Women’s awareness on campus club (WAC) has been holding a speaker series where mothers of Campo students come and talk about their career journeys. Junior Nishta Mukundan’s mom, Harshini Mukundan, talked about her experience in the realm of STEM. Nishta stated how Harshini “talked about the way her career progressed overtime…from when she was young and when she immigrated here and then how her career changed,” said Nishta Mukundan.
Nishta shared how it is important for students to know what it is like being a woman in a male dominated workplace. She said, “hearing it from someone who experienced it first hand and went through the struggles is important and especially for girls and women it’s different in the workplace to fight for the right to get the same amount of pay.”
Co-president WAC, senior Giorgia Stankus said, “our first speaker [Mrs. Mukundan] originally said that she didn’t even want to go into STEM, but she took a test and based on how high achieving you [were] on the test, you had to go into the STEM path so I thought it was really interesting that she was kind of forced there, but then ended up really enjoying her time working in STEM.”
Vice President, junior Sydney Han talked about another speaker who presented on November 20th. Han said the speaker Monica Sood is, “an OBGYN and a maternal fetal medicine specialist so it was really interesting to just hear her talk about her experience becoming a doctor.”
Stankus expanded on this, “our most recent speaker basically talked about her path from being in a third world country to working in the healthcare industry. She talked about how she treats women and how many doctors it really requires for one woman to have a baby and she just talked about her experience working in healthcare.”
Along with this speaker series, WAC is looking into getting female products in the restrooms. Stankus said, “this year we’re continuing to put period products in the bathrooms and we’re trying to maybe get the janitors to do it for us so that it’s not like a student run thing, but we’re trying to make sure that it’s provided for everyone.”
Overall, Stankus, Han, and Mukundan stated WAC meetings have so far had a big turnout. With this being a feminist club on campus, the club leaders try to make the students feel like they can do anything, regardless of one’s gender. “I think one of the biggest things [and something] we have always done in the past, is having people come and talk. I think it’s important for highschool girls especially to see the options possible for them in the future,” said Han.
WAC wants to spread awareness about women’s rights in the workplace and the importance of how women can get jobs that may be male dominated. WAC is still trying to continue this speaker series during the second semester and get a wide variety of different presenters. They hold their meetings during lunch every other Wednesday in D8.
