Empowering future female researchers – Girls’ Day 2025 at PIK

The day began with a tour of the historic Telegraphenberg, where the participants not only got to know the buildings of the resident institutes, but also learned more about their original use. A highlight was visiting the computer that runs PIK’s highly complex model simulations. They are crucial to a better understanding of climate change, which is why they are used by a great many researchers. Hannah Prawitz is one of them. The PhD student explained to the pupils how climate models work, why we need them and how the concept of planetary boundaries shapes our future.

But it didn’t stop at theory; the girls also had a chance to experience firsthand how models are used. They helped to carry out PIK’s ocean current experiment, which simulates the circulation of the Gulf Stream. This showed the role of ocean currents in climate and the far-reaching consequences that changes in these systems can have. The experiment gave the participants a practical insight into climate science research and illustrated the importance of modelling for understanding complex relationships.

At the end of the day, the students took part in a climate summit role play. As representatives of various countries, they negotiated future coal consumption. Their final decisions would have resulted in a global temperature rise of more than two degrees Celsius. This is a result that does not really correspond to the schoolgirls’ personal ideas, but it illustrates how complex such negotiations can become.

The Girls’ Day is the world's largest career orientation project for female secondary school students. Its goal is to spark girls’ interest in professional fields in which women are still underrepresented. Girls’ Day is sponsored by the Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth (BMFSFJ) and the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF).