The Orbispace Initiative – Future Female Leadership Forum

On Thursday 26 June, 11 Year 8 students attended the Future Female Leadership forum run by The Orbispace Initiative. The goal of The Orbispace Initiative is to inspire and equip the next generation of female leaders with the STEM skills, experience and networks to thrive as innovators across future industries. Students have been attending workshops this term learning soft skills such as building confidence, creativity and communication skills to be empowered in the area of STEM. With a focus on sustainability and stewardship, this program prepares young women to solve the defining challenges of their generation from climate and energy to AI. 

The future female leadership forum is a full day event involving multiple workshops and networking sessions. Students began the day with a tour of Sydney Startup Hub followed by mindset and communication coaching run by leading Women in Industry. Students then attended a workshop exploring technology and design with a focus on User Experience and User Interface within apps. Students designed and placed visual elements of an app to create a positive and effective user experience.

Over lunch students networked with female leaders, including Cathy Foley, an Australian Physicist who from 2021-2024 was the Chief Scientist of Australia. Here students practiced their soft skills of communication and asking open questions to understand the challenges and success for Women in STEM. The day ended with students participating in an Engineering and Maths challenge followed by an AI session. The AI workshop was presented by CJ Jones, the Head of Design for Generative AI at Canva. In this workshop students coded with AI to bring their design ideas to life.

Students will be using all the skills from the Future Female Leadership Forum to solve a sustainability problem and pitch their idea in term 3 at the Pitch for the Planet.

Kaitlyn McDougall
Assistant Science Coordinator
Newman Teacher in Charge