The motto of the event was to inspire more women to join engineering education from the rural community.
To mark the International Women’s Day, IEEE Bangladesh Section and IEEE Women in Engineering Affinity Group of Bangladesh celebrated ‘International Women’s Day Celebration 2019’ at Asia Hotel and Resorts on 8th March. The theme of the event was “Balance for Better”.
Prof. Dr. Celia Shahnaz, Department of EEE, BUET, Chair of IEEE Bangladesh Section and founding Chair of Women in Engineering Affinity Group of Bangladesh at the outset of the event welcomed everyone warmly to grace the occasion by their valuable presence.
She has shared the enormous number of impactful activities of this group in 40 universities of Bangladesh, the journey and hard work of this group to become the best one in the world and the outstanding international achievements and recognition the group has achieved by working for the women in the local community of Bangladesh. She has requested everyone to work consistently towards retaining this glory.
Attending as chief guest of the event Prof. Dr. Dil Afroza Begum, Member, University Grants Commission of Bangladesh has focused on her lifelong contribution and effort in removing gender disparity in STEM education. Also she shed light the benefits everyone is now enjoying due to those struggle she fought and led to form women friendly policies.
Accomplished 44 professionals from more than 22 institutions were present at the event and highlighted their experiences and opinions about ensuring “Balance for Better” through technical contribution that will help progressing the women engineering community in Bangladesh.
Among the present female professionals, the notable were Achia Khaleda Nila, Founder and CEO, Women in digital,Afroza Akter, Lead Tech Evangelist at Mentor Nations, Tasneem Tariq, Assistant Professor, Department of Architecture, BUET,Tamanna Motahar, Advisor of NSU ACM-Women Chapter, Anika Yunus, Professor, department of Water Resource EngineeringBUET, faculty members from NSU, Nova Ahmed and Farah Deeba, Nashiyat Fyza, Development Manager, Information Centers on Nuclear Energy (ICONE).
Moreover, the presence and discussions of successful women engineers, undergraduate and graduate students and few male colleagues from Robi Axiata ltd., Grameenphone, Teach for Bangladesh, Bangladesh Power Development Board, Dhaka Power Distribution Company, Energypac Engineering ltd., Banglaphone, BUET, Dhaka University, North South University, Prime Asia University, University of Liberal Arts, Ahsanullah University of Science and Technology, University of Asia Pacific, East West University, Independent University of Bangladesh, United International University, Bangladesh University of Business and Technology, Institute of Science, technology and trade, Daffodil International University and BAUST made the event a grand success.
Anamika Bhakta, Vice President, Robi Axiata Ltd. and current chair of Women in Engineering Affinity Group of Bangladesh was the event moderator. The flow of the event was supported by two vice chairs of the group, Lamia Iftekhar, Raisa Fariba and Raihanur Rashid, the secretary of IEEE Bangladesh Section.
The different angles of life of an women engineer, the identified problems and their technological and realistic solutions have been well discussed that made the event interesting and enjoyable.
The event ended with a group photo and cake cutting as a part of celebration of International Women’s Day 2019. Everybody in the event opined that an event of such a standard and scale to help the women engineers who are already working to become more proactive to contribute in the development of the nation and to achieve international recognition.
