A CU-WISE Primer

Welcome to all new and returning students and other supporters of Carleton's Women in Science and Engineering! This post is all about orienting you to what CU-WISE is all about. Whether you are just starting to get involved or have been around for a while, you will find something new.

What CU-WISE Is

As our website says, "Carleton University Women in Science and Engineering (CU-WISE) is a group of enthusiastic undergraduate and graduate students who encourage and support women to pursue an education or career in Science and Engineering."

We're a support network that helps ensure women who decide to come to Carleton to study science or engineering feel comfortable and know they can succeed. Many of our activities are centred on this goal. We also want to encourage younger girls to give science and engineering fair consideration, as seen through our participation in many outreach programs. We also exist because, sometimes, it's just nice to hang out with the girls. ;)

Executives and Officers

Executives and Officers work together to organize all the activities CU-WISE is involved in, from social gatherings to guest speakers to conference participation to mentoring to ... well, you get the point. ;) Executives are a smaller core team that are the last line of defence - they aren't more important than Officers, but are able to dedicate more time to CU-WISE.

If you're interested in joining the team, find out how to apply on our website.

Mailing List

If you haven't added your email to the mailing list yet, be sure to join now. Although all of our events will be posted online as well, there are many outside events and opportunities that we only include on the list. You don't want to miss some of the amazing things going on around town and at Carleton.

Website

The CU-WISE website is the hub of all our activity. You can join our mailing list, check out our upcoming and past events, learn about various awesome opportunities (like scholarships and conferences), and sign up to be a mentor or find a mentor. A bunch of our documents are available for download, and you can peek at our latest blog posts. Basically, if you aren't sure where to look, check here first.

Facebook, Twitter, Flickr

If you're on Facebook, you can become a fan of our CU-WISE page. Not everything on the mailing list ends up here so you'll still want to join that, but we do post interesting stories that don't appear on the newsletter.

If you aren't into Facebook, you can follow us on Twitter instead. Most of the content is the same, but we may soon have some dedicated Twitterers who will make things even more interesting.

If you want to see photos from CU-WISE events, check out our Flickr group. Even better, you are more than welcome to join it yourself. We encourage you to add your own photos to the group pool for all to enjoy!

Mentoring

Brand new this year is our formal mentoring program. If you'd like to mentor someone or find a mentor yourself, sign up today. This program will only work if you participate. We also want to make sure your mentoring relationship succeeds, and will provide you with all the resources you need. We are even working on hosting at least one social event per semester where mentors and mentees can get together in person and network with others in the program.

Please note that you can be a mentor even if you are still a student. For example, you might be a grad student who'd like to mentor an undergrad considering continuing her education.

Questions? Comments?

If you have any ideas on how CU-WISE should be run or want to suggest events or other activities, you can always email us, or just leave a comment to this post. Hope to see you at our Kick-Off Meet and Greet!