IEEE Women in Engineering Magazine - June 2008 - 11

Women to Watch
Nancy Salim

For the Love
of Engineering
Hard work and dedication pay off

Ferial El-Hawary's
Boundless Enthusiasm
Shines Through

Hundreds of miles away and over the
telephone I can still feel Ferial ElHawary's passion for engineering. You
can tell just how much someone loves
her career when she tries to recruit you
to it. During our conversation, Ferial,
IEEE Fellow, WIE member, accomplished engineer, grandmother of six,
and an avid swimmer, asked me if I was
an engineer.
"What do you do, did you graduate with an engineering degree?"
"Oh me, no, I'm a journalism
graduate," I responded.
"Well you can still be an engineer! It's a great profession ...,"
Ferial rattled off the benefits of
becoming an engineer.
Now if that's not recruiting, I
don't know what is.
Indeed, Ferial says her work is
focused on recruiting women into engineering. She's involved in a task force
with IEEE Nova Scotia that discusses
issues in the workplace affecting
women-issues such as promotion and
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MWIE.2008.925763

evaluation-and encourages more
women to pursue engineering.

Once You Have
an Engineering Degree ...

intelligence, advanced underwater signal processing, Kalman filtering techniques, and data fusion.
From 2003 to 2006, Ferial was a
member of the IEEE History Committee,
from 2001 to 2004 she was a member of
the Multilingual Subcommittee of the
IEEE Transnational Committee, and
since 2004 she has been a member of the
Rejuvenation Subcommittee of the IEEE
Section/Chapter Support Committee.
Her activities in IEEE Canada include
chairing the Canadian Atlantic IEEE
Oceanic Engineering Society (OES). She
is also a member of the IEEE Systems,
Man, and Cybernetics Society.
Her many awards include the 2001
Wally Read Service Award for Outstanding Service and Contribution to IEEE
Canada, the 2000 IEEE Third Millennium Medal, the 1999 IEEE Regional
Activities Board Achievement Award,
and the 1997 IEEE OES Distinguished
Service Award.

"Engineering is a straightforward field.
You can change directions once you
have an engineering degree. There are a
wide variety of fields you can go into,"
she says. Ferial earned her master's
degree from the University of Alberta,
Edmonton, Canada, in electrical engineering in 1971 and her doctorate
degree in 1981 in ocean engineering
Focus on Professionalism
from Memorial University of NewfoundFor a woman as accomplished as Feriland. She is president of BH Engial, there were bound to be some
neering Systems, in Halifax,
bumps on the road to sucNova Scotia, which specialcess. "During my studies
izes in consulting and
I was only one of five
Ignore
advanced professional
women who graduatyour gender.
development.
ed from my engiPresent yourself as
Ferial was on the
neering class. But
a professional. Work
faculty of engineerthroughout
my
as a team. You'll
ing at Dalhousie Unicareer, I did not feel
versity, Halifax, Nova
discriminated against.
gain more respect
Scotia, where she estabMaybe
it's just my perfrom men.
lished, and directed until
sonality. I didn't focus on
1997, the modeling and sigbeing a woman. I focused on
nal analysis research laboratory.
presenting myself professionalShe is editor-in-chief of The Ocean
ly," she says.
Engineering Handbook, published in
She tells all working women, not just
2001 by the IEEE and CRC Press. Curengineers, to focus on doing their work
rently an associate editor of the IEEE
to the best of their ability and to leave
Journal of Oceanic Engineering, she
the male/female dynamics out of it.
covers applications of computational
"Ignore your gender. Present yourself as

SUMMER 2008

IEEE WOMEN IN ENGINEERING MAGAZINE

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Women in Engineering Magazine - June 2008