International Women’s Day 2025

Statement from Dr. Janusz Kozinski, Dean of Engineering, on International Women’s Day – March 8, 2025.

On March 8 every year, we recognize the immense contribution of women to our economy and our society – and to both engineering education and the engineering profession as a whole. This is an important opportunity to shine a spotlight on the progress made towards equality, and to acknowledge the urgent need for action to address the inequities and inequalities faced by women and girls here in Canada and across the world.

The theme of this year’s International Women’s Day is Accelerate Action, which emphasizes the urgency of making faster, more effective, and more decisive steps toward gender equality. It calls for increased momentum in addressing the systemic barriers and biases that women face, both in personal and professional spheres. 

Engineering education and the engineering profession here in Canada still has far too many barriers and biases that hold back the progress of women. We still have not achieved the progress on gender equity seen in many other professional fields, and we lag behind many other countries in the world.

In line with the theme of International Women’s Day 2025, I have asked our newly-formed Engineering EDI Task Force to develop provide recommendations on specific actions and initiatives – including some we can start right away – to address the challenges we face on these issues in the Faculty of Engineering. 

Happy International Women’s Day to everyone! Please take the opportunity this weekend to recognize and celebrate the contributions of women in your personal and professional lives, and to reflect on what more can be done to make life fairer, safer and more equitable for women everywhere.

– Janusz Kozinski, Dean of Engineering at Lakehead University