YOUNG WOMEN’S ENGINEERING SYMPOSIUM 2025

What is YWES?

For the past 12 years, The Janksters, Notre Dame High School’s FIRST Robotics Competition team, has hosted the Young Women’s Engineering Symposium (YWES). This event was created to empower female and non-binary high school students interested in STEM through inviting female engineers from a variety of fields to host speaker sessions and a Q&A panel. This year the engineering fields include electrical, biomedical, software, marine, environmental, and civil. Speakers are invited to present their journeys as women in STEM and provide professional career advice.

Meet Our Speakers

Christine Harper

Biomedical Engineer

Katie Patrick

Environmental Engineer

Nina Ault

Electrical Engineer

Nina Ault is an electrical engineer at Silverman & Light with 10 years of experience designing lighting and power systems for buildings. Inspired by her love for math and architecture, Nina studied architectural engineering at the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, where an internship introduced her to electrical engineering. Since then, she has designed electrical systems for restaurants at the Chase Center, a 40-story high rise residential building in Hawaii, and the lighting of the Bay Bridge--to name a few. When she's not engineering, Nina loves hiking with her dogs and baby, and she is passionate about showing the next generation of girls that engineering is creative, impactful, and full of opportunities.

Event Details

December 6, 2025 from 9:00 am - 1 pm

Arrival and Registration

Welcome in Learning Commons

Keynote Speaker