HAVING limited exposure to female leaders in her role as a WA police officer prompted Julz Carter to create an event to expose female WA College of Agriculture (WACOA) Denmark and Denmark Senior High School students to women in leadership roles.
Held on International Women's Day last week at WACOA Denmark, Ms Carter organised for Denmark Shire president Ceinwen Gearon, Denmark Chamber of Commerce chief executive officer Sumer Addy and Elders sales representative Hannah Gaffney to present a short presentation and have an informal chat with year 10 and 12 female students and guests.
Using an International Women's Day toolkit put together by the Department of Communities and shared with the WA Police Force (WAPF) to help plan the event, Ms Carter said the day's theme 'Women in Leadership: Achieving an equal future in a COVID-19 world' had struck a chord with her.
"As I progress in my career with the WAPF, while the numbers of women in leadership are increasing, the majority of leaders within the agency are men, so finding my exposure to female leaders has been limited," Ms Carter said.
"I wanted to create an event that would expose young women to women in leadership roles to provide inspiration and motivation to seek out leadership opportunities as they begin their careers."
Identifying that there are typically less opportunities for young girls living regionally to witness, meet and speak with women in leadership roles, the women Ms Carter chose to speak at the event all had valuable information to share about their experiences, as leaders in their respective industries.
While Ms Gearon and Ms Addy spoke about their roles as leaders within local government and the local business community, Ms Gaffney described how she overcame challenges working within a typically male dominated industry.
Year 12 WACOA Denmark students Jacana Vincent and Hayley Albury said they found Ms Gaffney's experiences particularly valuable as they were relevant to their chosen career path in the agricultural sector.
"It was very courageous for Hannah to talk about her personal struggles she faced and how that didn't stop her from working hard to get to where she is today," Ms Albury said.
Both Ms Vincent and Ms Albury plan to specialise in cattle production once they graduate and said they had positive female role models all around them.
"The inspiring women in our life are the many women who teach us valuable lessons every day; our mothers, teachers, friends and even ourselves," Ms Vincent said.
Ms Carter said the feedback from students about the event had been overwhelmingly positive.
