“Become an Engineer. Make a Difference. Change the World.” This quote could be seen on over 40 HISD students’ t-shirts as they joined ExxonMobil engineers for “Introduce a Girl to Engineering Day” on Tuesday, February 19.

Students from Welch Middle School gathered at the ExxonMobil offices in downtown Houston for the special event. The students are among hundreds of girls working alongside women engineers this month as part of ExxonMobil’s push to inspire more girls to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).

 ”It’s important to the development of our future workforce, and if we can inspire students at this impressionable age in middle school to pursue careers in STEM, and show them what it takes to achieve success, we’re going to have a successful and motivated workforce,” said Sujata Bhatia, Strategic Advisor at ExxonMobil.  “We hope [the students] walk away inspired to pursue math, science, and technical oriented areas of study.”

Students learned about various engineering fields and the qualifications necessary to join the profession. Twenty five female ExxonMobil volunteer engineers and representatives from University of Houston’s Biomedical Engineering program spent the day teaching students from Welch about chemical, petroleum, and biomedical engineering through engaging activities designed to help students understand real-world applications of numerous engineering fields.

Louise McKenzie, Global Reservoir Engineer Manager at ExxonMobil, reminded the students, “As women, we should never limit ourselves.”

ExxonMobil has partnered with Houston area schools for the last 10 years to promote STEM careers, and the company sponsors the annual Sally Ride Science Academy each fall.