Balance Workshop - Report

Wednesday 4th September 2002

Introduction
As the Balance Project enters its third and final year a number of implementations will be carried out in Higher Education Institutions across the country. It was with this in mind that the workshop was organised and run by the Balance Project Team to support those academics undertaking an implementation in their institution.

Session 1
The workshop was held at Loughborough University on Wednesday 4th September. The day began with a brief introduction to the Balance Project by the project Director, Lesley Davis. She discussed the aims and objectives of the balance Project, the work already completed and the remaining activities to be completed during the coming final year. Delegates were able to gain an insight into the work of the project and also to find out if there is any other activity that they would like to participate in or any information that might be useful to them.

Session 2
After the introduction the Balance Project Officers, Kerry Baker and Sarah Bamforth, led the second session with a discussion on the issues facing women in engineering under three distinct headings:

• Why it would be a good thing to have more women in engineering
• The barriers to women in engineering
• What can we do about it

In order to conduct this session in as interesting a way as possible Kerry Baker led the discussion while Sarah Bamforth recorded the information onto a piece of software titled 'Decision Explorer'. This software enabled the cognitive mapping process to be recorded - a form of brainstorm that has the potential to be analysed by the software on completion.

The delegates came up with a number of reasons for the benefits of having more women in engineering including diversity, change of stereotypes and providing a more female friendly working environment. The discussion regarding the barriers to women in engineering provided a lively insight into common and uncommon aspects while the discussion on 'what can we do about it' led to some very dramatic ideas being shared.

Further details of the information collected within each of the three discussion areas can be found in the PDF files that accompany this report.

At this point lunch was served and the delegates were able to talk freely amongst themselves about issues previously discussed as well as other aspects of women, engineering and women in engineering including course structure, accreditation and the Institutes.

Session 3
The first session after lunch was led by Lesley Davis and was based primarily on the use and description of a WES Group. Aspects under consideration included 'What is a WES Group', 'How to run a WES Group' and 'the Benefits of a WES Group'. What could be learned from this session is that the smaller pieces of advice that come from years of working with WES Groups can be extremely valuable to those just starting out and that these need to be communicated in some manner that is easily accessible and easy to understand.

Refreshments were served at this pint in the day and the team took this opportunity to hand out a copy of the WES Group Resource Pack for the delegates to look through prior to the next session. Informal discussions with delegates also brought to light a number of interesting initiatives and reports that would be suitable additions to the long list of initiatives on the balance website.

Session 4
The fourth and final session was concerned with the evaluation/feedback of the Resource Pack and the planning and running of the WES Group. This session was run by Lesley Davis and the Balance project Manager, Dr Adam Crawford. Delegates were asked for their thoughts on the pack with regards to its usability, aesthetics and information contained in it. They were also asked to indicate where they thought that more information could be added to assist them in their WES Group implementation.

From the comments made, it could be deduced that the resource packs were highly valuable and effective but could be improved with the addition of information on each of the types of activities that could be organised. The information required should include including timing, cost etc as well as some anecdotes from those that have tried them and how well they worked.

At the end of the session and after the summing up and final thoughts there was some discussion of a second meeting being arranged by the project to discuss the implementations when they are approximately half way through. The team is looking into the feasibility of this idea and its location.

The workshop came to an end shortly after 4.30pm and can be seen as a success for the Balance Project and helpful for the delegates who attended with regards to their WES Group implementations in the coming academic year.

The Balance Team would like to thank everyone who took time to attend the Workshop for their input. We hope the day was as useful for every attendee as it was for the Project.