UK Researcher Writes 270 Wiki Entries A Year to Engage More Girls Into Science

Have you ever tried authoring a Wiki article? Turns out, Jess Wade, a female scientist from the UK, keeps posting to Wikipedia almost daily! The Typical Student team tells you why Jess is persistently authoring the Wiki entries to commend her fellow female scientists.

Meet Jess Wade, a Ph.D. at Imperial College London’s Blackett Laboratory and a Wikipedia author. Ms Wade says that during 2017 she did about 270 entries in the world-famous free internet encyclopaedia. Being busy as a  postdoctoral researcher in the field of plastic electronics, she would consistently post to Wiki: “I had a target for doing one a day, but sometimes I get too excited and do three.”

Why Does the Ph.D. Post to Wikipedia?

Source: The Guardian

So, why does Jess spend her precious time on writing Wiki articles? The reason is simple: she wants to engage more British females into science and research. Trying to make a shift from the inside, she writes inspirational articles about “sensational women in science” to motivate teen girls with their personal stories.

Source: RightBrainNews

Ms. Wade’s obsession with science comes from her family: both her parents are doctors, so science was always present in her life. Never facing any trouble while studying, it wasn’t until she noticed female scientists being a minority! As told by the Guardian, after feeling that she’s a part of an isolated and underrepresented group, Jess became a speaker at schools and “became engaged in outreach to encourage girls to take up science.”

How Many Female Scientists Are In the UK?

The data provided by the Guardian, shows there are very few female scientists indeed:

• Only 9% of engineers are women;
• An estimated £4M to £5M is spent annually on women in science outreach;
• The percentage of female A-level physics students has been at about 21% for the past decade!
• At that, there are currently only 10% of A-level female physics students in Britain.
• It would take about 258 years to close the gender gap in physics according to recent research.