Her Campus UBC was honoured to attend the International Women’s Day banquet, wonderfully organized by UBC’s Young Women in Business. The event brought together students from every faculty, every background, age or ethnicity to celebrate the importance of being a woman and standing up for our values. The event took place in TELUS Garden downtown Vancouver.
The event was called “Pave Your Path” because everyone has a different pathway to success, sometimes anticipated, sometimes unexpected.
The night started with different UBC Clubs representing women, setting up their booths for the audience to see. We stopped by the Young Women in Science, where we learned about many significant contributions women have made in engineering, chemistry, and biology. We also found interesting that not many women enroll in computer science and engineering as a major. We also visited Equal Voice UBC, another club fighting for equality and promoting it through their events.
After grabbing some appetizers, we listened to Juggy Sihota, a telecom executive with more than 20 years of leadership experience working for TELUS as the Vice President of Consumer Health. Her role was impressive, but her journey to get there was even memorable. She told us to never conform to fit in, and that you should always be aiming higher, exploiting your potential.
We then heard a Panel featuring four impressive women answering questions about their career, their ambitions, and goals. The women all belonged to different industries: from politics and business to athletics.
Finally, the last Key Note featured Jessica McDonald, known as one of Canada’s Top 100 Most Powerful Women, regularly listed as one of Vancouver’s Power 50 individuals. She is the prior CEO and President of BC Hydro. She shared her amazing journey and taught us that nothing worthwhile comes easy. There will be so many obstacles along the way, but there is nothing that we cannot overcome.
Throughout the event, there was a Silent Auction. All profits from the event and the silent auction will be donated to the Downtown Eastside Women’s Shelter. The auction items were donated by generous female entrepreneurs.
Her Campus UBC attended the event representing the voice of women in journalism.
Thanks to Young Women in Business once again for organizing such a memorable event. It was fun, it was encouraging and, most importantly, it brought us together to create awareness that we women are capable of anything!