Aditi Luchman was selected to receive the Queen’s Young Leaders Award, she was awarded for being a youth leader to female engineers at WomEng organisation.
Aditi Luchman has done so much in her 26 years! She has spent the last seven years working to break the stereotype that engineering is only for men.
An engineer herself, she started volunteering at WomEng and has worked her way into a permanent position. She is the lead co-ordinator and heads up all WomEng activities in South Africa and Kenya.
The organisation works to close the skills and gender gap in the engineering field. The organisation has reached out to thousands of schoolgirls, university students and women in industry around the world!
Aditi was invited to join a selection of youth leaders in the UK to attend a two-week programme and to be honoured with the Queen’s Young Leaders Award. This meant she was able to meet Queen Elizabeth II.
“Meeting the Queen was an occasion I will never forget, there was huge excitement and nervousness before we could meet the Queen. But when she chatted to each of us, she seemed very interested in the work we did.”
Each of the award recipients now have the opportunity to be involved in a one-year correspondence leadership programme linked to the University of Cambridge. They all had the chance to visit the offices of Google, Facebook and the TV station BBC World.
Aditi and WomEng have launched a campaign to reach a million girls through Stem (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) education. They plan to create awareness initiatives in at least 10 countries over the next 10 years!
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