For the seventh consecutive year, CaixaBank and Microsoft have awarded the WONNOW Prizes to the 16 top female students in science and technology (STEM) university degrees in Spain. These awards recognize female excellence in STEM fields—Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics—with the aim of promoting diversity and helping to reduce the gender gap in these sectors. Two students from the University of La Laguna are among the award winners.
Specifically, they are Paula Pérez Romero (Cartagena, Murcia), who has completed a double degree in Physics and Mathematics at the University of Granada, as well as a master's degree in Cybersecurity and Data Intelligence at the University of La Laguna; and Ainhoa Aranda Elvira (Granada), who has completed a degree in Mathematics at the University of Granada and a master's degree in Cybersecurity and Artificial Intelligence at the Tenerife center.
Since its inception in 2018, the WONNOW Awards have received over 4,800 entries from students across Spain, demonstrating the growing popularity of this competition, which has become a benchmark in the university sector. This latest edition broke another participation record, with a total of 1,078 entries, quadrupling the number from the first year.
In 2024, the student with the best academic record and personal, professional, and social trajectory was Carmen Tabuenca Gómez (Pamplona), a double degree holder in Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of Navarra. She received a €10,000 grant and access to a Microsoft mentoring program. The other award-winning students, including the two from the University of La Laguna, will also participate in a Microsoft mentoring program and will work for six months at CaixaBank under an employment contract in key areas such as Digital Transformation & Advanced Analytics and Media and Sustainability, among others.
The percentage of women in science and technology jobs out of the total number of employed women in Spain is 51%. For men, that figure reaches 131%. We must continue working to accelerate women's interest in and participation in STEM fields, which offer enormous job opportunities.
This is one of the objectives of the WONNOW Awards, whose seventh edition awards ceremony was held at CaixaBank's 'all in one' office in Madrid, where Gonzalo Gortázar, CEO of CaixaBank; Eva Fernández, Director of Digital Channels and Innovation at CaixaBank; Silvia Hernández, Director of the Financial and Insurance Sector at Microsoft Spain; and Raquel Hernández, Director of Security Solutions at Microsoft Spain, participated.
(Note and photo provided by the contest organizers).
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