{"id":25206,"date":"2023-03-27T21:01:54","date_gmt":"2023-03-27T21:01:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/saj.pachecostudios.com?p=25206"},"modified":"2023-03-27T21:35:10","modified_gmt":"2023-03-27T21:35:10","slug":"womens-aviation-career-symposium-marks-successful-event-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/state-news\/michigan\/womens-aviation-career-symposium-marks-successful-event-2\/%20","title":{"rendered":"Women\u2019s Aviation Career Symposium Marks Successful Event"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Photo above – Scholarship Winners<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The fifth annual Women\u2019s Aviation Career Symposium (WACS)\nwas held on Saturday, March 18th at the Western Michigan University (WMU)\nCollege of Aviation. This event was a professional career conference (for women\nonly) designed to introduce women to aviation and promote networking,\neducation, and scholarships while building up the aviation community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“This is a great way to network and connect with local\nwomen,” Helen Hagg, Corporate Pilot, and co-founder of WACS said, “It\nis a way for women to experience different careers in aviation that they may\nnot be aware of and to learn about all of the opportunities available to\nthem.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Despite the severe winter weather on the morning of the\nevent, over 220 people attended, selling out the event. Over two-thirds of\nattendees were in high school or college. Representatives from over 40 aviation\ncompanies, including corporate and charter flight departments, 10 different\nairline companies, as well as several aviation schools visited and spoke with\nattendees. The event was sponsored by 45 companies of which 25 were new.\nSponsors included Gulfstream Aerospace, WMU College of Aviation, Duncan\nAviation, Dow, Francine and Theo Hagg, GrandAir Aviation, Jackson National,\nMichigan Business Aviation Association, PSA Airlines, and United Aviate.\nThrough generous sponsorships, WACS was able to award scholarships in the\namount of $2000 to 20 women (totaling $40,000) for aviation education to go\ntowards flight training, maintenance training, and professional development.\nThis brings the total WACS has awarded since inception to $81,500 given to 43 women.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Attendees were able to immerse themselves in the many\naviation careers available during roundtable discussions. Panelists\nrepresenting 10 different aviation career fields including Airlines, Air\nTraffic Control, Airport Operations, Corporate and Charter, Engineering and\nAerospace, Flight Support, Maintenance, and Military Aviation answered\nquestions about and discussed \u201ca day in the life\u201d of their field of aviation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Exhibitors and sponsors had the opportunity to join an\nindustry briefing hosted by the Michigan Business Aviation Association MBAA,\nwhere they discussed current topics including labor shortages, supply chain\nchallenges, recruitment and retention, as well as diversity in aviation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The event featured opportunities to network with professionals\nat the exhibit booths. Throughout the day many workshops were held to promote\nprofessional development. Workshops included Engineering, Internships, Resume\nand Scholarships Applications, Career Paths, and Maintenance. Aircraft tours\nhosted by WACO Aircraft Corp, Cirrus and Boeing 737 Simulator sessions, and WMU\nCollege of Aviation tours provided fun hands-on learning and exploration. The\nday ended with keynote speaker Tammy \u201cG\u201d Barlette, founder of Athena\u2019s Voice,\nretired Lieutenant Colonel and fighter pilot, encouraging and inspiring young\nwomen to persevere in their goals. Barlette spoke on keeping a mission focused\nmindset. She emphasized how to stay focused on the immediate \u201cmission\u201d instead\nof getting trapped amid hard moments, \u201cWe give up too early on our dreams and\nour goals, whether they are big or small. We should be ready to fail out\ninstead of bail out.\u201d The presentation of scholarships followed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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From left are Mary Poirier, Tammy “G” Barlette, Helen Hagg, and Pam Catlin<\/em>. <\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

“In the last couple of years, this event has evolved\ninto a recruiting event as well as an educational event. We have numerous local\ncompanies attend, hoping to fill internships and job positions,” Mary\nPoirier, Corporate Pilot and WACS co-founder said, “Our mission has grown\nfrom promoting women, to helping them get hired within the many great companies\nhere in our Great Lakes Region.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“This is the best time to explore careers in aviation,\u201d\nsaid Pam Catlin, American Airlines Captain and WACS team member, \u201cThe industry,\nparticularly the airlines, need team members across the board, not just pilots.\nOnly 7% of pilots and 2.7% of mechanics are women- we are working to increase\nthose numbers by encouraging women to pursue their dreams but also to make the\ngoal be their journey.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Women\u2019s Aviation Career Symposium is an event designed\nto advance women in aerospace careers and help alleviate the industry-wide\npilot and mechanic shortage through promoting local companies and career\nopportunities in the Great Lakes Region. For additional information and to\nbecome involved contact wacsmichigan@gmail.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Photo above – Scholarship Winners The fifth annual Women\u2019s Aviation Career Symposium (WACS) was held on Saturday, March 18th at the Western Michigan University (WMU) College of Aviation. This event was a professional career conference (for women only) designed to introduce women to aviation and promote networking, education, and scholarships while building up the aviation […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":25207,"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-25206","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\/women-symposium-Scholarship-Winners-Small-edit.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25206","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=25206"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25206\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25212,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25206\/revisions\/25212"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25207"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25206"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25206"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25206"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}