Rapporteur - Hiromi Matsui

Current position: Director, Diversity and Recruitment, Faculty of Applied Sciences, SFU Co-Chair, Working Committee, WinSET (Women in Science, Engineering, Trades and Technology)
CCWESTChair, Sustainability Committee, APEGBC

The Women in Science and Engineering panel will review the education and career paths of gradate students and faculty in science and engineering. Some of these careers involve coping with family responsibilities while working or studying full-time. Our panel represents women from different cultural backgrounds and different career experiences.

Dr. Leah Bendell-Young

Dr. Leah Bendell-Young holds a Ph.D. (1990) in zoology and geochemistry and a B.Sc. in zoology and chemistry, both from the University of Toronto.    She accepted her appointment (Natural Science and Engineering Research Council (NSERC)-University Research Fellowship) in Biological Sciences at Simon Fraser University in July 1993.   She is a member of The Center for Coastal Studies (Continuing Studies, SFU) and co-investigator of the Oceans Management Research Network. She has served as chair of the undergraduate Environmental Science Steering Committee,   (1998-2000) and has developed and taught courses related to Environmental Science including Environmental Toxicology and Ecotoxoicology for 10 years.   She has written over 80 articles focused on determining the impact of anthropogenic activities on ecosystem structure and function. She is a recent co-editor (with Dr. P. Gallaugher) of the book " Waters in Peril " Kluwer Academic publishing, which serves to highlight the current state of our oceans.   She is currently principle investigator of a major five-year Natural Science and Engineering Research Council Strategic Grant entitled " Towards a sustainable shellfish industry " whose focus is on the development of practices that will allow the development of an environmentally benign sustainable shellfish industry. She in collaboration with DFO and MAFF, is also funded by Environment Canada and the Provincial government to determine sources of cadmium to oysters along the west coast of B.C., Canada.

Dr. Bendell-Young   is currently a Professor in the Dept. of Biological Sciences at SFU.

Issues facing women in academia

I think that for my presentation, I will speak to how, in the face of overwhelming odds, if you simply believe in yourself, tremendous gains can be made.

Meera Nair Patterson

Students arrive at university, brimming with excitement, focused on their future hopes and dreams. Too often, excitement gives way to anxiety, and then to despair, as the reality of university studies set in. The challenge
of adjusting to university curriculum can overwhelm these students‚ ambitions. Feeling isolated, they withdraw from science and abandon their previous hopes and dreams.

While a university is an excellent environment to find out what one's dreams really are, it is saddening to see bright young women give up, because they feel incapable, and lack the confidence to keep trying. Maintaining and regaining one's confidence is an uphill battle, particularly, when one struggles in isolation. Such isolation is not necessarily confined to academic environment. Now in its twelfth year, my small business cut its teeth in the area of technology transfer between academia and industry. While this is becoming more common today, twelve years ago, technology transfer and small business were unusual ideas and isolated entities.

In my discussion I hope to focus on the issue of isolation, and promote some discussion as to how it can be tempered.

Alma Barranco-Mendoza

In my presentation, I am going to be addressing the issues of women working in the software industry, in particular the challenges faced by women in management roles and those handling career and family.

Alma Barranco-Mendoza has been working in the software development industry for over 15 years, both in Canada and Mexico. She was the Manager of Product Development and Research at Knowledge Junction Systems, where she developed intelligent configuration and sales software for the telecommunications industry, and currently is the CEO and co-founder of Infogenetica Bioinformatics, a consulting company that provides professional services and development of intelligent software solutions and technical processes for industries in the life sciences. For several years she contributed articles regularly for a column on cyber-culture and new technologies in La Jornada, one of Mexico's best selling daily newspapers. Mother of twins, she is currently a Ph.D. Candidate in the School of Computing Sciences at Simon
Fraser University and holds a B.Sc.Hons. in Mathematics/Computer Sc. and a M.Sc. in Applications of Modelling in the Natural and Social Sciences both from Trent University. She has recently been appointed first female faculty member of the Department of Computing Science, starting this Fall, at Trinity Western University, in Langley, BC.

Dr. Atousa HajShirMohammadi

Atousa received her B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Isfahan University of Technology, Iran, in 1991 and 1993, respectively. From 1995 to 2000 she was a Research and Teaching Assistant at the University of Waterloo, Ont., where she completed her Ph.D. degree in Communications Engineering. In 2000 she was an Assistant Professor at the School of Engineering Science, Simon Fraser University. Later she joined the industry in Silicon Valley where she worked for LSI Logic Corp. for three years. In 2004 she joined back SFU, where she is currently a lecturer at the School of Engineering Science.

In my presentation I would like to share my experiences in the academic and industrial world, both as a woman and as an emigrant to North America from a different culture and language.