The halls of Cambrian College were recently buzzing with more than 75 young women from Grades 9-12 who were on campus to learn more about the opportunities in the technology industry.
Cambrian hosted the Sofvie Inc. Women in Technology event. Sofvie is a Sudbury-based technology company specializing in health and safety software for the workplace.
“This was a great day and fantastic chance to promote tech-related roles and jobs that we’d love to see more women pursue,” said Pamela Teed, chair of Cambrian’s School of Information Technology. “We really want to promote diversity in the industry. Hopefully, this week’s event inspired some of these young women to see tech as a viable option for their post-secondary education and future careers.”
Students from the Rainbow District School Board and the Sudbury Catholic District School Board took part in three eye-opening activities that stretched across a full day:
- Smart Tech: Intro to the Internet of Things — Students explored IoT programming via Arduinos, simple sensors, and actuators.
- Packet Post Office and Code Quest — Students discovered how computers communicate using IP addresses, MAC addresses, port numbers, and encapsulation by drawing parallels to the process of sending and receiving mail through a post office. The session also included a hidden message game that challenged players to decode secret messages using binary conversion.
- Press Start to Begin: What goes into video games? — Students got a first-hand look at what goes into making video games: what are the skills, tools, and ideas that bring your favourite titles to life.
"The future of the tech industry relies on smart minds who are focused on creating, innovating and changing the world around them," said Gus Minor, Sofvie's Chief Innovation Officer. "Initiatives like this inspire action and ignite passion by showcasing tremendous opportunities in technology. We were pleased to partner with Cambrian College and are already looking forward to next year's event."
