On the 18th & 19th of February 2025, the UNSW Redback Racing team had the pleasure of running two workshops, in partnership with the UNSW Women in Engineering society, aimed at increasing the confidence of female students in their technical knowledge. More specifically, the Redback team delivered a software workshop using the programming language C++ and an electrical workshop focused on the use of Altium, a software widely used in the team to design custom printed circuit boards. The delivery of these two workshops coincided with Redback’s Term 1 2025 recruitment drive, the team’s largest intake of new members each year. Over 50 students attended the two workshops with the team being able to engage in meaningful knowledge transfer and important conversations. Out of which, 6 students eventually joined the team.

Let’s hear from Janessa, one of the lovely attendees from the workshops!

Year and degree

First Year, Electrical Engineering/Computer Science

What made you interested in coming to the WWG Intro to PCB workshop?

The workshop was recommended to me after I stopped by the Redback stall during O-week to hear more about Redback. The person at the stall strongly recommended attending, and I was curious about what they would be like so I decided to go. I also didn’t know anything about PCBs prior to attending, so I thought this would be a good opportunity to get more of an idea of what they were.

What did you gain from coming to this workshop?

The workshop was a good environment to learn how to make a PCB! They had a template you could work on so you didn’t have to start from scratch, but also had enough to do to cover the 2 hr time period the workshop ran over. It was helpful to kind of explore the new software we used to create it, as well as gain more understanding of what a PCB was, in a friendly environment where you could ask questions. They also allowed you to manufacture your PCB after if you wanted, which I thought was a nice memento. Overall, I think this workshop really helped me gain more of an understanding of PCBs.

Has coming to this workshop influenced any other decisions since then? If so, what were they?

Coming to this workshop definitely influenced my decision to then later apply to Redback! Initially I was very hesitant to apply, especially because I was a first year, and I thought it might be better for me to apply in later years. However, going to the workshops and talking to the people there, both in Redback and not in Redback, as well as learning some new technical skills, has given me enough courage to put in my application.

Do you plan on using your learned skills outside of Redback?

Definitely, I know later on in my degree requires the use of PCBs so it was nice to be able to get a head start/sort of a feel for what designing PCBs was like, it was definitely helpful and I hope to be able to use it again later.

Any other thoughts!

Overall I’d recommend going to these workshops, they also offered snacks and stuff plus you got to meet other people who were also interested in the same things you were.

Importance

As a highly competitive Formula Student team, Redback is constantly striving for excellence through performance and innovation. Achieving this vision relies on harnessing the full breadth of talent available across our university. Currently within the Redback team, 23% of members identify as female, with clear gaps showing where support could be beneficial. As such, these workshops served as an effective way to engage with our Women in Engineering community and work towards closing the interest in STEM gap.

Written by Hayley Jiang and Lily Lam - members of our Women's Working Group