At the recent SSSC (Survey and Spatial Science Conference) in Wellington, I attended a Women in Spatial breakfast. Unfortunately most of the speakers (barring the guest speaker Cecila Wade - the major of Wellington) were men. Does this mean that all the 'leading' voices for women aren't women? Are we really so underdeveloped a sector within the Spatial Science arena?
Personally, I doubt this very much - but at the moment, I'm lacking evidence of women who are willing to put themselves forward and reach out to other women to encourage them to pursue Spatial Science careers. Can it really be so simple as to say girls aren't encouraged to do sciences as suggested by one of the male speakers at the panel discussion at the end of the conference? I don't see this in my undergraduate classes where students are pretty evenly mixed. However, when you get to postgrad the mix changes dramatically. Food for thought.
If you're in Wellington or New Zealand and would like to get involved with the New Zealand branch of Women in Spatial - please check out their linkedin page.
