Woman in Science: Building an Inclusive Community

As a child, I aspired to be a doctor, just like my parents. I was interested to learn everything related to medicine. As I studied Biology in my SSC with AKU-EB, some of the components of the syllabus, especially the application level Student Learning Outcomes (SLOs) pushed me to read beyond the information in the academic books. I questioned and researched about technology in medicine, bio-engineering and innovation in healthcare practices and so on. These SLOs pushed me to redefine what I liked and what I was good at. I have realized that the power of design and innovation in technology is fundamental to sustaining life and environment and we have seen it changing the landscape throughout the world. This is one of the reasons I chose to pursue Electrical Engineering, something more generic than becoming a doctor. Today, as a young woman engineer and entrepreneur, I can step into multiple fields to make an impact through my innovation in the field.

Women constitute almost half of the total population in Pakistan and have remained under-represented in most disciplines of science and technology. As a girl, especially a girl in Pakistan, it is not conventional to be a part of science and you have to fight this thought almost every single day. I learned that when you choose to ignore the equity for women, you become accountable for allowing it to continue. At the same time, it is encouraging to see that many organizations, especially academic institutions strive to maintain diversity in their teams with girls and women getting more preference at times. Similarly, a lot of events I attend, including workshops, trainings and competitions are especially geared towards women. While I believe that gender does not have a role in the choice of career, this is definitely the best time for girls to choose science as a field and leverage the opportunities designed specifically for women in STEM fields. My profession as an engineer and entrepreneur is attached to my passion for serving a cause ignored by most in our society –to create an inclusive society for the deaf community. Along with two other friends of mine who are also the AKU-EB graduates, we found ConnectHear, an organization directed towards bridging the communication gap between the deaf community and the society at large using sign language interpretation services. The aim is to integrate the deaf into an inclusive society, to give them the independence through frictionless communication. It has been a successful project and will expand beyond Pakistan. Currently, Areej is a fourth year undergraduate student at Habib University in Karachi. She was a fellow of the US State Department Exchange Programme 2016 where she completed a semester at Harvard University studying Product Design and Entrepreneurship. In her third year at Habib University, she went to Stanford University in the United States for her study abroad programme and studied Technology Entrepreneurship and Additive Manufacturing. Areej was an AKU-EB High Achiever 2016, HSSC national position holder in pre-engineering.