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New director of women's program sets many goals

Holloway

By Luis Jiménez
Summer Reporter

In many ways, the new director of the Women in Engineering Program has a lot to give back.

Beth Holloway stepped up Wednesday as the new director of the program — the same program that helped her during her first years at Purdue when she sometimes felt she didn't belong in engineering, especially while sometimes sitting in a class, in which there were only two women.

"I would ask to myself, 'Do I really belong here?'" Holloway remembered.

Despite the justified doubts about her career, she wasn't alone and she found the answer to her question in her friends and in the program.

Holloway, who graduated from Purdue in 1992 with a mechanical engineering bachelor's degree, said that the Women in Engineering Program played a significant role in supporting and encouraging undergraduate women engineers — as herself — when she was in college.

"I remember when I was freshman, they had speakers that came every week to talk about different subjects like combining family and career and the different things you can do in an engineering career," Holloway said. "I remember thinking, 'this really was the right choice for me, I can be an engineer and I can have a family.'"

The program, she said, helped women engineers create networks that allowed them to support and encourage each other. She also said the Society of Women Engineers and Phi Sigma Rho engineering sorority were fundamental in helping women engineers.

Upon graduation, Holloway started working at Cummins Engine Co., where she worked until last week. However, despite the burden of a full-time job, she obtained her master's degree in 1997.

While at Cummins, Holloway was heavily involved in the company's recruitment of new engineers, oftentimes women engineers from Purdue. She also established mentoring programs for Purdue interns, who were matched with women engineers at Cummins to help them through their internships.

At Purdue, Holloway has informational seminars to encourage women engineering students. She's also spoken at Society of Women Engineers meetings at Phi Sigma Rho.

Klod Kokini, assistant dean of the Schools of Engineering, had said at the moment of Holloway's selection that her strong interest and involvement in helping other women engineers such as herself made her an excellent candidate.

In her second day at work, Holloway believes her position is "like a dream come true." "I am a little anxious too, hoping that I can do a good job," said Holloway in her green-walled new office.

Holloway was chosen out of three candidates that postulated for the position, which became vacant after former director Jane Daniels left the directorship last spring, after 20 years in the position.

"I am honored that they chose me," Holloway said. "Jane (Daniels) is going to be terribly hard to replace. She had so much experience and she was so good at this job."

Holloway said her first challenge would be coming up to speed with the new position; however, a bigger challenge lies in her path. "There are some challenges ahead of us in regards of the number of women engineers; they're declining," she said. "We have to find ways to increase those again. My long-term goal is to have the percentage of women in engineering reflect the population split between men and women. I think there are an equal number of talented women as there are men."

Holloway believes that raising the number of women in the Schools of Engineering will positively affect the schools. "Women bring a unique set of talents to whatever they do," she said. "To really take the Schools of Engineering to the next level you have to use all those talents."

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