What does a scientist look like? Black and white pictures of famous scientists. Colour pictures of people doing science jobs. You tell us

Call to action 2

People stand in front of posters talking with one another

Share your story and celebrate your role model

Click here to submit your story and help us spotlight the people who inspire us all.

Is there someone who has inspired you, shaped your career, or deserves to be recognised?

We want to hear about them. Whether it’s a mentor, colleague, friend, or public figure, if they’ve made a difference in your life, tell us why.

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Community event

After the success of our first storytelling project, we are excited to hear more. Your stories help build connection, celebrate impact, and inspire others. Don’t miss the chance to honour someone who matters to you.

Read more here about the event.

The project

This project is about collecting and presenting diverse stories from our Imperial community. We want to know who inspires our community, including personal role models like teachers and family members, contemporary scientists and engineers from around the world, or historical figures who still have an impact on you today.

We are doing this for two reasons:

  1. To highlight the diverse stories of people who inspire our community.
  2. To build a database of STEMM stories that can be used to diversify and expand our teaching.

Explore

STEMM stories

Below are some of the STEMM stories that we have collected already.

Stories to make you think

Below are some of the stories from STEMM that made us think

 

Or people outside of STEMM that influence our community

  • Stuart Hall - Academic, cultural theorist, and activist
Personal stories

Below are the stories that are personal to us, and about the people who make us who we are as students, researchers, and educators

Ellen Eliel - Survivor, advocate, grandmother

Katie Piatt - Educator, colleague, friend

Joanna Atkinson - Researcher, champion, colleague

Shaway Yeh - Business woman, change maker, colleague

Viv Maginnis - Teacher, engineer, force of nature

The women of the family - and their influence

Matthew Fecher - Musician and educator

Sonja Pantic - Meteorological technician and mother

What is a role model?

The simple answer

The term role model is actually very hard to be define but for this project we mean it in the broadest sense possible. We want stories of:

  • The people that you think the Imperial community needs to know more about. Like Wang Zhenyi.
  • The people whose stories have inspired you or made you think. Like Henrietta Lacks.
  • The people that you want to emulate. Like Katie Piatt.

The academic answer

There is no consensus on one definition of a role model but in the literature, role models have been linked to:

  • Showing the behaviour a person would like to copy or emulate (Merton, 1968).
  • Modelling career ambitions (Jung, 1986).
  • To show what is possible and be a source of inspiration (Morgenroth et al. 2015).
  • Aspirational positions in society (Horsburgh and Ippolito, 2018).

These role models can fall into two categories. Accessible, which are those you have a personal connection to, and inaccessible, which are public or historical figures (Bird, Kuhns and Garofalo 2012).

 

Who we are

  • Katie Stripe

    Personal details

    Katie Stripe Senior Learning Designer

    Work and Interests

    Working on inclusive learning projects across Imperial College, including Attributes and Aspirations and The Animated Inclusive Personae project.

  • Linda van Keimpema

    Personal details

    Linda van Keimpema Schools Outreach and Science Communications

    Work and Interests

    Working in the Outreach department to improve access for underrepresented and underprivileged students into STEM and Imperial. Interested in the influences of role models especially on underrepresented students and their academic choices.