Celebrating International Day of the Girl

On International Day of the Girl, what better inspiration for St Mary’s students than a visit from a woman who qualified as a doctor, chose to take her medical direction forward with the military, operated in a hurricane disaster zone, and has been on the European Space Agency selection panel choosing the next generation of astronauts. 

Wing Commander (Dr) Jo Rimmer, described herself, in her years of education, as a somewhat shy girl at Saint Felix School for Girls in Southwold who then did a medical degree in the hustle-and-bustle of Birmingham University, where she found similar, like-minded people in droves and a whole raft of opportunities to take. 

Her advice: to take the time to find out what you really, really like by opening doors, taking gap years and trying new things. For her this meant joining the University Air Squadron of the RAF, which was perhaps her first step away from mainstream medicine as she was surrounded by aspiring pilots, engineers and astronauts. 

Trying new things also took the shape of sailing across the Atlantic, and also around Cape Horn, on the southern-most tip of mainland South America, and a diploma in tropical medicine. 

A six-month stint as a GP didn’t excite her as much as she thought it would, as she preferred seeing severely unwell people in hospital physically get well, rather than keeping people well in her GP role. 

Being part of the military provided her with the opportunity to get into aviation medicine and space medicine, which proved a good match with her medical specialisation in gastroenterology.  

While bloating and Boyles Law of gas was explained to the St Mary’s students during this fascinating lunchtime talk, diarrhoea was merely alluded to. 

A combination of bursaries and a reciprocal commitment to spend five years in the military saw her conducting medical evaluations on pilots, whose every minor illness was investigated fully with echocardiograms, 24-hour heart monitors, treadmill tests and so on. 

Aside from this, Jo, in her RAF role, was involved in disaster planning and relief, being in a state of ‘very high readiness’ for six months at a time, not knowing where she might be going, what the disaster would be, and whether she would need a rifle or not. 

When asked by one of our students: “Do you ever get empathy exhaustion” she remarked that you can avoid it by being a little bit detached from the devastation around you, by looking after yourself – which can mean something as simple as reading a book.  

Empathy, she said, is something that can be practiced, and the more you exercise it, the easier it becomes. 

As a woman with the most interesting and varied career imaginable, she advised our students to always be themselves and always put forward their best self. Never ever give up or lose heart and always follow your ‘Plan A’ and never settle for ‘Plan B’, unless, she said, Plan B was to ‘make a new Plan A!’ 

She did acknowledge that some stereotyping of roles still exists – in a war zone she once got assigned all the roles that would normally be given to the nurses despite being a highly trained and experienced doctor – not belittling the valuable role of nurses, but more an understanding that the role of women is sometimes still underestimated. 

A highlight of her career was being asked to be on the European Space Agency Astronaut Selection Panel, which she was not expecting, and which, even today, she still can’t quite believe. 

So, while some of us only dream about being an astronaut, she has helped select those chosen few – including the world’s first para-astronaut, John McFall. 

Fact check: Of all the candidates (and there were lots) for this astronaut class of 2022, most were women! 

And a last piece of advice from Wing Commander Rimmer – work hard to make sure people know and understand you are there as an equal. 

At the Junior School, the pupils dressed up as who they would like to be in the future. The girls came as doctors, vets, explorers, scientists, athletes and more as they embraced the limitless possibilities for what girls of today can achieve. 

Pupils recognised and celebrated girls’ achievements from across the globe by creating a mural of women and girls who have changed the world. The girls also watched powerful documentaries, from historical mathematicians launching rockets to modern day climate activists, the films promoted equality and “Girl Power” - reinforcing the fact that girls’ can become whatever they want to be.