We empower women and girls in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics)

We believe in inspiring girls to aspire to Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) careers by providing them with safe, supportive and fun environments to learn about STEM subjects, and surrounding them with positive female role models who are successful in STEM.

We organised a free one-week STEM Summer Camp for Girls from 29th April to 2nd May 2019, attended by thirty 6-13 year old girls from socio-economically disadvantaged urban squatter settlements in Suva.

The GWF STEM Camp for Girls Program

Our Goals

Through this program, our goal is to increase girls’ participation in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) studies as well as inspire them to aspire to STEM careers by providing a safe, supportive and fun environment to learn about STEM subjects and surrounded by positive female role models who are successful in STEM.

We want to start the conversation in order to break gender barriers, and transform stereotypical perceptions about girls’ interest and aptitudes in STEM.

We want to ignite that spark in girls, develop their interest and confidence through the camps, to let them know that they can. They can be whoever and whatever they want to be.

Empowering women in STEM

The other significant aspect about our program is the part where we also got the Nanogirl Labs team to train some local female professionals in the STEM fields as teachers for the Camps. The week prior to the first STEM Camp here in Suva, the Nanogirl Labs team facilitated a Train the Trainer program for five (5) women, some of whom are actually FNU Lecturers. Empowering girls and empowering women go hand in hand indeed, and by doing this we are also already ensuring the sustainability of the program.

Support and Endorsements

The GWF STEM Camp for Girls would not have been possible without the generous funding and support of the Fiji Women’s Fund (FWF), an initiative of the Australia Government’s Pacific Women Shaping Pacific Development Program that funds and provides capacity development support to women’s groups, networks, and organisations in Fiji to expand and enhance their work on women’s empowerment and gender equality.

The program was also endorsed by FNU, USP, The Ministry of Education and The Ministry of Women, Children and Poverty Alleviation. We are currently working on formalizing these endorsements via official partnerships and agreements, starting with FNU, and we thank the university with our deepest gratitude for their amazing support of GWF STEM Camp for Girls and Graduate Women (Fiji), as well as for their serious commitment in advancing women and girls in STEM.

Sisters in STEM

GWF is currently looking to secure more funding to have the same free four-day STEM Summer Camps (and possibly Coding Camps as well) in Nadi as well as in other less accessible urban and rural areas in Fiji. We want to make this program sustainable so that we can have these camps ongoing during school breaks for girls to attend around Fiji.

Having said all that, we would like to run multiple camps at a time by next year so we are looking for more trainers – we are putting out a call on our Facebook page and through our partners like FNU, USP and others, for female students in STEM fields who would like to become “Sisters in STEM”, to apply and become student trainers.

If you are a female student in Science, Technology, Engineering or Mathematics at university, and would like to become a camp trainer, apply to become a sister in STEM by emailing us at info@graduatewomenfiji.org.

Want to get involved with the GWF STEM Camp for Girls? Contact us if you would like to become a partner, a camp trainer or simply help us in this program.

“I was taught that the way of progress was neither swift nor easy.”

– Marie Curie
First woman to win a Nobel Prize, the only woman in history to ever win it twice, and the only human to ever win a Nobel Prize in two different sciences.

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