As The World Celebrates Girls In ICT
By Onyinyechi Nmecha
25 April 2019 is Girls in ICT Day—An annual International Telecommunications Union (ITU) event to empower and encourage girls and young women to consider careers in the information and communication technology (ICT) sector.
Having stayed and lived in the South-Eastern part of Nigeria almost all through my existence, Women hardly find their stand when it comes to competing with their Male folks at either workplaces, learning skills, being innovative cum solving societal problems most especially in the ICT sector.
Some young girls will say
“A career in ICT would be boring”
” A career in ICT would be hard and too logical”
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But it’s not!
We need to fix this! we need to “Redesign this Model”, we need to “Evolve”, we need to “Activate” our minds, we need to “Explode” from our shelves. we need to re-orientate our generation about the need to embrace digital skills as the only means of existence in the 21st century. we need to connect with one another, we need to network with The Nigerian women who are passionate about rewriting their stories.
Being so much interested about changing the Status Quo brought about me volunteering in digital inclusion for women programmes like Django Girls, She can etc. as well as founding a girl empowerment community SheTechEast , where we shall be connecting over One Thousand (1000+) young girls and women who are passionate about building a career in Technology. we shall be exposing them to lots of business and entrepreneurship opportunities, training them on digital skills as well as Coaching/mentoring them to kick-start their career.
The girls already have the ideas and innovative spirit. We need to provide them with the tools to enable them to start right.
Our major focus is to connect young girls and women to industry stakeholders, open them to opportunities, let them leverage on the network to excel, empower them with skills, follow them up to see that they are successful, in-turn use them to empower other women.
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The main target of today is realizing the United Nations Millennium Development Goals, among which eliminating gender disparity features prominently, the Girls in ICT Day project is a way to create connections that inspire ideas and innovation to address a societal need.
As a woman in tech and an advocate, I have the willingness of making a positive change despite working with very limited means, yet we have managed to move mountains and reach out to hundreds of girls.
Therefore, I urge everybody especially women to help encourage and empower each other in one way or the other, through this we will sow the seeds of empowerment in thousands of girls and young women around the world.
I also wish to celebrate all the women breaking shackles in the ICT industry and to every aspiring IT young girl, never give up on your dreams.
Happy Girls in ICT day.
ANAEDOOLINE CELEBRATES ETIABA, EZIMORAH, OKAFOAGU AT 2019 WOMEN’S DAY
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