Dr Marily Nika is the recipient of the WISE Influence Award 2015 presented by Her Royal Highness, The Princess Royal, Patron of WISE.
Dr Marily Nika was presented with the WISE Influence Award, sponsored by the Royal Academy of Engineering, on Thursday 12th November at the WISE Awards black tie reception held at the Grange Hotel, London. She was supported for the evening by her former PhD supervisor Prof. Will Knottenbelt and DoC Head of Department Prof. Susan Eisenbach.
The Influence Award category is to recognise ‘an organisation or individual who has influenced their sector or organisation to take sustainable action which has improved the participation of women in STEM in an evidenced way.’
Many of the activities Marily has been recognised for took place during her time as a PhD student in the Department of Computing. She founded the Imperial Women in Computing group and organised the UK’s first female only hackathon, inspiring UCL, Oxford and Edinburgh Universities to launch their own Women in Computing societies.
In 2011 Marily was the first Greek woman and the first student from Imperial College to receive the Google Anita Borg Scholarship, awarded to encourage women to excel in computing and technology and become active role models and leaders in the field. She has given 3 TEDx talks and was awarded the Imperial College gold medal for outstanding achievement as an ambassador for women in technology globally.
Marily now works for Google England as a Programme Manager, and is also a director of the London Geekettes, part of a global community dedicated to inspiring and supporting women in technology. Marily says ‘women should follow their passions and realise that if I was able to make my dreams come true, so can they.’
WISE is a campaign to promote women in science, technology and engineering, inspiring girls and women to study and build careers in STEM. Their mission is to get 1 million more women in the UK STEM workforce. The WISE Awards is an annual event, to recognise inspiring organisations and individuals actively addressing the core concerns of WISE. This year the judging panel was made up of 16 members including senior management at Network Rail, Goldman Sachs, Intel and The Royal Academy of Engineering.
Please see the below links for more:
https://www.wisecampaign.org.uk/
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Reporter
Sarah Willis
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
