00:00Victoria is just one of 16 people nationwide that's been selected to visit a world-renowned
00:06science facility in France. It's called the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility.
00:11It was a competition and it said I needed to write one 500 word essay about this scientist
00:18and how I relate to her because it was all about feminism and stuff. And then there was
00:23another 500 word essay of why I should go on this trip.
00:26As Victoria dreams of a career in radiology, she stands out not only for her academic ability
00:32but also for the challenges she's overcome.
00:34Ever since I was born I've always had x-rays and they always show me what these x-rays are
00:40like
00:41and it's in this big room. There's so many machines around me and because I was little
00:45they'd have to explain it to me because it was quite scary when I was little. So they show me
00:49all the anatomy, how it works, why they have to stand behind a big screen.
00:54Physics still remains a male-dominated subject and last year the Education Data Lab reported
01:01that just 24% of those entering A-level physics exams were female and say physics still has the
01:08second lowest percentage of female entrants of all A-levels.
01:11It is difficult, it is really difficult. We don't always have a physics class here. There's
01:17sometimes there's not enough students that want to do it, sometimes they want to move to a different
01:23school but we've been really fortunate. We've got a great cohort of students in year 13 who have
01:31kind of blazed the way really and they've achieved really really well and I think when younger students
01:36see that there are already students in the school studying physics they then see it as a possibility.
01:42This is part of the experiment that Victoria was teaching her class today which shows that light
01:47can be thought of as particles but as teachers find it difficult to get girls involved and interested
01:52in physics what do the students here today think? I love STEM, it's so interesting like one of my
01:59favourite things to do is watch motor racing and being able to look at all the female in that sport
02:06is important that more people realise oh I can go do that stuff. Victoria's journey is taking her from
02:12Raynham to one of the world's leading science facilities but back in this classroom she is
02:17not the only one with big ambitions. They're proving they're not being held back by the numbers.
02:23Kristen Hawthorne for KMTV in Raynham.
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