Illawarra girls thinking about a career in Science, Technology, Engineering, Medicine and Maths (STEMM) have two fantastic local role models in the University of Wollongong’s Dr Tamantha Stutchbury and Professor Danielle Skropeta.

Not only are the two women high achievers in their own careers – chosen to take part in the prestigious global leadership initiative Homeward Bound – they’re also creating opportunities for others.

Danielle is a medicinal chemist working on drug development in the Faculty of Science, Medicine and Health; Tamantha is director of iAccelerate. They have known each other for 20 years, although their careers have taken different directions. The pair reconnected recently to launch the LIFT program, a new academia-industry-community partnership based on the transformative principle of “lift as you climb” that won a Women in STEM and Entrepreneurship grant in January.

“Danielle and I co-led a grant that will put a million dollars on the ground to help inspire the next generation of girls to go into STEM and women that are already in STEM to stay in STEM,” Tamantha says.

“I've watched women that are amazing drop off throughout my career and I want to change that for future generations.”

Both Danielle and Tamantha have found Homeward Bound’s 12-month leadership course very valuable and are looking forward to the Covid-delayed highlight: a three-week voyage in November to Antarctica where women from around the world, experts in everything from shark behaviour to space engineering to emergency medicine, will finally meet face to face.

Today, Danielle and Tamantha are logging into our Zoom interview from opposite ends of the earth and the day: Tamantha is finishing up the day at her office at UOW, Danielle is waking up on sabbatical in Germany.

“I'm here with my family, which is pretty unique,” Danielle says. “We've brought the kids and put them into school in Germany and everyone's quite gobsmacked about that. I’m working again with a really amazing group of cancer researchers here. I'm giving research talks, but also one to inspire women that you can have an academic career with a family. You can travel around with young kids. I've travelled around giving seminars while I was breastfeeding and when the kids were little.”

Tamantha loves her job as director of iAccelerate, and believes she has the Homeward Bound program to thank. “iAccelerate is the University of Wollongong's startup accelerator and incubator,” she says. “It's an amazing interface … making sure research gets out to have real impact in the world and I'm so passionate about that. I didn't have this position when I applied for Homeward Bound and I think Homeward Bound has a lot to do with my confidence and skills to get this position.”

Tamantha was accepted into the program a year before Danielle, who applied during the start of Covid chaos in 2020.

“The reason I applied for it is that I love the opportunity to connect with the different women around the world, women in STEMM, a hundred women from different cultures. I love to hear their stories," Danielle says.

“I'm someone who normally talks all the time, you can never get a word in, but in Homeward Bound I just sit back and I'm mesmerised just hearing the amazing stories and I can't wait to meet all the women together in the trip in Antarctica. There's going to be a lot of tears on that first day when we all see each other.

“Two women who I am super excited to meet are wildlife conservationist Moreangels Muchaneta Mbizah and polar explorer Lungi Mchunu, the first African woman to sail to the North Pole.”

Covid delayed the trip of a lifetime and to catch up this year there’ll be 180 women leaders from 25 countries catching two ships from Ushuaia to the frozen continent. Danielle and Tamantha will be on different boats.

“They select 80 women a year to go,” Tamantha explains.

Her cohort, chosen in 2019, has already faced unique challenges together. “We connected through a global pandemic, and I got a view of the pandemic that I wouldn't have otherwise had from here in Australia.

“As the waves moved around the world, you were hearing first-hand what it was like to experience it in all different cultures. And we could support each other across our experiences when we were hitting big Covid waves at different times. It was really reassuring and supportive to have each other as we did that.”

The Antarctica trip will give them a chance to switch off and focus entirely on career development.

Tamantha says: “Often women, we are jugglers. We are always juggling our caring responsibilities, our work responsibilities, and often it's ourself and our own professional development that is last on that list. And so the ability to disconnect from the world and focus on my development and my connection for three weeks and experience with others things that I've never experienced before is what I'm looking forward to."

Ultimately, Homeward Bound – a brainwave conceived by leadership expert Fabian Dattner in 2015 – aims to equip 10,000 women with the skills to create better outcomes for our planet by 2036.

Danielle – who applied via video – said she was “really open and frank” about her desire to meet other women in STEMM in her pitch.  “Before, during any of these leadership programs, I was very much like you have to dress up like the boys, you have to laugh at the boys’ jokes and you have to play the boys’ game to get there,” she says.

Now Danielle is determined to empower other women and both she and Tamantha are supportive of another ground-breaking UOW initiative, the Women’s Research Engineers Network (WREN), which aims to close the gender gap in engineering.

UOW has had regular representatives on Homeward Bound courses, including Professor Martina Sanderson Smith, Associate Professor Sarah Hamylton and Associate Fellow Rachelle Balez. Most recently, last month the university announced that Georgia Watson – a research officer with  Securing Antarctica’s Environmental Future who is working on a long-term moss monitoring project – will be part of Homeward Bound 8.

Tamantha says: “We have a nice alumni here. I'm getting some disadvantaged schoolgirls in in a few weeks and I just put a call out to my Homeward Bounders to say, 'Who wants to come and talk to them?' And so it's an amazing network."

The formal program runs for 12 months, but it can make a difference for life.

“You're part of the Homeward Bound community forever,”  Tamantha says.

Read more at the Homeward Bound website

GO FIGURE: WHY SUPPORT WOMEN IN STEM

Women only make up 36% of enrolments in university science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) courses, according to the 2022 STEM Equity Monitor prepared by the Department of Industry, Science and Resources,

Women comprise 27% of the workforce across all STEM industries.

Only 23% of senior management and 8% of CEOs in STEM-qualified industries are women.