Join the feast! International Day of Women and Girls in Science

On February 11, we celebrate the contributions of female scientists, and we happily invite more to join our journey.

Every year since 2015, I celebrate this day with joy! Maybe with greater anticipation than my own birthday. After all, my birth was an event planned by others, while my choice to pursue science was purely my own.  

Today, we celebrate our presence in engineering, medicine, technology, and all the natural sciences! Each and every one of us, girls and women in science, should not forget that the equality we enjoy today was not always a given. 1890 was the year when the first Greek student, Ioanna Stefanopoli, was admitted to a university with the dean of her school* complaining to the ministry of education that dared to "allow" her study, and her peers welcoming her with the subtle "to the kitchen-to the kitchen!". Two years later, in 1892, the first Mathematics student, Florentia Fountoukli, was finally admitted to higher education.

With this in mind, I invite you all to rejoice and embrace the curiosity we see in all children, boys and girls, without dictating the “right” profession for their gender or telling them they cannot pursue specific career paths. Even more, I would like us to support the girls who enjoy playing with Barbie dolls and can solve the trigonometry exercises in a few minutes. That, along with their make-up explorations, they want to learn how to build their own robot. Our daughters and our students. 

I am grateful to all the researchers who formally or informally helped and keep helping and inspiring me to continue loving science: Drs. Antonopoulou, Zarkada, Demitriadou, Papangeli, Staikou, Touroutoglou, and Horsley.  

Last, I would like to say a huge thank you to the wonderful Greek scientists of this very group: Angeliki, Georgia, Danae, Katerina Bo., Katerina Br., Kelly, Kiki, Maria, Myrto, Natasa, Tatiana and Chrysovalantou you are superb, and it is my honor to know you! 

It’s party time, ladies, we earned it!  

* Admitted to law school.