Melanie Stewart – The View from an Office Window that Changed my Life

In this episode you’ll hear from Melanie Stewart, Lead Structural Welding Engineer at Merit.

Has a single moment defined the rest of your life? For Mel, it was looking out of an office window and seeing the sparks fly as some people were welding. Mel was amazed. The magnetism of that moment – the sound, the light, the creative power – pulled her away from a mundane office job and into a challenging yet deeply fulfilling career path she never knew existed.

Mel reveals that she was always arty and into crafts but struggled with academia. She left school without qualifications which later became a barrier to entry for her into some professions. She admits, had she known she’d need them to be a welder she’d have worked harder.

Mel recalls how she faced relentless bullying during her apprenticeship years, being assigned menial tasks while male counterparts received proper training. She also encountered systemic barriers like job rejections due to her gender. Yet through it all, her passion for welding never dimmed.

To learn more about STEMazing, and this week’s guest, head to https://www.stemazing.co.uk/podcast