Women in Nuclear - WiN Canada

Excellence and growth led the discussions at WiN-Canada’s 5th Annual Conference, held in Ottawa on February 26 and 27, 2008. “Celebrating Excellence” was the theme of this year’s conference attended by over 125 women and men in the industry.

Tuesday, Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. generously hosted a fabulous tour for twenty-five delegates to its Chalk River facility. The tour was very educational and showed the size and scope of the business activities being conducted at the Chalk River Laboratories.

Wednesday’s session began with a workshop addressing some myths about women's advancement and resulted in recommendations on how to improve opportunities for women in the industry. With over 40% of the North American Nuclear Industry eligible to retire within the next 10 years it is important that we, as an industry, draw from the entire workforce population to secure our success going forward. At present, women account for less than 20% of the nuclear workforce. The recommendations and strategies developed will be incorporated into a paper to support the industry to attract, select, retain and engage more women in the workforce. The session was moderated by Deborah Gillis of Catalyst and facilitated by the Human Resource, Vice Presidents from some of the industry's largest companies.

Our luncheon speaker, Tracy Edwards, spoke on her secondment from the industry to NRCan and talked about the wonderful opportunities in participating in this internship with the Federal Government. The afternoon comprised a series of fascinating presentations by women in the industry sharing best practices and WANO strengths.

The conference ended with a virtual tour of WiN-Canada’s new website.  

Presentations 

 Conference Participants - February 27, 2008

WiN-Canada Board with 5th Birthday Cake