Nicole Woon, a senior at the University of Pennsylvania, has been elected to the board of directors of the Society of Women Engineers. Founded in 1950, SWE is an international professional, educational and service society that aims to support women’s entry and advancement through engineering careers, an area where they have been historically underrepresented. The society is organized into regional sections, with subdivisions at city and collegiate levels. 

Starting July 1, 2014, Woon will serve as the board’s collegiate director for the following fiscal year. She will act as a liaison to section leaders at academic institutions across the nation and contribute insight about the needs and interests of the professional society’s collegiate members to committee chairs and the rest of the 12-member board.

Woon, from Santa Monica, Calif., is a member of the Jerome Fisher Program in Management and Technology and will earn bachelor’s degrees in bioengineering from the School of Engineering and Applied Science and in management with a specialization in entrepreneurship and innovation from The Wharton School. She is also pursuing a master’s degree in mechanical engineering and applied mechanics from Penn Engineering.

She has been involved with SWE from her first days on campus.

“I was looking for an environment where I would be able to meet other female engineers and grow from their experiences, gain professional mentors and have an opportunity to do educational outreach for K-12 students,” Woon said. “SWE was the perfect place, as it recognizes all three of those branches, and I immediately fell in love with the community there and sought out leadership roles to give back.” 

Woon previously served as president of Penn’s section of SWE, which focuses on professional development, educational outreach and social programming for over 500 undergraduates on campus. She also held leadership roles in SWE’s mid-Atlantic region as region collegiate communications editor and region collegiate representative, coordinating and sharing best practices with representatives from the 58 institutions across New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and Virginia.

"Nicole has been a great leader for the Penn chapter of SWE and a great advocate for women engineers,” said Michele Grab, director of the Advancing Women in Engineering program in Penn Engineering. “We're proud that she will be using her talents at the international level and I know she will represent Penn well."