I was delighted to learn that my 2006 student delegation fellows Prudence Mutowo and Pardis Sabeti have been selected as “Rising Talents” for the 2007 Women’s Forum (see also these previous posts for more on the 07 RTs).

It is no surprise, though, as these 2 friendly young women are real brains and committed scientists in their countries: The American Pardis Sabeti is an Assistant Professor at Harvard in Systems Biology and Organismal and Evolutionary Biology, after shooting-star studies at MIT, Oxford University and at Harvard Medical School. Prudence Mutowo, from Zimbabwe, works as a doctoral researcher on micro-organism archea at the University of Nottingham.

Prudence and Pardis both received the 2006 “L’Oréal For Women Science Fellowship”, an L’Oréal-UNESCO award, given to young female scientists.

Catching up with Pardis, I was wondering why there were so few women involved in sciences. “We need a better science education, and more role models in sciences”, she says, and this is one of the key aspect of her job as an Assistant Professor: teaching scientists and teachers-to-be how to communicate about science. “Children should also be given the chance to see the people behind a project.” Project Runway, a reality show showing designers realizing their project, could be a good source of inspiration for something similar in sciences.

Nevertheless, she shows a great enthusiasm in attending the Women’s Forum for the second time, this time as part of the Rising Talents delegation. “It’s a great network, and there was a good balance between all generations coming together, and meetings for the Rising Talents Group, where we could discuss the issues applying to our stage of career.”

Posted by Gersende - October 15, 2007
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