Youth Ambassador Ciara: Being a Woman in STEM

Interested in STEM careers? Hear from volunteer Youth Ambassador Ciara about working in STEM!

About my role

I am training to be a Technical Author who specialises in Control and Instrumentation. Control and Instrumentation (C&I) is a branch of engineering that specialises in processes that include pressure, temperature, humidity, flow, pH, force and speed. Technical Authors are the specialists who generate written instructions on how to perform all kinds of technical tasks in a safe and controlled way.

3 ways I got ahead in my STEM career journey

1. I built up my soft skills such as public speaking and communication.
2. Pushing to myself to share my opinions and ideas.
3. Developing my passion for STEM by speaking at recruitment events and volunteering for Youth Employment UK.

3 challenges I faced / wish I’d known about STEM that I had to navigate / overcome

1. The amount of self-doubt that I experience. It took a while for me to realise that STEM can be tough for everyone and that it was important to talk about how I was feeling.
2. The ability to stop making assumptions about myself based on my gender.
3. The pressure of me feeling like I needed to prove myself (based on working with predominantly men) when I never ran into such a problem.

3 reasons why I’m glad I’m doing the STEM work I do

1. There are many different connections between the different STEM subjects so there are always opportunities to learn new things.
2. I get to meet lots of different people who have different roles and interests.
3. As an industry, STEM is always developing new ideas so it’s a really exciting sector to be in.

1 thing I’d say to other young women wondering if a STEM career is right for them

Don’t think that your choices of going into STEM are limited because of the subjects you studied in school; you never know where they’ll come in useful.

Don’t let anyone make you think that you can’t pursue a career in STEM. Push yourself and go for it!