A Week Supporting Women in Tech

It’s been an inspiring week for the Fivium team, as we’ve had the opportunity to support several initiatives focused on encouraging women starting their careers in technology.

From hosting an influential speaker to judging student hackathons, the week highlighted the creativity, ambition and technical talent emerging from the next generation of technologists.

Learning from an influential voice in tech

Last Wednesday, we were delighted to welcome Beverly Clarke MBE to speak at an event hosted at Fivium.

Recognised as one of the most influential women in UK technology and a TechWomen100 winner, Beverly has spent years championing digital skills and encouraging young people to pursue careers in tech. Hearing about her work, including her book The Tech Career Coach for Teens, was both motivating and thought-provoking for everyone attending.

Judging the next generation of innovators

The weekend then saw members of the Fivium team supporting two Women in Tech hackathons, helping judge projects and celebrate the ideas students were able to bring to life in just a few days.

At the University of Bath Women in Tech Hackathon, Anastasia Anichenko and Lauren Little joined the judging panel and met teams competing across a range of technical challenges.

“Seeing what students can build in such a short amount of time is always impressive,” said Anastasia. “There was a huge amount of creativity and thoughtful technical decision-making across the projects we saw.”

Fivium sponsored the Best Use of AI prize, which was awarded to a team of first-year students for their project Edupal, an AI-powered study tool that generates questions and answers from learning materials.

The judges were particularly impressed by the team’s careful approach to their technical choices, including selecting and locally hosting a model designed to work effectively with longer text, alongside a polished user interface and confident demonstration.

“There was real thought behind the architecture of the project,” said Lauren. “They clearly understood why they chose the model they did, and their demo was incredibly polished.”

Meanwhile, at Imperial College London, Sam Warner represented Fivium on the judging panel at the FemHack event, supporting participants and reviewing the projects they created during the competition.

The overall winners were a team called PigNose, who developed a wearable safety device designed to help women feel safer when walking alone at night. The device attaches to a belt and alerts the wearer via their watch to how close someone is behind them, giving a real-time sense of distance and awareness.

Encouraging the future of tech

Events focused on women in technology play an important role in creating opportunities for emerging talent to experiment, collaborate and develop their skills.

For the Fivium team, the week has been a powerful reminder of the importance of supporting these initiatives and of the exciting future ahead for the next generation of technologists.