MORE than 150 school pupils from across Wiltshire were left inspired after attending an event to encourage more women to take up engineering as a career.

Hosted by Wiltshire College, the Women in Engineering event saw professionals from the industry give talks and demonstrations to youngsters.

This included the Army, Royal Air Force, Bristol, Bournemouth and Southampton universities, Siemens, M J Church, BAE systems, Hochtief, Zircon Software, CH2m, Network Rail and Rolls Royce.

Principal of Wiltshire College, Amanda Burnside, said: “The College was pleased to take the lead on this great event.

“We do need to make young people aware of the incredible careers in engineering open to young people in Wiltshire and in the UK and currently, just too few females go into engineering.

“Our new campus at Chippenham, where we have a large number of engineering courses and industry standard facilities, was the perfect venue for the day.”

The event, which was held last Friday (February 24) it is hoped will inspire female students to consider a career in engineering and raise awareness on the wide range of careers within the industry and the region.

Science teacher Dr Fiona Aicken from Sheldon School, who sent 25 Year 9 students, said: “All of our students had a great time and enjoyed the interactivities which they found a lot of fun.

“I know the students particularly enjoyed the virtual reality activity that the college hosted.

“I asked the students afterwards if any of them would consider a career in engineering following the event and around 25 per cent said they would.”