The first season of the Little Science Talks podcast focuses on generational influences in STEM. Little Science Co Founder, Heidi Gardner will be joined by her co-host Anna Kebke, along with a different guest for each episode.

You can listen to the episode in full using the Acast player above, the full episode’s transcript is below if you’d prefer to read along.

In our second episode we are joined by PhD Student, Diana Githwe. Diana’s research looks at how bacteria in the human gut microbiome break down sugars, and she joins us to share her career so far, and where she might go next. She explains how her mum wanted her to get a good education, and after moving the family from Kenya to Scotland, Diana hit gold with a biology teacher that encouraged her to pursue a career in biochemistry. We explore how the murder of George Floyd and the protests that followed in the summer of 2020 impacted Diana, and why she specifically chose to work with a Black female therapist to help her navigate the microaggressions and barriers that she will likely face as a Black woman in STEM. Diana discusses the importance of backing yourself, and why it’s important to remember that while everyone may have 24 hours in the day, there’s no need for you to spend it in the same way that Beyoncé does.

Heidi
Hello and welcome to Little Science Talks. Today we are joined by the wonderful Diana Githwe. Diana, do you want to give us a little introduction about yourself?

Diana
Sure. Hi everyone. I’m Diana. I was born in Kenya and based in Glasgow, I’m now in Newcastle, studying microbiology at the University of Newcastle and I guess, what else I do, I’m a blogger, I blog about science, social justice, just lifestyle kind of wellbeing. So, I do a lot of things on Instagram, and I also have my own blog and platform called An Abundance of Melanin. I dance as well. I love to dance. And I guess yeah, that’s pretty much it. There’s a lot more I guess about me, so we’ll discover a bit more in the episode.

Anna
I love your blog name!

Diana
Thank you!

Heidi
I love you’re just like ‘I do this. I do this. I do this. And I do this.’ Oh, not much else. A million things!

Anna
Just casually being a superstar.

Heidi
So, you’re in Newcastle at the minute?

Diana
Yes, I am

Heidi
And you’re doing your PhD. So what made you want to study science, to begin with when you were, you know, choosing probably undergrad, I’m guessing or even A-Level before that?

Diana
Yeah, I guess a bit of background in the sense that I actually emigrated from Kenya, when I was seven, to Scotland. My Mum was quite traditional in the sense of like, she wanted my brother and me, after we moved to the UK to have a good education and also get a good job in terms of sustaining ourselves and having good money, etc. and just being able to have a good life. So the kind of subjects that she thought would have that related fields to Medicine, Law, Literature, etc. So that was kind of drilled down to us, you know, aspire to these kinds of ambitions. But I didn’t want to be a doctor. I just thought it was too much. I wasn’t a big fan of lots of blood and, yeah, it just seems a lot to me. I toyed with Law a little bit when I was younger, but I just found that ultimately, I hated reading lots of books and writing lots of essays, and it was quite boring to me. And then it actually wasn’t until i was 14/15, and had to choose my subjects at school, and then start thinking about university that I was like, uh, what do I actually like? So, I guess the privilege that I had in terms of the upbringing that I had was that, because my Mum had moved us over to the UK, I got to choose something that I actually enjoyed. And she wasn’t, really pushy as a Mum, she didn’t really care necessarily what we did, as long as we did things that were sensible. I loved biology at school, and my biology teacher was amazing. And she really kind of encouraged me to do the subject, but I didn’t see anything that interesting as a career option with just biology, and then I saw biochemistry and I loved that idea, so kind of fast forward a little bit into school, I applied for university to do a Master’s in biochemistry. Then I did my final exams in school and then got into my undergrad, I think it was more because I love asking questions, I used to always ask my Mum, why does that happen? You should have an answer. And then I’d ask why is that? And why is that? I was always quite a curious child and quite a curious teenager as well. So I love that aspect of Science, that there was never a done deal with an answer. It’s always more to discover. And the fact that I did quite well in it as well, obviously, that helps when you do well on subjects, you know, that does help you think, okay, I could do this in future. I had a great teacher as well. So that also piqued my interest in choosing that subject. So yeah, I guess that that’s where it started. That’s why I am where I am.

Heidi
A good teacher always helps. In our school, one teacher would be amazing and another one wouldn’t and then suddenly, it was like the good teacher’s subjects that everyone’s like, ‘Oh, yeah, maybe I could do this’. So, what sort of influence did they have? Did they introduce you to new areas of science? Or was it just like a sort of general? Like, ‘yeah, you can do this’ sort of thing?

Diana
Yeah, they just had a lot of time for children. And I think a lot of teachers, you know, get 20 years into the profession, and just can’t be bothered doing the same thing over and over again. And they just seem quite curt and just don’t really seem to be that interested in teaching anymore, the actual fundamental aspects of teaching children, whereas she was quite new, and I guess in her career, she was quite young. And she kind of had a different way of teaching, and you could tell that she loved us, genuinely loved being able to spark an interest in everybody. And so I love her, and especially if you did well in her class or, even if you don’t do well in her class, she’d still have time to kind of, help you through a few different questions that you’re struggling with. Or if we had exams, she was always available and ready to support us to study. So I think it was just that time and effort that I have seen, that allowed me to explore science a little bit more as a child.

Heidi
And what are your plans for the next step, because obviously, PhD is a pretty massive thing. I’m almost certain that you’re probably sick of people asking you what comes after the PhD. But, what is coming after the PhD?

Diana
I know, we always think about these things, but as soon as we start a job or whatever it, we’re thinking, Okay, what can I do next? What’s the game plan? and I think I have a kind of future care destination more than an immediate one. So my kind of biggest aspirations and ambitions have to do with a policy in healthcare, but I really want to get hands-on in terms of actually how healthcare places are decided and how they are brought about into government etc, maybe here in the UK, and also in countries in the south. So particularly, of course, Kenya, where I’m from, that would be amazing to see how that can translate and how we can create collaborations between Kenya and here, because they are such a huge country that is developing so quickly, and they have the expertise, it’s just the opportunities aren’t there. So I’m if able to, kind of, be that bridge between here, we have the resources, and over there you’re lacking the resources, that would be amazing. And then within that as well, trying to sort of like inspire young kids, young black girls as well to be able to show, you know, maybe you can do something in science as well because if you can see someone doing that, so kind of creating maybe scholarship. So I don’t even know, just something that is practical and help people that were in my position when I was younger that I didn’t have. So to do that I realised having a PhD would absolutely help with that, so understanding the research aspects of science as well. And then I can move around different industries and science, go-to tech as well. Even just normal industry kind of go-to jobs as well, maybe academia a little bit further, but I don’t know, but just trying to jump around in science and healthcare as much as possible so that I can get a feel for everything. And then everything can be tied together when I’m older and wiser and can do a lot of things that will be great!

Anna
Love that!

Heidi
It’s cool, isn’t it? Because I think with science, you can have a game plan of like, this is the puzzle I’m going to put together and then eventually in like 10 or 15 years time, this is what it’s gonna look like. And this is where I’m going to go and I love that about science because I think it means that the people kind of at the top that can influence stuff, can have such a diverse mix of skills and experiences and stuff is such a cool way to I don’t know, I guess, do stuff.

Diana
And I feel like people don’t really understand, I guess, that there are many aspects that come with science as well like, and there’s just so many different parts to it that you think when you think scientists, you think someone is sitting on their bench all day and doing experiments with funny looking liquids and gases everywhere. But there’s just so many moving parts to it. And ultimately, you know, we’ve seen with what happened with COVID affects our day to day life so much more. So yeah, there’s, I can’t wait to just see what’s out there.

Heidi
Yeah, that’s a nice outlook as well, because there’s a lot of people, like when I was doing my PhD, we all kind of had like, this is where we’re going to go and it was like a straight line. And then like the further along you get your like, actually, I needed to wiggle a bit so that it’s any use, like if it is just a straight line you never really get like the experience and that diversity of experience to make the proper difference and to like understand different perspectives and stuff. So you’re like bench base now on you?

Diana
Yeah, definitely.

Heidi
So what does your day to day look like? What does your day in the lab look like?

Diana
So busy, usually. Normally, I come into the lab and I normally have a little checklist of things that I want to do from the day before, but it’s all dependent on all the microbiologists and it’s all dependent on your bacteria and how they grow and how they’re behaving. So if I’m doing a lot of things, which involve, kind of bacterial rights, then I’ll kind of have to make sure that the other things went smoothly the day before. So that kind of determines a lot of my days as well. But normally it’s kind of just like running experiments, doing a lot of reading as well since I’m in my first year. So a lot of things as well as kind of like everything’s quite new as well. And obviously, it takes a lot longer to understand certain techniques as well and making sure that I get them right. So I spend a lot of time as well on the computer, just making sure that I am getting that understanding and knowledge behind all my experiments and kind of thoroughly researching properly. And yeah, then I’ll have a coffee break, and then more experiments. Honestly, busy days feel like five minutes. That’s the amazing part about lab-based  PhDs, it doesn’t feel like I’m working. Sometimes it feels like I’m just having fun. Speaking to my supervisor and she’s always like, No, you are working, people can’t do what you’re doing. And I’m like I know, I know but it just seems like I’m just messing around with a lot of different equipment. But I love the variety of it, even though obviously things will take time. And certain things won’t work the first time, so you kind of need to try them over and over again. I love that experiments can take five minutes up to, like, five days, you know, and there’s always a kind of moving puzzle and things we can you’re always doing different things. But they’ll all kind of merge together and create this again, like, where you’re saying, Heidi, this puzzle of what it’s supposed to look like, but there’s just so many different moving aspects. Yeah, a day for me is just random. It’s just all over the place. But I love it.

Heidi
When you talk to your Mum, I always ask people this question. When you talk to your Mum, does she know what you’re talking about?

Diana
Absolutely not. She just learnt the name of my degree, maybe I think the other day, honestly.

And no one really, I feel like nobody really knows. And it’s funny because when people like, you know, meeting someone new for the first time that’s not in my, sort of family or you know, my circle of friends. And someone asked, oh, what do you do? And you get to see that person try to explain. You’re just like, Oh, no, like, that’s not it, but good for you for trying. Yeah. No one gets it. Even when I explain it everyone’s like, oh, amazing. And then you hear two months later, What is it you actually do again?

Heidi
Yeah, that’s kind of like the peak of, we’ve made it now. People around us have absolutely no idea. We are the transponder.

Anna
We are just too complicated for words.

Heidi
Yeah, pretty much we’ve managed to confuse them into thinking that we have proper jobs, it’s wild.

Diana
Exactly, exactly. And it’s so funny. It’s always just like when they can’t explain it, it’s just we do something that’s really clever. I’m like, Yeah, I guess so.

Heidi
Because I remember my partner ages ago was like, you know, you’re one of the cleverest people I know. And also the most stupid, like, I’ll do stuff, I’ll put the dishwasher on and forget to put a dishwasher tablet in it, and he’s just like how do you how have you got this far? I don’t know.

Anna
There are just too many things going on in our brain

Heidi
Yeah, man. We all just need like nannies or something to do all of the like, the basic life functions for us. 

Diana
I know. That would be amazing. Oh my goodness, I would get so much done. Yeah, ever since moving, even moving out of home I’ve just noticed how much goes into just like, living! You have to come home and you have to cook then you have to wash dishes, then you have to get ready for the next day. Then you have to clean. Oh my goodness.

Anna
How do you balance it all? You know, if you have a really long day at the lab, obviously, you’re doing the science communication, you have to be creative, you have to do all this. And then you have to function as a human being. How do you do it?

Diana
I honestly do not know. I’m a lover of lists and to-do lists and reminders. So I normally would just kind of write things in a diary and like try and like make sure that I get things done and you know, in the time I’ve allocated and if I can’t, I’ll set myself a reminder. And honestly, I feel like there have been times with blogging for example that I’ve just said, I don’t have time for that right now. And frankly, it’s not the most important thing in my life right now. So I’m just gonna give myself time to live you know and actually function as a human being. We can get absolutely you can get so wrapped up in trying to be superhuman, but we’re actually not and the more you do that, the more you burn out and the more you end up hating what you’re doing anyway, so I just tried to check-in as well with myself like every so often and be like am I actually enjoying what I’m doing right now? No. Okay, like backburner and focus on what you need to do if that’s work or if that’s seeing your friends and making sure that you get to go home and spend some time even just by myself watching trashy TV shows. Check-ins are the thing that I use the most.

Heidi
So important as well.

Anna
I love Heidi’s Checklist with the how to say no.

Heidi
Oh, yeah. I think everyone needs that in their life. It was like someone had written it was a girl called Alex who had written a blog post for me and she was like, oh this is the technique that I use to say no to people, I was like, how have you not? Like made this like what are you talking about how you don’t need to know this? So I was like can I make it into a notepad? and she was like yeah if you want, like just so you know if you ever need one just come to me. I’ll give you them for free so I said I like five of them. She’s like, can I send one to this person? And this person? Oh, this person never says no to anything said one to them. Okay, great. So we like, post bombed them these little gifts from us. You need to just say no more often but after that I was like, this is an absolute freakin brainwave that this woman has had like how? How does no one ever coach you on how to say no, because, particularly in academia, you go through your undergrad and if you do a PhD, like you’re taught to say yes to all of these different opportunities, and like, look good for your CV, and all that kind of thing. And then you kind of carry that into adulthood, and then you just burn out. You don’t have enough time physically to do all of those things. So you have to draw the line somewhere because you have to have a life.

Anna
It’s toxic productivity, I think that all of them do that. And I saw you wrote a blog post about it, which I actually bookmarked, I love it. But yeah, it’s weird how that works.

Diana
Yeah, it’s just insane. It’s like, even though you know, you’re doing so much and probably much thing you should be doing, seeing someone else checking off a task on their list is like, Oh, my God, I need to do more, but you really don’t and it’s just such a cycle of constantly feeling that you’re not good enough, or you’re not doing enough work, or that you’re not gonna get your dreams and aspirations. I hate those like quotes and memes of like, you have the same hours in the day as Beyonce

Anna
Oh Bull!

Heidi
Beyonce has 24 hours, but she also has like a million other people around that also have 24 hours to do the stuff like, yeah, does my nut in.

Diana
Absolutely and even then I don’t want to be Beyonce. You know, it’d be amazing, but also like, I mediocre and average is, sometimes it’s okay, it’s needed. But everyone is built up to be like, these, you know, these people who do extraordinary things. That’s why they are in these positions. So yeah, I think the toxic mess of overworking is bull.

Heidi
I think like when you’re trying to write your thesis and stuff, obviously, your first year, I don’t want to scare you. You’re writing a thesis, my boss would always say to me, a good thesis is a done thesis, it doesn’t need to be this magical, life-changing thing. It just needs to be done to a point where someone else says like, yeah, that’s not rubbish. And then you can move on to the next thing, it’s not crap. So you’re fine. Move on. You need to put in as much time as you have, rather than as much time as you think is, like necessary for it. So yeah, totally get you with that whole toxic productivity thing. It’s, it’s a frickin nightmare.

Anna
Absolutely, and correct me if I’m wrong, but you went into your PhD from your undergrad?

Diana
So my undergrad was kind of became mixed, so it was a combined Master’s. So I did four years of biochemistry and microbiology. And then I did one year just a master’s in microbiology, but it was like the undergrad sort of. It wasn’t a separate Master’s. And then I went into my PhD.

Anna
Cool. How do you think that prepares you for your PhD? Like, was it a big jump? Or was it more of an ‘Okay, this is kind of a continuation of what I learned’?

Diana
I would say it’s kind of half and half. The only reason I say this is because I did an internship in my third year, which was industry-based. So I never really had a lot of lab experience apart from my teaching labs at university. And if anybody does teaching labs at University, they’re not great. You know you get an hour a week or something, I don’t know, three hours a week or something. And you don’t really learn much because obviously a lot of these are kind of like simulations if that makes sense, to kind of makeup experiments that are supposed to work If it doesn’t work they kind of give you the results you’re supposed to get. And so you don’t necessarily learn much, you know what it feels like to be in a lab and doing research. It’s kind of just trying to validate the knowledge that you’ve learned in class. So I don’t really do a lot of lab work. And so after my internship, I was really interested in industry, like industrial science. So for my fourth year, my honours project was an enterprise. So it wasn’t again, lab-based at all, it was actually kind of to do with business and science, which I absolutely loved. And the reason I chose that was because I knew that I’d have my Masters which is completely lab-based. So I had a set of sessions in the lab, which were amazing. I think that really prepared me for my masters. And that’s what made me choose to do a PhD anyway. So I was dead sure I was going to go straight to industry. And then I then completely changed my mind and chose to do a PhD instead that was lab-based. So they prepared me in the sense of I felt ownership of my project and masters level. And I got to understand how it feels like to kind of work you know, nine to five in a lab and do experiments etc. But the other Flipside was because I didn’t have as much experience in the lab, as others might have a didn’t prepare me in that sense. And also, my project is completely different. So wasn’t necessarily continuation in terms of knowledge. So again, I had to kind of like reverse and kind of learn what my new project is. So half and half, but I am still glad I did my masters. And I’m glad for the path that I took to get here.

Heidi
Yeah, I think that you pick up different things from whatever, like job or choice and thing you make. And particularly with a PhD, like you need all these different skills all the time. So even the skills that you don’t think you need like you’re going to pick them up from different areas. So like, even if you work a part-time job, in a shop,  those customer service skills are really helpful when you’re trying to argue with someone who doesn’t seem to understand the scientific point, all of it is going to help.

Anna
A piece of advice, honestly, to just even in like job applications, PhD applications, everything, you have you lived a life, you learned so much from you know, all the different things you do in your outside life, and people are so scared to talk about that. But you can have so many like, you learn, even if you had to argue with someone, and even have the same point, they thought the earth was flat, and you were convincing them that the Earth was actually round. Do you get my point?

Heidi
It’s a good point. Good point. It is it’s just like, you pick up skills all the time. And I think even Instagram, stuff like that. I think a couple of years ago, maybe a senior academics might have thought like that was kind of not a waste of time. But they might not have said those words, but they may have thought them like why are you spending your time doing that sort of, like communication online? And like why are you on Twitter and all these different things? And I think the longer it goes on that the longer they’re probably thinking like, Oh, right, that does make sense. Their arguments are more solid or they’re more developed and the communication skills are better and that kind of thing. And it helps as well with just like building a network like having like friends that know what’s going on in your in like the PhD life is a freakin lifesaver. Like, I remember a bad day PhD wise, like I’d come home and try and explain it to my partner. And you just you try and get it but he couldn’t because he hadn’t done it. And then I’d like put it on Instagram. I was like had a really annoying day like my results weren’t coming through and my data was really bad. And someone else would be like, Oh, yeah, that was me last week. But this week, it’s fine. Like, keep going, you’re cool. It was like little things like that always helps so much just to pull you, pull you through make sure you actually get to the end of it.

Diana
Absolutely. And I think especially like the past year, my first year was mostly in lockdown as well a quick, I got to go into the lab but this wasn’t what I was expecting. My first year is completely different to this sort of social aspect that I was excited about at PhD and even just the novelty of it kept me going for so long. But then it kind of obviously it kind of dissipated and I was just like oh my goodness this is all I do this is all I work is just life. So seeing people and Instagram, you know kind of talking about like their bad days. I mean even their good days as well kind of gave you that motivation, keep calling. And also made me realise I wasn’t alone at all, even though I have people in the lab that are going to does that same thing. It’s sad in a way but it’s nice to know people are also going through the same thing be it good or bad. So Oh my goodness. Yeah, the network aspects of any job or any PhD or whatever it is you’re doing is so important.

Heidi
Yeah, definitely. And do you think that makes more of a difference? Do you like seeing as though you’re sort of, like first gen and STEM sort of thing like the people like your family and stuff might not have had that same experiences? Is that like being more of a comfort for that reason?

Diana
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Because my Mum, you know, she doesn’t really understand and you know, she knows exactly what I’m doing, if that makes sense, she knows I’m still working, etc. But she doesn’t really understand what science is and that it can be frustrating. And that it is, it’s hard in it in a sense, you know, people think, oh, you’re clever, it must be quite easy to kind of do science or it also clearly must work, you just kind of get to, again, play around with equipment all day. But when you’re working on something that you don’t know, the answer to as you mentioned, Heidi, it’s so difficult to kind of keep your motivation and be like an actually made for this is this. Am I the right person to do this? So yeah, it’s quite hard to kind of like say, I’m having a bad day because of this, because they’re just like, Oh, well, it’s okay. Like, hopefully, you’ll get better. I don’t know. Well, but it’s, it’s hard.

Heidi
You don’t want to hear that.

Diana
Exactly, because no one really gets why the bad day was a bad day. Yeah, unless they actually do a lab-based PhD, or they just did a PhD, you know, and in general.

Heidi
It is funny, like trying to explain, like, I remember getting home one night and being like, well, I lost my USB stick. And I’ve lost five documents that took me this many hours to do, my partner was like, why don’t you save it on a hard drive? Like, that’s not the answer, like do not take that away from this. How did it take you this long to do five documents was like, You have no idea. But it is like you talk about it. And it just it’s not it doesn’t hit the same as to like the person who has had the same experience. And they’re suddenly like, Oh, yeah, you need to order Chinese food and like, lay on your sofa and not think about it. That’s the response I want, rather than like, oh, I’ll be fine. You’re like, shut up. I know, my rational brain knows I’ll be fine. I do not need to hear that from you.

Diana
Yeah, I want them to just grieve with me.

Heidi
Yeah, yeah, totally get you. I wanted to delve a little bit into it, like some of the blog posts that you’ve written? Yeah, basically, because I’m addicted to it. So I just go back, I have literally bookmarked so many of them be like, that is such a good point. I need to remember that.

Anna
You are the Fanclub.

Heidi
Literally, so good.

Diana
That’s so nice to hear, thank you.

Heidi
They’re so easy to read. Like, I’m just, I’m just going to fangirl over you for a sec. But to get to the bottom of the blog post now, like, Oh, actually, like, I understand something that I wouldn’t have understood without this. But it didn’t feel like that, you know, like, it doesn’t feel like you’re reading some like big educational thing. You’re just reading, like experiences. And this is what it’s like for you and that kind of thing. And I don’t work in the lab anymore. So I think I even you’re, like snapshots and stuff on Instagram of like, you’re going into the lab, and this is what you’re doing. Like that sort of stuff is completely over my head now because like my brain, it just falls out at the end of it. Like my PhD wasn’t in a lab. So the last time that I was, like 10 years ago, and it all just fell out. And now someone says Western blot. And I’m like, I don’t know what that is. When you explain it. I’m like, I get it. Totally. Yeah, I can do that. But yeah, anyway, after my fangirling moment, one of the things that you’d written about on your blog was like, it was talking about, like, microaggressions that you might have experienced. And one thing that really struck me was like, Oh, God, I didn’t even think of that was like language barriers. So in well, in the world of science, I guess the language of science is English, right? And you’d written on your blog posts, when you were younger, that your Mum was speaking to you in Swahili outside, and like, you were kind of embarrassed by that. And you’re like, Oh, don’t like English outside the house sort of thing. And I just wondered whether you could say a little bit more about, like, how that experience and how, like being bilingual might have changed your views on STEM or, like helped your views and stuff? Like how, how has that changed your experiences?

Diana
It’s a really good question. Actually, you know, I think a lot of immigrants kind of go through that whole phase of well, it’s sad that they do go through that phase of not wanting to have their culture anymore and kind of you know, try to assimilate and try to kind of get to the norm of at all, but I think I didn’t see science as a thing that I could do not until you know, I kind of was told by my teachers, I could do it. And that it seemed quite interesting because 1. my Mum never talked about it, obviously, because I didn’t know any scientist growing up, I didn’t know anybody that science anyone who studied science, so it was kind of all either traditional routes, or it was just get a job that can sustain your life. And that was good enough. So that wasn’t really a thing for me. And then when I can have obviously seen, I thought STEM was and I thought what scientists look like, it wasn’t anything like me. So that was, it was a hard thing to kind of like think of can I actually do it? Is it for me am I made for it? The language barrier was actually not too bad because luckily I got to learn English and when I was kind of firstborn in Kenya, we learn pretty much English in school as well. So in that terms that weren’t that difficult it kind of like get to know to learn a different language in that sense. So in that respect it was fine, but in terms of I guess, like your in a completely new world and having to kind of adjust to people thinking that you’re not made for something as well it’s quite difficult because you feel that you’re yourself that you might not be made for something. And then to kind of have other people thinking, oh, wow, like, whenever I would say something, and I used to have a part-time job at a supermarket, and people would obviously have, you know, make small conversations with you. And they would ask what I do, and I’d be like, well, I’m at university, they go, Oh, wow. Okay, what do you do? And I will tell them, you know, biochemistry and microbiology, they play Oh, wow. Really? I mean, you know, and it wasn’t just, it wasn’t a more like, Oh, well done. It was more like you are doing it, you know, and you could feel it. And it just, it does kind of break you down a little bit. Because if, yeah, because it’s a double. It’s a double-edged sword at the end of the day, you don’t think you’re good enough and then other people don’t think you’re good enough so are you really made for it? But luckily, it’s better now.

Anna
For you, you went to therapy right at the beginning of your PhD?

Diana
I did. Yeah. I did some therapy. Yeah.

Anna
Did you get any tools like to work with?

Diana
Yeah, I did. I think luckily, as well, I asked for a Black therapist as well, a Black female therapist, so and that was really important to me, because especially after last year, with what happened with the BLM movement, I realised the importance of having someone who is who understood your struggles, so that even in therapy I know that, you know, you’re not supposed to have the therapist isn’t supposed to necessarily bring their own experiences into it. But I knew that if I was talking about something, and someone didn’t understand it, how could they necessarily give me the tools and resources to kind of combat what was going through. So that was really important. And I think I’ve talked a lot about kind of that feeling of this even larger than imposter syndrome that can feel in all they know that people are out here to catch me out and make sure that I don’t excel. And even though it’s not being as unfair now like lead, not to know, to where I know, it’s gonna get harder and harder as I as I grow older, and the higher up in STEM that I go. So I kind of talked a lot extensively about this to my therapist, and, you know, I think, again, it’s that whole point we’re talking about earlier, but someone getting it, when you’re going through something bad. And it’s like, she wasn’t necessarily saying, Oh, it’s fine, you’ll be fine, you’ll get better. She was like, I know, it’s not gonna get better. She’s don’t sugarcoat anything. She validated my experiences, my feelings will develop because she says, you know, no, it’s not going to get better. But what are you going to do about it? So that gives me that kind of, I guess, motivations kind of say, Well, yeah, actually, well, I can moan about it all I like, and I’m not moaning, but you know, I’m, I can express how I feel as much as I like, but at the end of the day, yeah. What am I going to say about it? Am I going to make it better? Or am I going to fold and say, Yeah, okay, you win, you don’t want me to be in STEM? So I think that kind of constant thought of what you’re going to change about this situation? And what can you do to make it better for you and everybody else around you that are going through the same thing? That was the biggest tool that she gave me, my therapist gave me in terms of being a Black woman in STEM and how to combat certain issues.

Heidi
And that’s so important as well, like, when you’re going through anything STEM-related. Like, you’re always like pushed back, because that’s what we do. Like that’s the nature of the work. So you push until you find something that doesn’t work. And then you go back and troubleshoot. And then you push again until you find something else that doesn’t work. But when you’re doing that, it grates on you. And if you’ve also got a higher thing above you that say, like, yeah, you will find something that won’t work. Yeah, you can’t do it, you won’t be able to do that. Like that is a massive thing that I think at the minute stem in the UK is just not it hasn’t really acknowledged that it’s happening. And there’s a few like pockets of people who are like, right, we need to do something about this. Obviously, I’m a white woman. So it’s, I’m not trying to say like, you know, I’m centring it up, but I just I find it really difficult to get to like how, how have we got to a point where at universities are not they don’t have like a programme or some way to connect black women in STEM to other black women in STEM to be like, Look, we need you here we need, we need to make sure that we’re lifting you up for the whole time because the system is pushing down on you. So how can we like contribute to making that better? And it is like it’s just an ongoing issue that I think we just have to chip away out. And that sounds easy. And it’s easy for me because I’m not in the position of being pushed on but constantly having that on you is an awful lot and I think the fact that you’re so open about it is amazing. Like there’ll be well I know that there is because I’ve spoken to people. There’ll be young black students looking at your Instagram and being like Yeah like she’s absolutely nailing it. Like, why can’t I do that? Cool, I’m gonna go do it like, let’s do it, man, like and you get that like inspiration from you and you’re the content that you put out. It’s, there’s always like a series, it’s like, look you need to know about this but there’s always like a bit of optimism and a bit of let’s pull together and let’s change it I think that is why as soon as I found your page, I was like oh my god I need to like befriend this girl, I can’t even be cool about it anymore!

Diana
I guess why we connected as well as because I could see you doing the work too. And I think a lot of people get really nervous to kind of feel like they’re centring themselves on an issue that doesn’t necessarily impact them. But we’re all an issue. And at the end of the day, we’re just different points of it. So that’s why a lot of you and your page, because you acknowledge that I knew you say, Well, this is what I’m doing about it. Join me, you know, and it’s not necessarily about saying, because as much as we can, can all acknowledge the fact that there is racism and xenophobia and misogyny etc. in science and in STEM. acknowledging it is it’s okay, it’s just okay. And it’s just at the cusp is that a cusp with them, because if we don’t do anything now then it’s just gonna be a thing, we can chip away at it, we can demolish it, we can then build from that. So that’s why I think we did connect really well because I could see the work that you’re doing, which is so important, and that you support the work that I’m doing as well. And that at all, we’ll just build up into something much greater.

Heidi
We’re just like having a little love in here. Yeah, is it’s just like, for me, it’s about trying to get other white people to recognise that we’re usually the majority in a room and I said to someone the other day that I was sick of women in STEM initiatives because they’re always aimed at white women in STEM. And I stepped back from a couple of like, the events and stuff that I was doing, because I was like, all I’m doing here is perpetuating the problem, like, under the guise of it solving the problem, but it’s not solving the problem, because all we’re doing is bringing in more women, but they’re all white women. So is that really helping? Because I’m pretty sure that in like biology and life sciences and stuff because I’m in health sciences, I’m pretty sure that we’re majority women in a lot of cases, it’s just when majority white women, and that’s kind of the diverse bit where everyone’s like looking over it. And they’d be like, Oh, this woman in science event, I’m like, cool. We all grew up on the same freakin street here lads, it’s like, well, we all have the same references and yeah, nothing is, there’s no diversity when it’s just all the same white women in the room all the time. I think that as well as like, the thing that I think is really cool about Instagram is, the number of diverse faces and diverse voices that you hear because it’s not like I don’t think I’ve ever seen one of these like, you know, 15 women to follow in STEM things. They’re not all white, because they never are like, it’s a diverse group of people. Because you want to hear from different people. Like how is that revolutionary? I don’t know, at this point. But that’s where we’re at. I think like the, as you said, like the Black Lives Matter movement and stuff, had really drawn attention to it. And yeah, I’m hoping that there’ll be change. Have you seen any sort of like change and things within like your programme or your university or anything of things that they’ve might have done to strengthen what should be happening?

Diana
Kind of, there was actually an open letter, I think that was written to the university before I even got there. I think about their lack of diversity and just what they were doing. And I think they had got a response back. I never read all that because it was one of those ones where like, basically, they took like three months to write a response to something and they said what they were going to say, but I don’t think it was anything really that concrete, you know, there’s plans etc. In terms of my close lab, we talk about things quite a lot, actually, my supervisor is quite open and talking about you know, issues and race which is actually really good because it makes me feel comfortable that I can raise my concerns etc. And I don’t ever feel like I’ll be kind of ostracised or feel embarrassed to kind of come up just to say anything, or if I’ve got an issue to kind of raise that I think it will be dealt with quite quite quite well and quite quickly within my close lab group. But other than that, not necessarily anything huge. I wouldn’t say I always feel like it’s just again, it’s always just like, yeah, this is what we’re required to do, but it’s never actually made them to anything useful.

Heidi
Yeah, there’s a lot of talking. Do they ever get off their emails and just do the thing?

Diana
Exactly. I never really actually address it well, by not talking to people that are faced by these issues, they don’t really talk to the Black people in STEM or even other ethnic minorities. It’s all kind of like, they’ll decide what’s best moving forward, but then how is that going to ever impact the people that are actually been impacted by it. So I haven’t seen anything huge, necessarily. But I hope I hope soon, at some point, I think once I get my feet into my PhD as well, and also kind of solidify, you know, what I’m doing my PhD and everything, I’m gonna definitely start doing some more initiatives as well, like, that I can do personally within the university, and in my programme as well to help that.

Heidi
Yeah, I think it’s nice that you’re willing to do that because it’s not your job. I remember, there was an ad going around at uni a couple of weeks ago, saying if you want a mentor younger people and stuff, and it had particular groups that you’d be happy to mentor. So there were loads of people, people like women, being like we’re happy to mentor young girls and I said would be more than happy to mentor someone who doesn’t look like me. So whether it’s a Black boy or an Asian girl or a non-binary person from Spain, I literally, I could not care as long as they don’t look like me and I got an email back and she was like that wasn’t like on the sheet, like, it wasn’t that wasn’t one of the options, you were meant to tick a thing. And I was like, yep, moving on, moving on. It’s like computer says no at every point, it just doesn’t work. And I remember speaking to a girl a couple of weeks ago, who’s she’s from Malaysia originally. And her names, because they’re not Western names, they don’t fit in the university system because her passport name is not the same name as it is on like maybe her birth certificate or registration documents. And she had to come up with all these different like pages and pages of stuff and be like, Hey, so these six things are all my name – that is all me, and the university administrator was just like, Hmm, not sure about that. Your system doesn’t work for me. You have to change the system. Don’t expect me to put myself in the system. If something massive has happened after last summer, maybe we, all would have been a bit like, Hmm. What’s this about like a bit suspect because you don’t just want one massive thing. It needs to be sustainable as well. So yeah. Well, something huge might have been good. It will be better if there’s like 15 huge things, one after another, you know what I mean? Rather than this one kind of gesture

Diana
Absolutely. Yeah. Cause that’s the thing, a lot of institutions and companies try to do this big, massive gesture. But if you tell that it wasn’t genuine and it wasn’t sustainable, as you mentioned, it wasn’t ever going to want in the long-term because they were just trying to show face and that. It’s not that it’s not what they actually intended to do. So yeah, absolutely. Small steps toward genuine steps will definitely that’s the big picture.

Heidi
Yeah and I think that’s all over the next, maybe five or six years, we’ll start to see people like you, like coming out of your PhD programs and like holding a position of power where you’re like, yeah, you can call me doctor, come on, let’s do this. I’ve earned it. And now what can I do? Like which role can I go into now? And then. I think I keep going back to Instagram, but I just think it’s so powerful that people like those have all kind of come together and be like, we all got to change something. Like we might not be in a position where we’re hiring people yet, but at some point, we will. And at that point, the hiring practices are going to change to how they are now because they’re not working for anyone. So yeah, I’m, I’m cautiously optimistic that we are going to have like. I always say like when all the white, old, white professors die, but I don’t actually mean not just me one at a time.

Diana
I hope so. But then also the good thing about social media, I think as well, is that, that, that when you do get a copy of the big ball, when are you, when you am, have even a smaller one, but when you have an audience of any capacity, people are listening to what you’re seeing. So that, that will subconsciously kind of change the way you think anyway. Um, and make you question a lot of things that you hold true to yourself where you kind of had a belief about it. So you might change that. So that will, I think, impact as well, the professors and the academics and the same, you know, the people power that we have in future because I think if we all kind of just sit in our own little silos, we would have just had exactly the same beliefs and everything would just take over as it has been. So that’s, that’s going to be amazing to see it.

Heidi
Yeah, definitely.

Anna
I was just curious about – because you’ve talked about having an audience and like an Instagram following and then obviously there’s a lot of people out there reading your blog posts. Do you have any like plans for developing this communications side further?

Diana
Yes, I do. And I think it’s all just if I’ve got the time and honestly, I’ve got so many ideas and so many things I want to do, but it’s sometimes I’m just like, it’s okay. You know, just focus on one thing at a time, but it’s actually coming up to my one year anniversary on Monday, which is going to be so exciting. I’ve kind of recapped what’s happened in the past year., what I’ve loved and what I haven’t loved so much. And what my ambition was was to have an online magazine sort of thing as well. So what I’m planning to do in the next year or so it’s definitely kind of more collaborations kind of trying to get more people on the blog, like guest posts and kind of understanding how we’re all interlinked and try to get different perspectives from different women in science and non-binary people as well. Just trying to kind of open up a network. I want to, I want it to be a welcome platform, but it’s not for me necessarily, but for people just to kind of see different perspectives and during the conversation and, you know, kind of raise a topic and say, what do you think about this? And to kind of get that engagement interaction going on. So that’s kind of one thing. And then also one thing that I’ve had in the back burner, but I’m going to definitely do. Is a little series called Diana lab bench and, like mini little series,  kind of like follow me around in the lab, seeing different techniques, kind of open up that world of microbiology that people don’t necessarily know just showing what it’s like to be scientists, and make an accessible for people. Because I think one thing that I’ve seen a lot of people doing in science communication and I’m a victim to it as well as try to make science accessible, but it’s not really still. People still don’t understand what the, what you’re talking about because you’re using scientific terms or you think that your audience is more scientific as well. You think they understand you but they don’t really, and even certain science might not be. Biology, you know, so trying to open up and what I do to more people so they can see like, oh, I can do that. You know, yes, it’s hard, but every job is hard if you think about it, so you know, you might not have the skills to do whatever the person’s doing, but if it seems accessible, then it can be.

Heidi
It’s a cool way to kind of nudge collaborations as well. So I’ve been doing lots of inward swearing at the lack of like social scientists and stuff in the field that I work in. I’m like, I just need to find this person. So I keep finding people and being like you, I need to speak to you. And then I’ll email them. And they’re like, why do you want to speak to me? You do nothing that’s related, but it’s, if you know their methods and you know, how they do stuff, then other people can like translate it into their own sphere. So even if you’re like explaining how to do a Western blot, which clearly I’m obsessed with today, I’ve just got like scarring from like my undergrad dissertation, – which we had a, complete side note, but, me and my friend, Anna were in the same lab and we were trying to do this Western blot and it was in the middle of February. And our hand-in date was like, end of March and we just cried for the entire day, but it got to the point where you were like crying, laughing, crying, laughing. But yeah, someone else look at it and be like, oh, she’s doing that, I could use that in my research. I think that cross-collaboration can make science, so much stronger than it currently is because we’re not, we tend to work in very heavy silos of like you do health stuff, So you’re over there, you do microbiology. So you’re over there. And like you just said obviously, the methods are hard, but you use the same methods that your professor and the people before you have done. And we’ve kind of lost that like crosstalk between different areas where you’re like, Ooh, they do that, maybe we could tweak that a bit kind of making that a bit more open and stuff I think is a really cool idea to try and even just to be like, right, you don’t have to do microbiology, but this is how I do this.

So, we always ask our guests a top tip or Pearl of wisdom for you to give our listeners. So is there anything that you, like you learned and then you wish that someone had told you like earlier or something that you’re like, everyone needs to know this, if they’re doing like a career in STEM?

Diana
Well, it’s nothing revolutionary, but I don’t think any pearls of wisdom really ever are? They’re just reminders to keep on going. So the one Pearl of wisdom that I would give is to back yourself because I think when you are, especially for students or are in STEM, you always feel imposter syndrome. You always feel like you’re not really made for something, and people will be quick to push their excuses on you and say, maybe you shouldn’t do this. They will think they know you better than you know yourself, but at the end of the day, you have to live with your decisions. So if you feel something in your gut and in your heart that to do something just back yourself and that’s what you’ll have to push you through. If it doesn’t work out, that’s okay. You know, life moves on and you get to change and you get to move on, but stop letting your excuses or other people’s get in the way. Have faith in whatever you’re doing.

Heidi
That’s so important. Perfect sign off right? Back yourself to the extent of a mediocre white man.

Diana
You’ll get anywhere in the world.

Heidi
You will probably be the prime minister at some point anyway, politics. Obviously, we’ll leave your blog links and stuff in the show notes so people can go and follow them. Is there anything else that you want to share?

Diana
Just remember that there are other people in STEM that aren’t as privileged a possession as you are. So just keep pushing, keep pushing for accessibility at all levels. And that’s not necessarily just ethnic minorities. There are people who don’t conform to the same gender that you do. There are people who have disabilities, et cetera, et cetera, the list goes on. So just keep pushing, make sure that as accessible as possible for everybody.

Heidi
Yeah, it is, and we shouldn’t need a reason for it, but sometimes you need a reason because people disagree. So we need diversity. We need a completely different melting pot of what, what science should look like because otherwise the science then doesn’t apply to anybody. If it doesn’t work for everyone, then it doesn’t work for anyone.

It’s like what I’m trying to hammer in, in my like day job life, because when you go through the categories, I think particularly in like stuff related to health and like microbiology of what we fit in here as well, like. W when you say like, oh, it doesn’t work for pregnant women. It doesn’t work for older people. It doesn’t work for Black people. It doesn’t work for people whose first language is not English like this huge, huge, huge list. And what you’re left with is a massive thing where it’s like this group, it doesn’t serve. Or this one group writes privileged, you know, fluent in English, white middle class, probably retired. Versus everybody else. And you’re like, how did we get to the point where there’s one group and it only applies to them. So it literally doesn’t apply to the rest of the world and the rest of the world in this case, or a majority. So do something. And I was like, make it work, make it make sense. And then make it work.

I just think it’s like, it’s a group of us just chipping away. Like your blog, like educated me without feeling like I was being educated and we need more of that. Like we just need so many. And like pay people. Like you shouldn’t have to write a blog that’s free and put your time into it and stuff so that I can be educated. Like, geez, man, come on. People should be paid to be in that position. Like, why don’t we have universities where they’re like, you should be blogging for your uni to be like, look, this is what it’s like in this situation. Not pointing at Newcastle cause I’m a northerner and we love you

So at the end of every episode, we always allow our guests free space to plug, if you want to give us a rundown of the things where people can find you online?

Diana
Awesome. So you can find me on Instagram at An Abundance of Melanin. My blog name is also An abundance of melanin.com and my Twitter is just my full name.

Heidi
Thank you so much for being our guest!

Diana
Thanks so much for having me on it, was so much fun!

Find out more about Diana and her work here:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/anabundanceofmelanin/
Blog: https://www.anabundanceofmelanin.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/dianagithwe

This week we launched the first season of the Little Science Co podcast, Little Science Talks – hoorah! The first season of the podcast focuses on generational influences in STEM. Little Science Co Founder, Heidi Gardner will be joined by her co-host Anna Kebke, along with a different guest for each episode.

You can listen to the episode in full using the Acast player above, the full episode’s transcript is below if you’d prefer to read along.

In our first episode we are joined by Trainee Psychologist, Sanna Rehman. We explore if and how Sanna’s South Asian background and cultural experiences played a role in her decision to study a STEM subject. She explains how her passion for breaking down the barriers that women and girls from South Asian backgrounds can face stems from her own experiences of struggling to meet expectations, pressures and demands throughout her childhood. Sanna has worked hard to fight against these stereotypes to pursue her own goals, and in this episode she shares her experiences of studying psychology, and why being one brown face in a sea of not so brown faces that work in mental health is something seemingly small that can contribute to chipping away at.

Heidi 
Hello, and welcome to Little Science Talks. This is our first episode of season one and today we are joined by Sanna Rehman. Sanna, can you tell us a little bit about yourself?

Sanna 
Hi, my name is Sanna. I’m from Glasgow currently, living in Edinburgh and I work as a Trainee Clinical Associate in Applied Psychology. So very much in the psychology field, I guess for some context, I’m 24, so I still feel like a baby in my career. Yeah, that’s a quick intro into me.

Heidi 
I think we all feel like babies in our careers! I’m 29. And I’m still like, yeah, no, not doing it. I had a conversation with my Mum this morning, and she was like, “Are you still going to uni?” And I was like… “I work there now”, it’s not quite the same, Mum.

Anna 
Yeah, I think Heidi and I were talking about me even having a baby and still feeling like a baby!

Heidi 
We’re all just winging it, like all of us all the time, just winging it. And the older you get; you just realise more people around you are winging it too.

Sanna  
And what’s scary is like, whenever someone talks about when you graduated, and that was like, seven years ago, 10 years ago. That’s pretty terrifying.

Heidi 
Yeah, that’s getting me right in the ‘Oh God, what’s happening?’ My partner just turned 30 as well. And that was just enough of like, oh, God.

Anna 
Although, the past year hasn’t really counted. You know, we can just take away 12 months.

Heidi 
I like that!

Anna 
Yeah, we get a year back.

Heidi 
Yeah, sure. So I’m actually just gonna be 28 now and you can just be 23, and so on. So we’re good. Amazing. Excellent.

So, I guess in this episode, we wanted to talk a little bit about your experiences getting into STEM. I know that you’re based in the psychology field, which is an area that I don’t know a huge amount about. I’m looking forward to learning a bit from you from that. Can you just give us a bit of an overview of your career? So where have you been? And how have you got to where you are now?

Sanna 
Definitely. So, I guess it all kind of starts with you know, psychology is your base. I did psychology as my undergrad, and it was accredited by the BPS or British Psychological Society. And that’s quite important if you ever want to move on to doing anything where you’re qualified if you’re treating clients, things like that. So that was my undergrad. And then I didn’t really do much during uni in terms of you know, extracurriculars or jobs that were relevant to my degree, I think I was quite focused on surviving. And that’s definitely what happened during undergrad. And then after undergrad, I kinda came away from psychology, thinking I wasn’t going to pursue it. And this is the kind of problem I foresee with the area is that there’s kind of lots of negativity. That’s because it’s quite a long road to actually achieving, like a clinical psychologist role or something where you’ve got a doctor, the beginning of that title. And it’s not often talked about until you’re kind of in the first year or you’re applying for your psychology degree. So on the surface, yeah, you’ve just graduated, you’ve done four years of psychology, you’ve got all this knowledge and research behind you. But actually, you’re not qualified to do anything other than have a sort of BPS accreditation to say, you can do something if you want to. So off the back of that, you probably will want to do a Masters just to help stand out from the crowd. And if you want to pursue something psychology wise, you’re looking at doing a doctorate at some point, but then to go on to that doctorate, you need lived experience, you need professional experience. So I had decided that, nope, that was far too much of a long road for me, I’m not going down that road, I’m not doing four years of undergrad, a year saving for my master’s, a master’s, and then, you know, three, four years working in jobs. And then a three-year doctoral training programme, it felt like a lot. And I guess I was quite focused on enjoying my 20s and trying to make money in my 20s or not want to really sort of in low paying jobs for a really long time.

So I stepped out of it after undergrad and decided I was gonna do something else and actually ended up being a project coordinator and eventually a project manager for an IT company, which is totally random. But one thing I’ve learned is that you can make anything sound transferable. And that’s kind of what I did when I decided to come back to psychology. So I suppose the long road short is that I spent a year doing not health, not science, not psychology, and missed it so much. I ended up taking volunteering experience with the Sick Kids hospital in Edinburgh and then coming back to do my masters. It was basically Health Science at Aberdeen and then naturally fell back into doing mental health research, psychology research, and that’s why I’m doing the current training programme that’s also masters currently, so had a range of experiences I’ve worked with health in Edinburgh remotely. I’ve worked for a journal, Sexual and Reproductive Health Matters for a little while as an intern, which is amazing. So what kind of range of experiences but definitely a looping background to the first step.

Heidi 
Yeah, I was gonna pick up on that as well because when you turned over your information and stuff before we started talking, and I think you already had a Masters so then you were doing this other one I was like, “How is she doing this?

Anna 
Superwoman!

Heidi 
Yeah, but how did you find the process of doing your first Masters? So I guess when you said to like your family, I’m going to go back to uni and do this Masters. What were they thinking? Like, what was their reaction?

Sanna 
I think I’m super fortunate in that the Masters I’m currently doing is… I call it a Masters because that’s what you get when you finish, but it’s also a paid programme. So, it’s really unique. It’s run by both Stirling and Dundee and NHS Education for Scotland, and I’m employed by NHS Lothian. So lots of recruitment, different areas. Even though it’s a second Masters, I guess I’m not shelling out 10 grand this time, and I’m being paid, which is amazing, especially in psychology, where there’s just so much association with sort of low paid lower roles, and you know, to get to where you want to get to making those sacrifices. So, actually, I think it was kind of met with joy that there was actually going to be in a full-time job for more than a year.

Heidi 
It’s a big thing, particularly when you’ve had to save up for the first time and then you’re like, oh God, now I need to do the second goal. How am I going to sustain myself? How am I going to eat? The uniqueness of that programme is really important as well, that must be a really good way to get various groups as well into that sort of area, because if you’re getting paid, obviously, you’ve not got that battle. Is it like quite a diverse cohort that you’re in? Is it a small group? Tell me a bit about it.

Sanna 
I suppose it’s …I think it’s diverse. And I say think because I’ve never met any other trainees other than seeing them on Microsoft Teams, and Zoom and stuff and our WhatsApp group, I think we’re fairly diverse. And there are lots of people from different countries, which is really, really great, that’s really nice to see. And I suppose in particular, in terms of access, there are 40 of us this year. And I think that we had 350 applications. Last year, I think there was only 30, it’s actually been running for 15 years, but I think they’re slowly trying to increase the number of trainees year on year to get more people into the workforce to have more CBT therapists to treat more people, ideally. So yeah, we’re increasing in number, which is really nice. I remember the biggest year we’ve had so far. And I think we might actually get to meet each other at some point in the year with some face-to-face teaching. We do a week of teaching every month, and then we’re just sort of on placement and studying the rest of the time.

Heidi 
When you first started that first Masters had anybody else in your family? Did they have experience in STEM? Like what was your sort of background and upbringing?

Sanna 
That’s a really good point. So I suppose I was, no one else had a Masters, and no one else had an undergrad and my family. I was the first person in my little family to have gone to university and was the first person on my Dad’s side of the family to have gone to university as well. Actually, when I think a bit more about my parents sort of attainment, I think my Dad barely finished high school, and my Mum sort of started college but dropped out. So they had never been, which is perhaps why it was more of a push for me to go to University. I suppose the disclaimer is, I was really fortunate to have gone to private school. But that also maybe comes with a bit of difficulty in that there was lots and lots of pressure to do well, there was never any conversation about not going to University, that was not an option. And kind of related to that, I suppose that there was perhaps more pressure to study something that was STEM, something that was either STEM business, or you know, law because I came from a South Asian background and your education is generally important because your job is incredibly important. It’s important to be financially stable to look after your family to possibly look after your parents when you’re older. Or at least that was the experience of the community and culture they came from. There was never any conversation about, you know, pursuing drama, or art or anything like that, so I never actually considered anything with those kinds of subject areas. I think I briefly considered, you know, perhaps social work or speech and language therapy, but came to where I am now very much with the cultural background that I’m from as well. And that pressure to go to uni, to do well, and you need to do well in school to get to uni as well.

Heidi 
Yeah, I think there’s quite a big, not necessarily a stigma, but I think you phrase it as a push and I do think that’s right, my Mum didn’t go to Uni, and there was never a question that I wasn’t going to uni, because there was just this, normalisation of that’s what you do. The people in your school are going to uni, so you’re going to uni. It’s never ‘are you going to go?’, it was always a, w’here are you going to go?’ ‘what are you going to study?’ sort of thing. I do think that is kind of maybe, it’s like a subconscious thing in parents minds when they haven’t gone they’re like, right, we’ll give you a little nudge and maybe help you along that way.

Sanna 
Perhaps parents think about the opportunities they might have had if they had gone to university and you know, they want the best for us really, naturally and that’s perhaps why they’re so keen for us to not be restricted in the way that they feel like they might have been restricted and, you know, for us to have an amazing future and no glass ceiling. What better way to ensure that? That was perhaps the mindset at that point when, you know, you didn’t need a degree to get certain jobs?

Heidi 
Yeah, definitely.

I wanted to talk a little bit as well because you mentioned your South Asian heritage. And I think when we’ve spoken earlier, you’ve mentioned your gender as well as being quite a sort of forceful, you know, women in STEM and, and thinking about representation that way, rather than it just being like a heritage thing. Are you able to unpick that a little bit about, you know, how your parents and your family might have reacted to things? Was it? Because you’re a girl? Was it because you’re from a South Asian background? Are you able to unpick it I guess?

Sanna 
So, I suppose, kind of yeah. I think I was always really encouraged to pursue science or a degree of sort of that kind of stability in a profession that would really give me a stable future and you know, stable finances and a good home life and something that was perhaps good to be done part-time when I became a mother. That was definitely the type of conversations being had at the time. I remember kind of been steered away from perhaps certain subjects, that would have been seen as more masculine at the time.

So, something perhaps closer to engineering, that maybe would have been too demanding on what would have been Mum life or something that would have taken up too much time, wouldn’t have left me enough time to, you know, cook dinner or something like that, I’m kind of breaking it down to, you know, the real basics of what kind of things would be going through their heads. But that was, that was quite evident, I think, and the ways in which I was encouraged to pursue some things, and not others.

But it was actually what was not said, that kind of pushed me towards psychology. So going way back, I think the original reason for pursuing psychology was actually because my little brother, who is now around, I guess, 13, now 12 to 13. Around 10 years ago, we adopted him into our family. So I ended up getting lots of exposure to social workers, and what it was like to be in contact for looked after child and then eventually speech and language therapy because he had some difficulties.

I started to look into, I’ve never heard of these health professionals before, because they just didn’t come into my world is that something I could have a look at, look at social work looked at speech and language, and language quite related to developmental psychology, one of the branches, so pursued psychology sort of off the back of that. But I think what brought me back after spending a year out psychology back into it was the cultural side. I suppose it’s what’s not said, that brought me back. And there’s just not really conversation about your mental health, in my experience when you’re from certain communities. I’m British Pakistani, I’m from a South Asian community, and I suppose I will tend to talk a lot about South Asia instead of British Pakistani, I’ve never actually had the pleasure of going to Pakistan. So a lot of my sort of influences turned to tend to mix it a little bit with different areas, India, different regions, things like that. And growing up, you just didn’t ever hear the words anxiety or depression. No one ever spoke about your emotions or your feelings. And that was just my experience of it. And so I think that over time, I started to realise that I actually didn’t want that to be the case or not to continue to be the case for, you know, like future individuals that were actually having difficulty with these areas, and would therefore really benefit from input from professionals from, whether that’s research scientists looking at how to do you know how to better treat individuals that were from diverse backgrounds, for actually just getting help from an individual that’s maybe from a diverse background themselves.

I kind of realised I wasn’t hearing any I hadn’t heard any of those words, haven’t seen anyone that looks like me, that worked in this field. I think the first time I ever did was when I’d already decided to pursue psychology. And I met a family friend who was a trainee on the clinical, sort of, doctoral programme, which was really great to start to speak to someone about what that involves. I think for me, it kind of comes back to wanting to add my coin to the big sort of foundation of representation because I just don’t think that it’s there. And there’s a sense of comfort and seeing or being with what’s familiar, we like the familiar as human beings, it helps us feel safe, it helps us to feel secure. And so I would really like to start to contribute to that to be one brown face and a sea of not so brown faces that work in mental health and work in psychology and work in primary care. I think that that’s the thing that kind of keeps driving me to keep going with coming back to psychology with trying to pursue and get to where I want to go, and it’s to improve that. And I guess that kind of touches on the work that I did with the journal sexual reproductive health matters. Half of that was a great experience, but half of it was just to have my name associated with the words sexual reproductive, because those are not things that are comfortably typically spoken about, in perhaps a South Asian home. And it’s not even to be it’s just not really acceptable to be on so part of it is, you know, I want to get experience working for an academic journal, wouldn’t that be amazing, and maybe I could do some work and it could get, you know, shared somewhere or published somehow. But it’s also to just start to be someone that can start to have conversations with other people from where I’m from, about your sexual health, about the fact that you have rights. And if you have these difficulties, no, there are actually people you can talk to, you don’t kind of need to suffer in silence, or you shouldn’t ever have to. So I think it’s the lack of communication from perhaps my cultural experiences that keep bringing me to want to pursue this line of work.

Anna 
I just had a question pop up about the whole sexual health, like stigma, I suppose, in the, in the community, because, I imagine, you’d have some reactions from people around you just like talking about it, because, like, I come from a Russian background, and it’s kind of the same there that, you know, depression and anxiety, and burning out doesn’t really exist. And, you know, it’s kind of seen as, you know, weak at times, if you do, and there’s a little bit of a stigma as well of sexual health and, and all of that. So just really curious to hear. How the reactions were?

Sanna 
Yeah, I think I’m still in the early days yet. So I haven’t really, perhaps had the chance because I actually did start to work for the journal during the pandemic. I think it’s been quite limited in terms of really starting to go, like deeper into those conversations. And I think that it’s still quite difficult, because still to this day, to start to try and have that kind of conversation, you’re going to come up against a barrier. And I think it’s, it’s really hard and difficult, I just don’t think we’re there to have variable conversations. But I think even just starting to contribute to like literature, and articles and research to have all of that out there, to have things like online support groups to have different websites have different charities popping up. But hopefully, with the increased presence of doing things like talking really openly about your sexual reproductive health, about your mental health, related to culture, and start to challenge some of those barriers, some of those stigmas as well, that will hopefully start to normalise what’s going on for a lot of people so that ideally, over time, you start questioning it less, or at least the individuals that would question the appropriateness of speaking about any of us can have the conversation, any of these topics that will hopefully naturally take a bit of a decline. I think it very feels like baby steps, and to even have, I guess, worked for them at this stage or have entered them with them for a small amount of time, it’s almost quite a lot to even just put, like, put on my LinkedIn, the fact that, you know, I interned with them for four months, and quite proud of that. I mean, I didn’t do anything groundbreaking with them by any means. It was very much sort of critiquing research and giving them reports and things like that, but just to start to be associated with the organisation with their name, it feels really great. And, you know, to be able to meet younger individuals that are from different backgrounds and cultures and start to talk to them about what I did one summer, what I did in my masters and what I learned and get their take on it is really nice. But I think it’s hard because you’re always going to come up against a bit of a barrier, particularly with older generations, where it might just remain difficult to have those for a little while. But we can still work in other areas to continue to improve it.

Heidi 
Yeah, I think it’s important as you said, even just to be there, just to be seen in research, because, I say this as a bit of context, I guess my like day job in my adult grown-up life. I work in research on a lot of the stuff I’m doing at the moment is on inclusivity in clinical trials and trying to get a more representative population. So a patient population and a trial should just look like every member of society. But it doesn’t, it never does. It always looks like a group of white, middle class, usually approaching retirement age people. And that I think is all really down to the fact that we don’t have representation and research because every time I’m trying to write a grant application for something like that, I’m thinking, I don’t want the whole research team to be white. And then you kind of go on this awful journey, like, oh, who can I think of to work with? You might have this experience and then you don’t want to be, you know, going to people because they’re Brown, because that’s not where you want to go. You just want everyone to be available and happy and able to work in an area where they want to work. I think yeah, as you said, just being that representative face is so important because you then other people looking at LinkedIn might be thinking, oh, maybe I could intern with that journal, maybe I could intern with another journal. I think it’s just it’s super important and absolutely good on you! I know that if I was even thinking of interning with the Sexual Health Journal, I know that I would blush telling people. Good for you!

Anna 
Giggle and blush!

Sanna 
I think that what you said is so interesting about how your samples often are older white males, particularly like, what are the reasons for that? Is it because they generally have more time do they retire earlier? Do they have higher-paying jobs where they have more time to spend on these things? I think that that relates a lot to why clinical psychology is not diverse enough, and we’ve got a lot more to do in that area. It’s why I like talking about how the road for psychology is so long, and it’s so off-putting because you also have no guarantee that all of these, you know, hours and years that you’re paying into all of these different jobs will actually guarantee you a place on seeing the clinical doctorate to then be a clinical psychologist. And part of that problem is that there are lots of roles that have been made that are voluntary roles, but they often come close to what a paid part-time role would be. So quite a popular one is the Assistant psychologist role, it’s kind of hailed as the gold standard to almost guarantee you a golden ticket to get into the doctorate. And a lot of organisations for universities have created an honorary assistant psychologist role. But to be able to take that role, you need to be wealthy enough to give up half a day or a day of your time. Sometimes it’s more, it’s two days. So you start to get what is a very different picture in your workplace in your psychology field of individuals who are from a wealthier background, who can afford to take time off, who can afford to only work three days a week and due to volunteering to then get into the doctorate one day. And what ends up happening is your workforce becomes middle class, and generally quite white. And I suppose that it’s generally a bit of an off-putting influence in terms of even trying to crack into your future as a clinical psychologist, which means you’ve got even less diversity because you’re stopping before you’ve even claimed the first rung on the ladder, because you’re like, what’s the point?

Heidi 
Yeah, totally understand that, I guess that then plays into the taboos and the lack of sort of openness and transparency around mental health. Because if there’s not somebody that looks like you in that clinic when you go get help, suddenly you might feel oh God, I’m just the only one in my community that is suffering, or that is experiencing this and so I’m not going to talk about it, because it’s embarrassing, or it’s stigmatised, and it’s just not something that I want to share with people. It’s almost like a vicious cycle of, there isn’t enough diversity, there aren’t enough diverse faces in the workforce. Therefore, the patients are not diverse enough, the whole design of the service then fails, essentially in it. That’s exactly what I’m finding in researchers. All of the trials are essentially built, designed, conducted, run by white middle-class people, and then we get shocked why they’re full of white middle-class people. I’ll tell you why. That’s why.

Sanna 
I find that through doing the current programme, I’ve naturally found myself paying a lot more attention to, you know, culture and diversity matters, when we’re delivering therapy, we should treat everyone as equals we should, you know, go into clean slate every single time is that practitioners psychologist or is that their therapist? And so why would you want to bring culture, diversity, or religion or sexuality into the room. And there’s an individual, I think that they’re American, and they have the surname Hayes, and they have a book on sort of approaching cognitive behavioural therapy with a culturally diverse approach. And they give us really nice case study where they have this psychologist in America who the therapist, and they’re treating a South, or let’s say, an East Asian client, and these Asian clients quite depressed, and they come in with lots of difficulties, which seems to be fueled by lots of arguing at home with their parents. And a therapist is like, you know, be independent, you should really challenge the arguments happening with your Mum and your Dad, you know, really try, maybe move out, like and tries to really encourage them to do things that are related to, you know, being really independent, being really individualist. But perhaps the client actually feels that’s really disruptive, or that really is that sort of mismatch with their own ideals, their own beliefs, and that would cause a lot of pain at home, and then they start to lose trust or faith in that therapist, and then they don’t actually have a good treatment outcome. And I suppose if you had a more culturally sensitive approach to that, you would have assessed what their, what their diverse needs are, what their beliefs are, what their religion and culture is, and realise that actually, more collectivist community families are really important, staying together in the family home is really important, you know, having a sort of letting go attitude instead of a confrontational one. That’s also really important. So the culturally diverse therapist would come in and actually maybe suggest some techniques to help them release anger, or aggression, or some conflict resolution strategies. Instead of doing things like saying, you should move, you should do that. Let’s look at how to help you and only you and they kind of dismiss the wider picture. So I think that over this year, I’ve started to really understand the importance that diversity plays, even when we should be taking a bit about blank slates to our therapy, and that, you know, and as individuals, we’re just too complex to treat, based on our expectations, or even what we think someone will present as a difficulty into the room.

Heidi 
I guess as well, the people that are often saying, let’s treat with a blank slate approach. To me, they’re usually white, because they assume that the blank slate is white. And so they’re like, Well, you know, this is the baseline, this is the majority. And instead of then, reframing their view of the majority is not everyone, it’s just a majority. Like, there’s still loads of other people. That I think is, it’s just telling of the way that medicine and psychology and research and the whole, every area of STEM really, particularly that the health areas and aspects of it. Riddled with privilege, aren’t they? It’s just, yeah, okay, the baseline is white. Let’s, work from there and it just doesn’t work for everyone.

Anna 
Yeah. And it’s hard to go against, your upbringing and your culture and the whole thing, like, you can’t go and confront your parents if that’s not what you’ve grown up with. But then if you’re told, go confront them, go tell them you’re moving out, you’re leaving them, you know, it’s not going to work. So it’s actually really opened my eyes to this.

Heidi 
It must be a very difficult situation to be in when you are that, that client, when you’ve got somebody, a psychologist on one side, because then you’re almost between a rock and a hard place, because neither of them are giving you the good treatment outcome that you need to then make sure that your family life is settled, and therefore you’re settled.

Sanna 
It’s so hard because there’s been some research as well, which I can’t cite, because it’s just sort of generally being taught to us, you know, on slides with bullet points without any citations on as to where that’s come from. And it talks about why we might not be, you know, taking a diverse or cultural approach to assessing and treating our clients. And despite the fact that it wasn’t referenced or anything, it was actually so refreshing to see on paper, what is the truth, and it’s that we’re so scared of offending our clients and our patients, we don’t ever want to cause them further distress by seeing the wrong thing. At any point. We don’t know enough necessarily about their culture or, or their beliefs to feel like we can confidently navigate the field, we’re perhaps too blinded by our own biases to even consider the fact that this is something we should be doing. And it’s just quite sad, quite refreshing to see, someone actually say that it makes us really uncomfortable to talk or ask someone about their culture when we don’t really have much of an understanding of it. But then even if you do have an understanding of it, each individual’s experience can be completely different. So you do need to explore each time. It’s just quite nice seeing that, you’re not the only one who’s uncomfortable navigating these awkward conversations at times, but it does need to happen.

Heidi 
They are, they are awkward conversations and as well, I think, again, as part of the research that I’m doing, I keep doing this, I’m sorry, but it is relevant, I swear. So I’m writing a paper at the moment about why we should report ethnicity and trials because at the moment, there’s no UK standard for it. There’s no like government push or mandate or anything like there is in the US, but they do it terribly, so I just don’t want us to replicate the crap that they’re doing. I think for us, the things that I’m talking about all the time of people are like, yes, but you can have that conversation, we can be open, you tell people about your culture, and they might tell you about that and if they’re not comfortable, that’s okay. But just plant the seed, you know, make that relationship, or sort of build that relationship, I guess, and I guess with psychology, it’s even more important because it’s, it’s such a personal connection with your therapist, as to whether that treatment outcome is successful or not. And I just, I can’t even imagine not understanding about the person in front of you, I guess. Like, do you when you’re doing like a consultation? Obviously, you haven’t done things yourself at the moment because you’re still in training. But how does that initial consultation process go? Are you supposed to, just find out about them? Or is it their culture and their background and stuff too?

Sanna 
So I suppose this is actually quite helpful to note, but as a trainee on the programme, my speciality that I’m training in is Cognitive Behavioural Therapy. And the reason for that is that it’s what we have most research looking at, it’s with so many RCTs I’ve had a look at the efficacy of CBT for a range of different disorders. And because it’s generally shown to be the most sort of effective and fairly cost-effective, it’s quite a short-term brief. It’s you know, anything from 8 to 20 sessions, as opposed to years of psychoanalysis and Freudian stuff like that. It means that it’s a good option for the NHS, which you know, is quite relevant since we’re in Scotland. So as a trainee CBT practitioner, I’m quite lucky in that I take a lot of my sessions myself so I’m quite heavily supervised by often take a lot of my sessions on my own and the process is to have an assessment, and then your treatment, and then your discharge. So, for me, my assessment could be anything from one to three sessions. And I usually like to have my first session be about, you know, the main difficulty right now, what’s going on? What impacts it? How frequent is it? What’s going on? What kind of consequences is that having for you in your daily life, and then I go into the background for your second one. And then the third session, we usually do functional analysis, which is basically a micro analysis of all the things that happen in one particular time. So we’ll say, tell me about the last time that you had really low mood and we look at what was going on in your body in terms of physical reaction? What happened before that? What were the thoughts? What were the emotions going on? And what did you do to cope with that? And so somewhere in there, you should somehow understand more about your client, you know, culturally, which means that CBT is based on all these RCTs that have generally been done in western countries, they have not really been done as much in terms of the research we have from it coming to us back in the 80s. Until now, but that is starting to slowly change. I suppose the issue is that I don’t personally think that we’re taught enough about how to assess someone’s cultural background in psychology generally and CBT, at the moment, but there are lots of books and resources out there. So at some point, during that assessment, you should start to, ask them what are their religious beliefs? Or their cultural beliefs? try and pick up on different things, if they start talking about a family? What does family mean to you? How does that dictate your everyday living? Or is that quite important? Do you have a sort of dependence on each other? Except for last and a bit more of an open question? They were closed questions. I suppose there is an opportunity there at the assessment to start to take our cultural approach to assessing an individual and as you said, you can’t imagine not doing that, because psychology is the study of our human mind, how the human mind develops, how it works. And you know how to assess and treat it when things are difficult or not going to plan? How can you do that when someone’s culture usually informs your identity, because then you start to feel to actually be able to understand and treat your client because you’re essentially missing half of the picture. If you don’t know that a lot of their beliefs are there because of their, their cultural background, or their religious background, or their sexuality of, of their, you know, gender expression. Anything. So, yeah, I think that it’s quite difficult because I think we forget sometimes that culture has this integral role in defining who we are and psychology is how we work. So they should be like very much mesh together, but they’re just often not seen that way.

Heidi 
Yeah. And hopefully, things will start to change, I guess. I’ve been doing this for the past, like, what, 10 years, saying “hopefully, things start to change”. But really, hopefully, they will. I guess, seeing faces like yours. And you know, you doing bits of outreach and engagement like this will be hopefully a nice starting point for people that are maybe listening or, you know, seeing you in other areas to say, oh, maybe I could do that.

Sanna 
Exactly, hopefully. And if it doesn’t, I’ll just I don’t know, start marching down Princess Street screaming about sexual health and women’s rights and your mental health, if that doesn’t work in 20 to 30 years time.

Heidi 
What would your Mum do if you did that?

Sanna
God knows!

I think that there is more research being pushed out, there’s more attention, we’re hopefully trying to take on a workforce that is more diverse and reflective of the population that we’re trying to treat. And then ideally, it all gets better. But I suppose some people would argue that’s quite naive, even though it’s what we need to happen.

Anna 
You’re also just human, you can’t, even as a clinical psychologist, you can’t possibly know everything about every culture and every little nuance. It’s hard. And you can’t just spend 24 hours a day reading all these papers and books. So it’s a fine balance as well, I feel, yeah, coming from a whole different background.

Heidi 
I guess it’s all when things get better. I’m not I’m not going to say if because I’m optimistic. But when things get better, it’s not all on you. And it shouldn’t be all on you. Because like I said, you aren’t you know, we’re all human and yes, you can maybe know the South Asian experience in Glasgow particularly well, but maybe it’s slightly different in Bradford or Edinburgh or Aberdeen. No two people are going to be the same and I guess just we do our best in what we know and how we can help people that way.

Sanna 
That’s the typical view that all researchers take, and it’s just not quite generalizable to the whole population.

Heidi 
Yeah, oh God, you’ve just like life flashing before my eyes. Yeah, 100%.

Anna 
Just circling back to the Mum stuff and you know, being able to provide but then also having to have the option of working part-time, so not taking on something that’s too demanding. Did you ever have like a certain profession in mind, before you settled on psychology, or was there like other options in a way that you like role models around you that kind of juggled everything at once and successfully did all this?

Sanna 
I think that my family were really keen for me to be a pharmacist and I mean, crazy, keen.  I tried to look up some research to see if there’s like some prevalence research or like anything to back up, you know, encouragement with South Asian children pursuing pharmacy, and it just seems to be science in general. But she was really keen for me to be a pharmacist, I think it’s because we had a lot in the family and the hours are good. And it’s, you know, they’re accommodating for having children and stuff. I think at the time, it depends on the culture that you grew up in. But it can, depending on your own, and the kind of background you come from, I certainly felt very restricted in terms of expressing my own freedom and pursuing whatever the hell I wanted. So I think I was just so focused on doing the degree I had decided to do. And moving on with that, I did toy with being a sort of a teacher at one point or a primary teacher. And I guess as school went on, and as I started to learn more about what psychology was, and, you know, learned that it wasn’t someone on a sofa, and you asking them how they feel, for hours at a time. But once I, once I broke past that, that actually, this is something I really want to do. And I knew generally that psychology can be really accommodating in terms of having a life out of psychology, don’t get me wrong, it can be hard to keep boundaries, and to not spend hours into the night looking into a particular case. But a lot of individuals I know will have days where they’re actually nearer four days a week or three days a week. And it seems as though they’re able to maintain that financially, as well, which is great. So I did have in the back of my mind that it would be a career that seemed to be quite flexible and hadn’t really given too much thought over to that. I suppose that would be pleasing to my family that it was factored in somewhere.

But to be honest, I think I was just so keen to do what I wanted, regardless of the impact to family or elsewhere. Because at the end of the day, you know, you have to look after yourself. And I think it’s so hard when you come from a culture that’s so collectivist perhaps because, you know, it’s a South Asian or East Asian country where there’s no NHS, and there’s no support network for becoming elderly. And so you rely on your younger family to look after you, you know, there’s I’m not gonna pronounce this, right. But there’s some Asian concept of filial piety. And that’s why things like Tiger parenting are so intertwined, you know, really pushing our kids to achieve. So we do well, they get good jobs, they make money. And I’m the look after you, when you’re, you know, parents that are becoming children again, when you’re older. So I think had to start to learn that, you know, South Asian, but I’m British living in Scotland, in Glasgow, and eventually, you know, moving away at some point, and I guess it’s hard when you’re kind of caught between culture sometimes, but I was very much veering more towards the Scottish side of life.

Heidi 
Yeah, I think it’s the thing that kind of jumped out to me there was that it was just like an assumed thing, you would have a family? Like it wasn’t a question of, are you going to have kids? Do you want to have kids? Do you want to, you know, is that something that’s on your agenda? And I think, particularly in different cultures, that’s tricky. So I’ve been very lucky in that, like, my Mum now has a grandson. And that’s my dog. And she’s fully into that. She’s like, how is my boy doing today? And she expects photo updates as if I’ve had a baby. And there’s no pressure from her whatsoever. Like, there just never has been. But I know from friends and other cultures and with other backgrounds and stuff, like we’re approaching 30. And suddenly, it’s a bit late, right? Well, times ticking. What’s going on?

How did you manage to deal with that? Because I guess lots of people want to have families, but maybe you don’t? Maybe you do, how did you tackle that?

Sanna 
I think it’s, it’s a hard question. I suppose my situation is a bit different and I’m quite open talking about this. But when I kind of pushed back and was quite adamant about studying what I wanted to study, doing what I wanted to do, pursuing whatever career wherever, that kind of translated into other areas as well, life, so generally, being independent, doing what I want, which is not necessarily something that from my experience, a lot of South Asian girls are able to do, sometimes it can be quite restrictive, there can be a lot of parental pressure and things like that. I kind of ended up taking it on my own and moved out like at 17 and moved through to Edinburgh, and I’m generally really independent. And I managed to do that because I only rely on myself sort of financially and I very much have people in my life that you know, mean a lot to me and I’m happy to have them there in a very supportive and I suppose part of that it’s hard because there’s not really a safety net when it comes to financial matters or just, you know, some emotional support, but it means that I get to live without any pressure ever. Which for me is quite a big deal. So, I guess that kind of helps to frame things a little bit in terms of it was really tricky for me to pursue psychology because there’s never a guarantee and having kind of started to slowly move away from a life I wasn’t happy with at all that I felt was controlling or brought you back into pursuing certain things that I didn’t want to pursue. It made it that much harder, because I guess there were doubts surrounding everything about doing it on my own about pursuing things. And when I say doing on my own, I see that with a caveat, because I’ve been so privileged to have gone to an all-girls private school, to have had support from family for so many years, I think I got to a point where I weighed up that versus the emotional trauma call it if you will, or the emotional difficulty of having to balance that. And I think it helps that I’m now training as a sort of practitioner or psychologist, but you realise that there is more to life and that you cannot live a life based on what other people’s expectations are.

So I luckily have none of that pressure, and that’s really, really nice. It means I don’t even have to think about what so many people have to think about in terms of how to deal with, you know, the in-laws or Mum and Dad this week or next week, or how to put them off. And, you know, we’ve been married now for one year or two years. And everyone’s like, “where’s the baby?” I like that we’re getting to a place where it’s no longer acceptable to ask someone what their baby plans are because shouldn’t ever be. So I am very lucky. I don’t have to, and that has certain drawbacks. But yeah, I really do feel for others not in that situation.

Heidi
Yeah, it’s a really difficult life to live in and a horrible choice to make. I think, because as you said, it’s not just like, uh, you know, I’ll, I’ll be in a low paid job for a little while and then I’ll be okay. Like it’s not, it’s the emotional difficulties as well. That is, that is tough stuff. And yeah, I’m guessing a bit of, a bit of psychology probably helped with that was like, hmm okay, “other people have stuff as well”, this is how I can, techniques that I can use to help myself and that kind of thing.

Sanna
Yeah. It definitely helps you to keep grounded. It helps you. And that’s why, like, there are reasons I love social media and that’s for pursuing a career in psychology and, you know, dealing with your own personal difficulties is that. There are so many online support forums for all sorts of stuff. And I mean all kinds of stuff. And it’s just so nice to be able to connect with other people that are going through the same journey as you, or trying to get that same job as you, especially in an area that’s so murky and so grave. So yeah, when social media is good, it’s fantastic.

Heidi
Social media is also excellent at showing what you bake kind of just like, bring that up for a second. So Sanna’s Instagram is closed and I was like, is this creepy? If I just try and follow her now? So I tried and it works, but, but the meringues that she was making, holy cow.

Sanna
Thanks!

Heidi
My God. I was like immediately, okay, you need to send me a recipe for this now.

Sanna
Oh my gosh, those were the first time I’d made that.

Heidi
They looked incredible!

Sanna
I am a scientist and my approach to baking, I research everything weeks of planning, all my equipment, all my materials, doing some test ones and they were going for the final.

Heidi
The final trial and the final show was freaking perfect. So yeah, the scientific approach totally worth it. Excellent. I’m going to have to maybe bring in my science to my baking because that might explain why it’s not great. So we wanted to finish up by just sort of asking you for like a top tip or a Ppearl of wisdom from you like something that you’ve learned or wish that you’ve learned that you would have learned earlier.

Sanna
My tip comes from being recently… No pre-pandemic, being on a holiday. I went on holiday for two weeks to LA in America, and I started meeting people who were late twenties, late thirties, who were doing their bachelor’s for the first time. And it kind of hit me because when they told me there was just no reaction, like that was normal and it was sort of refreshing to see people take life at a normal / their own pace. And it made me reflect on how I’ve spent so much time, like running towards the next school or the overall goal. And I don’t give myself enough time to breathe during the jobs that I had. So, you know, when I was a senior project coordinator, project manager, whatever, it sucked. And all I was doing was looking what are all of the voluntary jobs I can get? All of the experiences I can get to get to my doctorate to get into my master’s quickly. When I took the support role on I was making even less, I never took time to enjoy the fact that I was learning incredible stuff for the first time. And I would lose that first time, you know, shininess, completely once it was over. And once I’d moved on and also as you move through life, you get more responsibility. And I think it naturally becomes a little bit less enjoyable and there’s, there’s sometimes more, more stress associated with that. So what my takeaway was seeing people so happy and proud to be doing things later in life, and that there’s no reason anyone should achieve anything in their twenties.

The dream job no longer exists in your twenties. And that’s okay. So I think, take life at a slower pace, that can often help. I think the last year has kind of taught us that and just try to enjoy things in the moment work. That’s so cheesy, but it’s really what I learned.

You know, every other month or every other week where I just felt like I wasn’t going anywhere and I was never going to achieve anything in the same year. I was turned down for a post at like band 4, and I got onto this program, which is band 6. And I now have something, hopefully, once I qualify will be a career that I can sustain until I want to do my doctorate. So it just goes to show that sometimes you need perseverance and patience.

Heidi
Definitely. I think that whole going at your own pace as thing, like it just, I don’t even know how we got here as a society where it’s like you go from being at school like you choose your A levels or whatever the equivalent is in Scotland, Highers, like, when I was looking back, I was like, oh my God, how did I just assume that I could do all of those qualifications in two years and then did them and was really sad for whole time, and then went straight to uni and then straight to a PhD and like all these internships and like this fast pace of life when you’re literally like a baby. And now we’re like, yes, we’re in our twenties. It’s almost like we’re at a career stage that people 10 years older than us would look at and go, yeah, that’s cool. Good job. We’ve done it, but we’re kind of sitting here being like, oh God, we’re exhausted. How did that happen? How do we even get here? It’s like a big whirlwind. Just as a sort of plug to a book that I’m reading at the minute that might be of interest it’s by Helen Peterson, it’s called Can’t Even and it’s about Millennial burnout and it’s basically about how Boomers have ruined all our lives, it’s very US focused, but, it is still relevant about how we’re always on this big cycle of next thing. Where’s the goal? What’s the goal? What are you going to do forever rather than it just being like, okay, maybe you want to go on holiday today? Maybe you want to go exploring. Maybe you want to take a day off for the sake of just taking a day off. That is a really important thing. And that probably ties quite well with your psychology background cause I guess, you’ll see it firsthand, that burnout and the mental implications of what could happen if people don’t take it.

Sanna
That book sounds fantastic, I’m going to have to get it, because that’s literally, that was like the reflection that took me all of five years to get to, because you put it so well and yeah, you have so much pressure and expectation that we attach to everyday life.

Heidi
It’s so hard. It’s really hard. And I’m glad that you recognise it at 24 because I didn’t. So yeah. Good job on you being so young and recognizing it.

Anna
Jesus, I feel like I’ve been in a therapy session, a massive weight lifted off my shoulders, Like it’s all right, we’re fine!

Heidi
Cancel that therapy session! 
We’ve had a great time with you, it’s been so interesting and thank you so much for giving your time.

Sanna
Thank you so much for having me. It’s been really, really nice. It’s been so refreshing and lovely to have a bit of normalcy if that’s the right word during these weird as hell times, and I can’t wait to see what you guys do next.

Anna
So that was our first episode. Thank you so much to Sanna for joining us and for sharing her story. Our next episode will be released in two weeks time and as we’re recording this, we don’t really know who that will be with, but, make sure you join us then to find out.

Heidi
And remember to follow us @littlescienceco on Instagram, Twitter, and on Facebook. Let us know what you think about our first episode and the new website has just gone live about a week ago, I think as you’re hearing this and that will be www.littlescienceco.com. So have a little explore and let us know what you think and I hope you like the new branding!

If you are like me – meaning – a Western-educated adult over the age of 35 – you probably grew up thinking there was only one female scientist – Madame Curie (she didn’t even get a first name). You also learned she was a freaky outlier and that doing science killed her.

That’s quite a ‘don’t try this at home’ lesson for little girls.

Maria Salomea Skłodowska Curie, however, was not the only woman doing science back in the day. There were hundreds of them. And most of them didn’t die prematurely as a result of their work.

Nevertheless, most were:

• Ignored
• Denigrated
• Suppressed

And/or

• Had their work stolen by colleagues.

I write children’s books, many of them science-related. I see my role as a ‘truth-teller’ – to share with kids the wonders of the world, and give them the straight goods on how they work. That said, it’s not enough for me to tell kids what we currently know. I also aim to tell them who did the discovering, and how.

Early in my career, I didn’t question the ‘who’. I ‘knew’ women never had the chance to do science (See: ignored, denigrated, etc.).

But then I stumbled over a story about Rosalind Franklin. (This was well before she was featured on posters; maybe 1990 or so).
I was shocked. I was supposed to be knowledgeable about science and science history. Yet I’d never heard her name.

I made it my mission to learn as much as I could about Franklin. And McClintock, and Herschel, Mitchell, and Tharp, and all of their multitudinous scientific sisters. I would write about them too.

While I was working on a book about space for National Geographic, I came across my ideal subject, Katherine Johnson. Counting on Katherine: How Katherine Johnson Saved Apollo 13 (subtitled How Katherine Johnson Put Astronauts on the Moon in the UK edition) tells the true story of a brilliant African-American mathematician who overcame both sexism and racism to play a pivotal role in the American space program. When I contacted her, asking her for her blessing on the project, there was virtually nothing written about her, for children or adults. The book Hidden Figures was not published until the following year.

I followed that first book up with a book about a pirate, and the most powerful pirate that ever lived (Pirate Queen: A Story of Zheng Yi Sao).

Then, going back to science, I wrote Emmy Noether: The Most Important Mathematician You Never Heard Of. It tells the true story of a German-Jewish mathematician who fixed the flaw in Einstein’s Theory of Relativity and then went on to discover an equally revolutionary aspect of the universe. When I began writing about Noether, there was almost nothing out there about her, either. As of this writing, there still isn’t.

Despite utterly different backgrounds, Johnson and Noether shared similar back stories. Incredible intellect. Schooling opportunities denied. Inability to make a living in their field.  Their work attributed to others, or not attributed at all. Yet Both Johnson and Noether persevered in the face of racism and sexism, and made huge contributions to their fields.

Of course my decision to write about these towering figures did not happen in a vacuum. Picture book biographies of female and minority STEM pioneers are currently being published at a rapid clip. So much so, you can call it a trend – hooray!

You can now find excellent children’s biographies about:

• Wu Chien Shiung (Queen of Physics: How Wu Chien Shiung Helped Unlock the Secrets of the Atom)
• Sophie Germain (Nothing Stopped Sophie)
• Ada Lovelace (Ada Lovelace: Poet of Science)
• Hedy Lamarr (Hedy Lamarr’s Double Life)
• Maria Mitchell (What Miss Mitchell Saw)
• Rae Montague (The Girl with a Mind for Math)
• Eugenie Clark (Shark Lady)
• Mary Anning (Mary Anning and the Sea Dragon)
• Anna Atkins (The Bluest of Blues)
• Mae Jemison (Mae Among the Stars)

And that’s just for starters.

These women’s stories are important for several reasons. One, they give ground-breaking STEM pioneers their long-overdue recognition. Not as desirable as a salary, or a Nobel Prize, but late-date fame is still better than disappearing into obscurity, don’t you think?

Secondly, their stories are inspirational. Young people need to know their lofty ambitions have a precedent. Many others have forged a path before them, in even more challenging circumstances. If others did it, so can they.
Third, they are inoculations against bias. I hear time and time again that books about women are ‘for girls’. Heck no. Newsflash – the majority of girls already know we can do amazing things! It’s the boys who need to have their foundational views shifted, so they don’t grow up to be sexist men.
Fourth, they provide ammunition against dream-squashing bigots.  You can now reach for a long-as-your-arm list of names to counter that snorting ‘women don’t do science’ smackdown (please feel free to hit aforementioned fools over the head with it).

Interesting final note. All of the authors of the books on the list above are also women. I’d put money on the editors who acquired them for their companies are women too.

In short, when women and minorities are at the table, no matter what the field, we bring a wider view. We ask different questions, and tell different stories. We make a difference.

So can you.

At 19, the summer after graduating the Swedish equivalent to high school, I started feeling nauseous. I was tired, dull. It might sound like a particularly bad hangover, but there was actually a little human responsible for early morning dates with the toilet bowl. My carefully crafted life-plan was suddenly scrambled. The font had been changed from Times New Roman to Comic Sans.

After studying natural sciences in school, I was ready to continue my journey to becoming a marine biologist. Choosing a university was difficult, but after careful consideration (supported by the fact that my boyfriend of six years – now fiancé – was going there too) I clicked ‘accept offer’ on my UCAS portal, and secured my place at a prestigious Scottish university.

So here I was, pregnant, afraid, and moving to a new country in the next two weeks. If it sounds like I had a lot on my plate, it’s because I did.
I was both excited and terrified at the same time, but even before my first scan a couple of people told me that I’d ruined my life by becoming pregnant and any shot at university would forever be doomed. Luckily, this negativity and judgement was outweighed by some very supportive people calming me down and assuring me that university was not the big scary monster that it is often made out to be. My mum finished her PhD with two young children (no biggie), so why couldn’t I go to university as planned? I promised myself I’d do my best.

The first year of my undergraduate degree involved a lot of repetition, and seemingly endless hours memorizing various life cycles. The teaching staff included some basic laboratory work to make sure we knew that science could be fun too. This is where pulling out the I’m pregnant card really worked, and the joys of the internet became apparent. I could skip lectures and catch up on them online (which also meant I could pause for the excessive amount of pregnancy pee breaks!), AND have a free pass from lab sessions dissecting rotten animals. Thankfully, teaching staff and healthcare professionals were all very helpful and I am forever grateful for that.

My daughter Freja was born in April, right in the middle of spring break (very well-timed indeed). Four weeks later I sat my first university exam with leaky boobs and a newborn at home. I’m now in my fourth year of study and the routine of picking up my daughter from the university nursery instead of running to the local pub (which my partner and I still do when we have family over) is just a natural part of life.

I’ve always been a very driven person. I knew early on that I want a career as well as children and that there would never be a right time to do both. Life will not always go according to plan (hello, 2020) but deciding what is important to you at this moment in your life will get you far. If, like me, you choose to have a baby and go through university as well, you will have to work your ass off, but it’s much easier to work hard when you can see what you’re working for.

My advice would be to do everything that you have to do first (essays, research papers, meetings etc), then you can use the gaps for fun stuff. It’s vital to not forget about your own mental and physical wellbeing – super important whether you are parent to a human baby, a pet or a collection of houseplants.

In my opinion, there simply never is the right time to have a child. The stork won’t come knocking on your door holding a baby (though that would be less painful…), particularly not if you want a career in science. There will always be something in the way – starting your dissertation, invitations to field work, speaking at conferences, or job offers. You simply must learn to adapt and make the best of the situation that unfolds.
Living life through both mine and my daughter’s eyes gives me a much greater perspective of my goals and I dare say that I am a much more rounded person and scientist because of her.

In mid-February 2020 I headed out to Singapore to spend a month with my partner and my mum’s family. I spent most of the month working remotely, enjoying some space away from my usual hectic freelance life while planning for the festivals, events and workshops I would be organising and speaking at for the rest of 2020.

By the time I flew home to London in March, 2020 was looking very different for everyone. The COVID-19 situation in the UK was incredibly worrying, and everyday my email inbox brought more event cancellations until my calendar was completely empty.

Over the following few months, I and so many others adapted, steadily figuring out how to deliver more events remotely. Festivals were uncancelled, new events were organised and slowly my calendar was peppered with commitments again.

Remote events proved challenging in lots of ways and plenty of us found it harder to find that sense of connection we’d had in live events. It’s tricky to connect with an audience you can’t see, or to figure out if your joke has landed properly when there’s a split second delay in the laughter you’re hearing.

Through all of this, I found the events which involved some form of art or making a lot easier to deliver. There seems to be something about the shared physical experience of creating something, even over Zoom, which fosters a stronger connection than simply staring at a screen while talking and listening. Over the last few months, I’ve delivered workshops covering zine making, observational drawing, mathematical art, upcycled postcards, vulva mandalas and more. It has been absolutely amazing to see what people have made based on my prompts and instructions – artwork is honestly the best sort of feedback!

Whether I’m running or attending creative workshops, I find being not just able but actively encouraged to look away from the screen throughout the event really helps my energy levels, attention span and eye strain. The informality of moving around more and looking at the screen less seems to be part of why audience members join in conversation more, and ask more questions.

Some of the exchanges I have had also suggest more self-conscious audience members might be more comfortable joining an event online than face to face because no one else can see what they’re making unless they want to share it. This seems to be particularly true for those who don’t see themselves as creative or artistic, or those who are worried they’ll get something wrong.

Running these workshops has been an absolute joy over the past few months and I’m looking forward to running more in the future. I’m really hopeful that remote events will continue even after COVID related restrictions are lifted.

If you’re interested in running your own creative workshop online, these are some of my top tips:

• Have a camera directed at your hands or table as well as one showing your face. I usually use my phone on a stand above my desk but have also used a tablet propped up so the camera is tilted down. I use ManyCam to split my screen between cameras and OBS is a free alternative to this which I know others use. Signing your phone or another device in as a second user is a lower tech option.

• Keep essential materials to a minimum and think carefully about what your audience will have at home. For example, do they really need plain paper or could lined paper work? Could an activity work with recycled materials?
• Ask your audience questions and encourage them to ask you questions too! Don’t be put off if you get silence though, they might be busy creating!
• Give your audience options to go at a different pace. Make it clear it’s okay to continue with a previous activity while you move on to another. Or suggest things they might want to try if they finish a section before everyone else.
• Be prepared to be flexible with timing – different individuals and different audiences might take longer on different activities. Have some content you can drop if you run out of time, and have more ready to add on in case you go too quickly. You can always suggest activities you don’t have time for at the end of the session for people to try in their own time.
• Keep reminding everyone nothing needs to be perfect. There is rarely a right way to draw or make!
• Give participants the option to share their work with you! This could be on camera, through social media, via email or another channel I haven’t thought of. I’ve found it best when there are a few different options.

I hope you find these tips helpful!

If you’re raring to get creative straightaway, I would recommend checking out the informal SciComm Crafting sessions Sarah Cosgriff runs. Everyone brings their own creative activity, and we have a bit of a chat while we’re making. Sign up here.

This post is written by Daisy Shearer. Daisy is an experimental quantum physicist currently pursuing her PhD at the University of Surrey’s Advanced Technology Institute in the UK. Her research focuses on semiconductor spintronics for quantum technology applications. When she’s not in the lab, she spends time communicating science on Instagram @notesfromthephysicslab, Twitter @QuantumDaisy and her blog. She is a PhD student contributor for Physics World magazine and writes for Massive Science. You can find out more about Daisy’s research, writing, and other outreach activities on her website.

For those of us whose neurology differs from the ‘norm’, it can be difficult to find space in science as we often work in unconventional ways. By embracing neurodiversity and listening to the stories of neurodivergent scientists, I believe we can find ways to better support atypical neurotypes and tap into our unique and often outside-the-box thinking. In fact, it’s thought that many pioneering scientists like Albert Einstein and Isaac Newton may have been neurodivergent.

So, what exactly is neurodiversity? Neurodiversity views neurological conditions as simply a difference in brain functioning rather than a disease or disorder that needs to be cured. Although it has its origins in the autistic community, the neurodiversity paradigm includes other neurological variations such as ADHD, dyslexia and dyspraxia.

Like many autistic women, I wasn’t diagnosed until adulthood (I was 21). This is because autism tends to present differently in women and girls, and it is more common for us to unconsciously ‘camouflage’ our autistic traits through mimicry. Three years later I’m still processing my diagnosis, but I do feel that identifying the specific neurological differences that I have was a turning point in my life and my scientific career. Before I knew I was autistic, I spent many hours of introspection trying to work out why I behaved the way I did and tried to work out how other people managed to not get overwhelmed by the sensory inputs around them. I would get so angry and frustrated at myself because of my inability to cope with things. Turns out I just process things in a certain way, and that does not mean that I am broken or flawed.

I disclosed my autism to my PhD supervisor a few months into my PhD. Looking back, I sometimes wonder if he would treat me differently if he didn’t know about my disability, but I do think disclosing was the right decision. To do this, I worked with my specialist mentor on an email outlining the main ways that being autistic impacts me personally and what he can do to support me. This included things like ‘I sometimes find processing oral instructions difficult. If possible, I would prefer written instructions, and for oral instructions I would benefit from a pause between points to fully process the information.’ and ‘It is extremely difficult for me to attend meetings that have not been pre-arranged. It would be helpful if even informal meetings could be pre-booked through email.’ Since then, we have adapted our working practices to support both of us as we do sometimes need to compromise.

Adapting to accommodate for different ways of working can be challenging for those who are used to a certain way of doing things. It’s also important to remember that neurodivergent conditions impact people in unique ways, so it’s best to take everything on an individual basis. Neurodivergent people are often perfectly suited for science but can only thrive when supported sufficiently. This is one of the main reasons why I started talking about my own experiences as an autistic scientist online. I think that through raising awareness around neurodiversity and highlighting the experiences of neurodivergent scientists, we might see cultural change in science towards more accessible and inclusive teaching and working practices.

At the beginning of this year, I started a visibility campaign called ‘neurodivergent in STEM’ which aims to share a wide variety of stories from neurodivergent people in STEM fields. We want to share examples of how we can be supported in science and beyond as well as highlight both the strengths and challenges of neurodiverse conditions. It’s also important to me that people recognise the ways in which we are all similar. Having a differently wired brain doesn’t make people like me inferior or superior to neurotypical people. At the end of the day we’re all humans. I don’t think it’s productive segregating people into lots of different groups, but it is important to ensure that we’re supporting everyone as best we can and not discriminating for or against people just because of a certain identity they happen to have.

Sometimes I wonder what kind of person I would be if I wasn’t autistic, but my neurotype is so integral to who I am that I don’t think I can even start to imagine what I might be like if I wasn’t autistic. My intense interest in quantum physics, my attention to detail, and my ability to pick up on patterns are all traits that lend themselves to being a good scientist. Having said that, there is much more to me than ‘that autistic person’. At the end of the day I’m primarily an experimental quantum physicist. I want my work to speak for itself and with the right support, I think that I can become the kind of scientist I aspire to be.

We’ve all done it, taken on that one favour that we don’t really have time for, or stayed late to quickly look over something for someone. Or maybe something bigger? An impossible deadline you felt unable to say no to.

Why does saying no feel uncomfortable?

Saying ‘yes’ is ingrained in us from an incredibly young age – just imagine saying ‘no’ to your teachers. Responding to someone’s request with “no” can be interpreted as rude, argumentative, or label you as not a team player. Academia, in particular, is built on a foundation of unpaid labour or ‘volunteering’; the peer review process, teaching, Diversity and Inclusion initiatives, outreach and more, and women pick up the majority of this labour. The structure of academia is inequitable and unsustainable; therefore, we should practice saying no to it.

When to say no

Now, this isn’t to say that you should be turning down everything and everyone, let alone turning down things you desperately want to do, but there is value to assessing opportunities and thinking “what if I say no?”

I did this a lot over lockdown. Having a computational aspect to my PhD project that I’m very good at led to a lot of scientists seeking out my expertise and help on computational projects they wanted to start while they didn’t have access to lab space. It made sense for them to capitalise on the opportunity to try out something new. However, a combination of mental health struggles, my own project not being on standby, and other commitments, meant it didn’t make sense for me to take on many, if any, of these requests.

After struggling with saying no, I came up with a checklist to help. It covers the time something would take, and whether you’d have to deprioritise other responsibilities (including your responsibility to look after yourself), what you would gain from helping, whether you really want to do it, if other opportunities to do the same or similar thing might come along and whether there’s anyone who would benefit more and has been overlooked.

How to say no

Okay, we’ve reached the decision that we don’t want to do this, what now? Here’s the hard part, we need to say no and stand firm in that decision.

If this request is something that’s dropped into my inbox, I tend to structure my emails like this: Compliment the request and tell them you don’t have capacity (saying I didn’t have time made people less likely to accept that this was a no – I’ll touch on this more in the next section). Depending on the situation, I’ll suggest a date to revisit this or someone else to reach out to.

Is the request in person? Take a moment to go through the mental checklist and make it clear you are weighing it up. Then say, “I don’t have the capacity for this, somebody else might be able to do it for you.”

Some non-optional points? Don’t apologise – you don’t owe anyone your time, expertise or knowledge; even if it’s a teeny-tiny thing, even if it’s your supervisor, or even if it’s your best friend. If it’s outside your normal responsibilities, it’s asking you to go above and beyond. Also, don’t just not reply, you aren’t the kind of person to leave someone in the lurch, let’s send that polite ‘no’.

Finally? Pat yourself on the back! Nice job saying no!

Uh oh, they’ve not taken no for an answer

Maybe they reframe the request as something smaller – “I just want to pick your brain on it” or think they need to convince you. First things first: congratulations! You’re clearly very good at what you do, and they desperately want to work with you – that should be incredibly reassuring!

You guessed it: it’s time to say no again. I’ve found even just letting someone ‘pick your brain’ on the topic can be a slippery slope.

Practice makes perfect

Let’s make next month NO-vember and really flex those ‘saying no’ muscles – note: this challenge is the only thing I won’t let you say no to! Want to share your refusals and get a virtual pat on the back from me? Tweet me at @aomholmes.

If you’ve spent any time on social media this week, you’ve probably seen the now infamous ‘Fatima ballet advert’. For those of you who have somehow missed this government-backed advert – which the Culture Secretary described as ‘crass’ – at first glance it seems pretty innocuous. It’s a photograph of a young woman getting dressed in her ballet clothes, with the caption ‘Fatima’s next job could be in cyber’ and underneath, in brackets ‘she just doesn’t know it yet’.

The advert was originally released in 2019 as part of a series, and recently resurfaced on social media and, against the backdrop of Chancellor Rishi Sunak encouraging people to retrain out of their suddenly ‘unviable’ industries, the advert has been roundly condemned. Plenty of much smarter, funnier and better informed people than me who actually work in the arts will tell you what exactly is wrong with this advert; but I thought I’d take the opportunity to talk about it from the point of view of a person whose job it is to get young people excited about computer science.

Firstly, what I do like. Obviously, an advert aimed at a young woman designed to encourage her to take up a career ‘in cyber’ is great. I’m sure Fatima would be a top-notch software developer, and the Cyber First project looks like it has some bursaries and advice if she does decide to take the programming plunge. It’s also nice to see this sort of advert aimed squarely at someone in the arts – convincing people that actually computer science is creative and interesting is a large part of my job. The number of people who commented that this adverted was condemning Fatima to a life of digital drudgery shows that we have a long, long way to go in showing people just how interesting and rewarding cyber careers can be.

Which brings us on to my first point – careers, or rather the lack of them, in this advert. The advert refers to ‘Fatima’s next job’ rather than her ‘next career’. This distinction is important because it’s implying that being a professional ballet dancer is ‘just’ a job. She might worry that ‘ballerina’ is something that her new colleagues might look down on as a passing fancy, rather than the culmination of years of training, dedication and practise. But it also suggests the same thing about cybersecurity or web design – jobs, sure, but nothing more. Rather than being seen as a possible exciting new chapter, the start of challenging career, we’re left feeling that Fatima’s next job in cyber will just be another dull job in a long line of blah.

Secondly, why ballet? Of all the professions, ballet is a terrible choice to put up against computer science in this context. Not because there’s anything in particular about ballet dancers that would make Fatima a poor candidate for a career change, but because of how we think of ballet in our collective consciousness. Being a professional ballet dancer isn’t just a job, it’s one of those dreamed-about-it-since-I-was-a-little-girl, actually-it’s-a-calling type jobs. Fatima hasn’t accidentally stumbled into an audition and impressed with her plucky can-do attitude; it’s a highly skilled, competitive and desirable role.

The way the advert is set out, the sinister and vaguely threatening ‘she just doesn’t know it yet’, the tag line urging her to ‘Rethink. Reskill. Reboot.’ – (you want to shut her down first?) – none of this frames her new job in cyber as a good thing. There’s a distinctly melancholic, time to hang up the silly tutu and get a ‘real’ job sense to the whole situation. Grow up, Fatima.

Fatima’s next job as an ethical hacker could also be skilled, competitive and desirable, but you’d have no idea based on this advert. Is studying or retraining for a cyber career a ‘safe, sensible’ option? Absolutely. The money will be good, there should be plenty of positions available, heck it’s probably a lot easier than being a prima ballerina. But if you want young people like Fatima to really consider this sort of work for their future, we need to explain that these aren’t just the smart choice, but a choice they won’t regret making 25 years in the future when the alarm wakes them on yet another Monday. These jobs need to be sold as something that you might actively want for yourself, relevant, interesting and worth doing on its own terms.

This advert could so easily have been saved with a few tweaks. Fatima is creative, dedicated and not afraid of hard work – perfect attributes for a programmer. The fact is Fatima is going to love her next career in cyber, but thanks to this advert she just doesn’t know it yet.

“Team Aquarius, you’re going to nationals!” the commentator yelled into his microphone.

After initial hesitation from shock, we cheered, complete with jumping around. Our months of planning and perseverance paid off. We’d just placed first in the Future City competition, a project-based learning program for middle schoolers to develop their interest in STEM, held at Drexel University that year for the schools in the Philadelphia region.

Mr G, our head technology teacher, embarked on creating our school’s first engineering team. This team, ideally less than 30 students, would create a futuristic city using SimCity 3000, saving our work on floppy discs (!!!) at each stage, and then convert the virtual model to a scale model for the Future City – 8th Grade Division’s competition in the Spring of 2001. Unsure if he’d generate interest through his technology classes alone, Mr G asked all homeroom teachers to distribute flyers to their students.

I’d known I’d wanted to be a teacher since fifth grade, and I generally preferred reading and writing. But I also excelled in my science classes; I was intrigued by how things functioned, both alone and in connection with other things. So, I, along with other interested students, attended an informational session two weeks later, which covered the standard who-what-when-where-why. I walked in curious, and I left with determination and a six-page application packet, which included two essays among other requirements.

I still remember the second essay topic, which asked me to discuss the lessons and skills I hoped to learn by being on the engineering team. I wrote an analogy: in the same way a city’s parts work together, I wanted to unite with my teammates, each of us finding our own purpose or function in the bigger picture. Within a few weeks, I learned I’d secured my spot on the inaugural engineering team, one of 16 girls on a team of 28 students.

Beginning in September of 2000, Mr G divided us into sub-teams who alternated working on the various aspects of this project. Our teams spent countless hours building the infrastructure, moving and tweaking the buildings and the environment; collecting parts and pieces from myriad materials for the scale model; learning from professionals from the wider community to supplement our understanding about how cities operate, like my teammate’s uncle from the Pentagon and Mr G’s friend, Mr Waldron, from Cingular Wireless; visiting establishments, like the United Nations headquarters in Manhattan, to help us navigate the sociopolitical aspects of a city; and deciding on a fitting team name.

The wealth of information, the team’s efforts, and the kinesthetic learning afforded me numerous opportunities to see STEM in real time and gain confidence about decision making. I voiced my opinions on placement of buildings in the game and on the model. I asked questions about how things worked, worked on pulley systems and grew mini trees for the scale model, and interviewed our professional aides. I learned about trial and error, public speaking, and teamwork.

The months moved along in our preparations, and Mr G settled on our moniker, “Aquarius,” partly inspired by his favorite The Fifth Dimension song, “Age of Aquarius,” and partly inspired by aqua (water), under which more than 50% of our city lived.

Our collective stress, lost sleep, and hard work awarded us first place at regionals and third place at nationals in Washington, DC. As a result, I felt accomplished and validated as a key member — in a leadership role, called a “moderator,” Mr G assigned to just three girls.

Ultimately, I followed my true passions of reading and writing, rather than pursuing a STEM career, and, in 2010, began as an adjunct English instructor at the post-secondary level. Later, I also taught ninth grade writing and tenth grade English for five years, and I eventually transitioned back to teaching college composition and public speaking courses. I am confident that my time on the beloved engineering team provided me with the confidence to speak in front of crowds, the patience and listening skills to collaborate with students and colleagues alike, and the time management and organizational skills needed to be an engaging educator.

If life experience was a field of study, my Dad would have a PhD.

Ironically, he didn’t have a formal education. My Dad dropped out in middle school when his Father died unexpectedly. Things were different in rural Guatemala; education wasn’t a priority when necessities like food and water were hard to come by. At the age of 13, he became the man of the house.

Just like a scientist, my Dad has always been resourceful and logical. He knew his life situation wasn’t ideal and he experimented through trial-and-error to find the ideal method to make money. The result was a move to America, where there was a promise of hard work and opportunity. My Dad set an example, he worked hard and secured his GED after moving to America, and I am incredibly proud of him.

His decision meant that his children – not just me, my siblings too – graduated from college. I started a Master’s program where I performed neuroscience research on alcohol addiction. I was incredibly proud of myself, and I knew my Dad was too, but I also felt conflicted.

Neuroscience is a branch of science that isn’t too familiar for the everyday person. On one hand, it’s exciting to feel like an expert on said subject, but on the other hand, it is disappointing to not have people understand why studying science, including the intricacies of neuroscience questions, is important. As I moved away from the idea of life on a lab bench, I thought about what drew me into science in the first place. And then it clicked. People don’t care unless you give them a reason to care. It isn’t a matter of what the research was but how it is presented. Thoughts like these propelled me towards chasing a career in science communication.

‘Make science accessible to the public’, that was my motto. To do that, I needed to read articles from science writers who have done this successfully. My preferred publication was New Scientist and I quickly subscribed to their weekly print subscription. I also thought it would be a good investment for my siblings to read since we are all studying and working within STEM fields.

On one particular Wednesday, my Brother and I were in the middle of talking about the latest research findings on Alzheimer’s disease when I noticed my Dad lingering in the background. Paying no mind, we wrapped up our discussion and went our separate ways until my father asked me in Spanish a question on the study, “was this Alzheimer’s part of the brain?” It was a simple question and one that could have been answered with a quick yes or no answer. But I was dumbfounded. Shocked and disappointed, in myself. All this time I prided myself on my neuroscience education and I always spoke to my friends (and strangers on the internet) about what I learned. So why had I never spoken about it with my Dad?

One question turned into three more. It never crossed my mind that my Dad would be interested about science. Maybe it wasn’t that he was disinterested, but rather he had no way of accessing the subject. Science wasn’t something that influenced his life unless it concerned the weather. Or a pandemic. Even the Spanish news channels he watched glossed over science. Interesting headliners featured the latest political scandals, not bacteria growing in space.

Just because someone doesn’t have a formal education doesn’t mean they don’t value learning. My Father wanted to learn, he just didn’t have the tools to do it. So, with all he sacrificed for me, how could I call myself a science communicator when I never communicated with my Dad?

We talked for hours that night. At first, there was a language barrier. New Scientist doesn’t come in Spanish, but I translated the articles and we used an interpreter app to translate complicated terminology. Since then, we sit down weekly to go over the latest scientific findings. My Mom has recently joined us too. I’d be lying if I said it was easy, it takes time and patience to simplify concepts that require preexisting knowledge. I had to challenge myself not to regurgitate the words written in New Scientist articles, but rather tell a story that makes a meaningful connection between the research and his life.

Science communication starts at home. It starts by talking to people who don’t care about science. It starts with talking to family. For me, it started with my Dad. When the goal is to make science accessible to all, it means overcoming any language barrier, and any scientific jargon so that people understand the world around them. My Dad didn’t have the best education, but he loves to learn. He is a wonderful reminder of the impact science communicators have in educating the public, including the ones standing 3-feet away from us.