![\"\"](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/WACS-2020-Scholarship-Groupedit.jpg\")
Scholarship winners were Kendra Blackie, Karissa Fricke,\nKayla Hoffman, Victoria Moore, and Katherine Priddy. Blackie, Hoffman, Priddy\nand Moore are working toward Commercial Pilot Ratings, while Fricke is will use\nthe money towards her Airframe and Powerplant Maintenance certificates. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Poirier, an International Captain and Safety Manager at\nJackson National, said, \u201cThe impetus of the Symposium three years ago was to\nallow women to network with other women in the aviation profession. There is a\nreal shortage of pilots and mechanics. Women comprise only 7 percent of the\naviation workforce and more women need to be introduced to the many\nopportunities available in these high paying and rewarding careers.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cOver $6 Million is available every year for training in\nmany different fields,\u201d said Hagg, Women in Aviation Great Lakes chapter\npresident and corporate pilot for GrandAir Aviation, \u201cMany of these\nscholarships go unused and our goal is to make people aware of this important\nresource and help them pursue their dreams.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Keynote speaker, Kari Smith, an Engineering Manager at GE\nAviation, discussed her career and addressed the need for more women to enter\nthe field of aviation. Smith, who spent 23 years on active duty, accumulated\nover 3,500 flight hours as a KC-135 instructor navigator. Smith told attendees, \u201cFind your passion, ask\na lot of questions, and stay positive. \nIf one door closes, check to see if there\u2019s a window open, then go\nthrough it to another career option.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n Smith further advised, \u201cDon\u2019t take no for an answer. If I\nhad a nickel for every person who told me I couldn\u2019t do something, I\u2019d be rich!\u201d\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n The response from the attendees was positive and\nencouraging. Many of them were impressed by the professionalism and wealth of\nknowledge from all of the panelists. One attendee remarked that she learned\nmore about aviation from this conference than she ever knew before and is\nplanning on starting her flight training. <\/p>\n\n\n\n This year was a great success thanks to generous\nsponsorships from Dassault Falcon Jet, Francine and Theodoor Hagg, GrandAir\nAviation, Inc., Meijer, Duncan Aviation, MASCO, Mead and Hunt, Northwestern\nMichigan College, Satcom Direct, Stryker, and Western Michigan University. The\nWACS more than tripled their amount of scholarships awarded, raised nearly\n$10,000, and increased their attendance by 52 percent. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The symposium included round table panel discussions with\nprominent women in their professions, aircraft tours, interactive displays, and\nbooths featuring several Michigan aviation companies and schools. Following the event there was a tour of the\nLansing Air Traffic Control Tower. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The Fourth Annual WACS event has been scheduled for January\n23, 2021. For more information, contact wacsmichigan@gmail.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Nearly 100 women attended the Third Annual Women\u2019s Aviation Career Symposium (WACS) held on January 25th, 2020 at the Capital Region International Airport. This symposium, hosted by Jackson National Life Insurance, was the 2019 Michigan Aeronautics Commission Award of Excellence winner and was organized by co-founders Helen Hagg, Mary Poirier, and Pam Tobin. The symposium […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":14797,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[98,45],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14796","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aviation-education","category-michigan"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/WACS-2020-Group-Photoedit.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14796","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14796"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14796\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14800,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14796\/revisions\/14800"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14797"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14796"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14796"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14796"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/WACS-2020-Panelists-Exhibitorsedit.jpg\")