WOMEN AND ENGINEERING ARE COMPATIBLE

Last March, VIA 40 EXPRESS, the Colombian branch of Vinci-Highways organized a conference meant for high school students and student from universities, several female engineers talked about their jobs and personal experiences.

This conference and several activities were animated by several female employees, themselves engineers working for VIA 40 EXPRESS.

First, the students from the school of La Despensa de Soacha and seven other schools from Sibaté City interacted with the female engineers during a “speak-dating”. They could expose and detail their job and professional experiences.

François-Regis Le Miere, VIA 40 EXPRESS chief executive officer, explained these activities were the opportunity for the engineers to share their experiences with the young girls and to demonstrate that women have the same skills and competences as anyone else.

The schools and universities representative had the chance to exchange more casually with the female engineers.

Many of these women were very grateful and pleased to participate in such activity. According to Nidia Patricia Pedraza, Enviromental Supervisor of VIA 40 EXPRESS : “it is a message of conviction, of learning how to chose the career correctly, and there is nothing more beautiful than doing what you like while you work”. Sandra Viviana Nova, Environmental Supervisor of  the National Infrastructure Agency (ANI) highlighted that “it is very important to motivate the girls, but also to support the community”.

The rest of the day was dedicated to the visits of the asphalt plant to the partners and the female employee’s children, and the student of the different schools invited.

Yadira Alexandra Colmenares Martinez, studying in San Miguel School from Sibaté city has shared his excitement about this #GOM2019 action: “We should do this more often since they gave us information about some careers such as industrial and civil engineering. I think it’s a very good initiative.”

One of the teachers present that day, Jose Arlet Bermudez, from Pablo Neruda School, explained that is an event that is needed: “This activity besides being interesting has an impact on the Girls. When they see other fields and cases of success, it awakens in them the interest in studying engineering.”