Elizabeth Croft

Elizabeth Croft’s career as a mechanical engineer specializing in robotics has always involved dedicating time and energy to encouraging other women to pursue careers in engineering.

“I have found engineering an exciting and rewarding career, and I am passionate about sharing these opportunities with bright young people who may not have considered engineering as an option, especially young women,” said Professor Croft. “Most of the challenges facing society require engineering solutions, and women are attracted to solving these problems. Engineering is a wonderful opportunity to make a real difference in society.”

When the NSERC Chair for Women in Science and Engineering for BC and Yukon became available, Croft’s application to build on the work she was doing had the full support of the UBC Faculty of Applied Science, and a matching industry partner was approached and fully supportive.

But with the market crash and other circumstances, the industry partner could only partially support the chair and Croft’s application was approved on the condition of raising the rest of the matching funds.

So Croft started knocking on the doors of industry contacts. “My pitch was about developing their future employee pool. The NSERC Chair is about attracting diverse and dynamic future leaders to engineering and science careers,” said Croft. “This is important to engineering firms because their capital is people, and developing women is just good business. Smart women bring diverse points of view to the engineering discipline.”

Her pitch resonated well – she raised the matching funds from 13 different sponsors and raised a whole lot of awareness at engineering firms along the way. “I think it turned out far better in the end,” said Croft.