS, will be announcing their appointments shortly.