Last year from 27 to 29 June, King Willem-Alexander and Queen Máxima paid a state visit to Austria. Minister Hoekstra of Foreign Affairs, Jacquelien Scherpen (from our top team) and representatives of the automotive roadmap accompanied the royal couple. In this article, Jacquelien shares her experiences.
The topics of this visit included women in technology and the sustainability of motorized transport, innovations in e-mobility, autonomous driving, hydrogen applications and battery technology.
On day three, the delegation was received by Hermann Schützenhöfer, the governor of Styria. Before lunch with the governor, Willem-Alexander and Máxima followed a discussion about the importance of more women in the natural sciences.
Jacquelien Scherpen gave a penetrating speech. Here's a quote: "At the University of Groningen, where I moved in 2006 to become full professor, I found they have the pioneering Rosalind Franklin program, focusing on hiring women of top quality at tenure track level. And, the faculty board always expressed that it is important to have women in the field.Why? Well, as role models, but also because awareness that diverse teams perform better, are more creative, and, let's face it, also in engineering a female perspective is important.”
Jacquelien about her experience: "The king and queen were very committed and committed to the subject, of course also because of their daughters. We talked about raising awareness of the 'unconscious bias' for the (certainly hard-working) teachers and teachers. The role of parents was also mentioned as a point of attention.
Willem-Alexander and Máxima talked about the fact that the technology sector needs more talent and they support this. One solution is to pay attention to the beautiful sides of technology at a young age, for girls and boys. They want to support this wholeheartedly."
