While the world celebrated International Women’s Day on Saturday 8th March, this month the Forest Economic Partnership have been celebrating some of the Forest of Dean’s amazing women!
The Education & Skills subgroup recognises that the Forest has historically been seen as a place with few opportunities and little of interest happening, but we don’t believe this is true, there are so many innovative and industry leading businesses here, and with that so much career potential.
So with this in mind, we developed our latest project, Inspiring Women of the Forest!
This project was created to run alongside International Women’s Day 2025 to show not only the opportunities in the Forest but also the brilliant women that have forged aspirational careers.
We really wanted to demonstrate that careers can be non-linear and work for the individual, not the other way round. We want young people in the Forest of Dean to know it’s fine to not have it all mapped out, they don’t have to fit into pre-determined boxes, they can try out different careers, and they can make their hobbies pay. We also wanted to break down stereotypes of what a CEO or someone working in agriculture for example would look like.
For the past few months, we have been filming interviews with inspiring women who grew up, live, or work locally asking questions about their background, career pathways and day to day work life.
In total we filmed with 15 women with representatives from the agriculture, construction, education, charity sectors, as well as small business owners. We then shared these videos with local schools to show to their students.
You can watch the videos here - https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLnsFXL8_BX1Fr-NWST7nFJcaTaO76H6cy&si=56bY-jjA5HhGATz7
To make this an even more interactive event, 5 schools followed up with a panel session featuring some of the women, where a year group had the opportunity to hear more from the women and ask them questions.
We also prepared a small handout featuring top tips and words of advice from our panelists, plus the opportunity to win an iPad by telling us what their favourite video and top takeaways were. Take at look at the handout here.
In total we visited 5 schools in the Forest of Dean, Wyedean in Sedbury, Five Acres in Coleford, Dene Magna in Mitcheldean, Dean Academy in Lydney, and Forest High in Cinderford.
We even had Mark Jones from Dean Radio join us to interview the students & careers lead!
It is so important young people have these chances to interact with relatable and local role models because visibility is key, research shows if they can't see it, they can't imagine themselves achieving it.
The response to this project from schools, students, and businesses has been overwhelmingly positive, with plans for next year already being discussed! We couldn’t have done it without the support from our brilliant interviewees whose expertise and knowledge has been so valuable for young people to hear. The student audiences have also been fantastic with students independently asking questions and approaching our panellists afterwards to ask about work experience and shadowing!
Huge thanks to our panelists, schools, and careers leads who supported this project and made it all possible.
Get in touch with FEP@fdean.gov.uk or click here to find out more.
