My Vision is Balanced with ICT

Hello everyone, It’s my pleasure to wish every one of you a happy Girls in ICT Day 2019. Every year on 25th April, the world honors Girls in ICT Day to reflect the importance of ICT for individual girls and women in their communities and societies and the need for intensified efforts towards more digitally balanced societies. While celebration of Girls in ICT Day take place all around the world, I have decided to celebrate it right here on worldpulse by sharing with you on the topic: “Education in a Digital World: How Technology Balanced my Vision for Better”. As everything now is just a click away, I consider it so timely that worldpulse honored me to be one of its ambassadors in Nigeria to lead young women and girls through their digital journey. Of course as an education and technology professional, this is a an event and a cause dear to my heart.

Increasing technology are vital in education and business, but young women and girls in sub-Saharan African are disproportionally left behind in accessing the internet and the benefit it holds. A report stated that “the difference in sub-Saharan Africa internet gender gap is 30 million. Only 40 million women in sub-Saharan Africa have access to and use of internet compared to 70 million men.

While Education for its own is empowering, Girls Education is closely tied to important development goals. Girls Education is especially powerful - it strongly correlates to better economic opportunities and health advancement when women become able to read about job opportunities, sanitation, medication and reproductive health and hygiene.

To reap the social and economic benefits of increased literacy among women and girls, the technology tools and resources must be use as a tool to improve access for young women and girls. WorldPulse in its effort of investing in accelerating closure of gap in technology and career path, has is partnering with women leaders as Ambassadors  in doing just that- empowering more girls and women to use technology, connecting them to economic opportunities and social opportunities and inspiring them to become innovators.

Cultural norms, high level of illiteracy and low accessibility and availability of information and communication technology infrastructure are major barriers to technology access and use for women around the world.

In Nigeria and as a WorldPulse Ambassador,  I am working further in scaling up digital empowerment programs by integrating the the World pulse training model and Intel 'She Will Connect' into  my organisation activities to make the impact of technology more accessible, relevant and engaging for girls and women, specifically those between the ages of 12-35, who comprise a large and growing population lacking opportunities for employment and skills development. Key pillars of  my work at Girls Education Mission International and as a WorldPulse Ambassador includes:

Integration of digital literacy into my organisation (Girls Education Mission International) programs to enable young women and girls access hardware, software, internet connectivity and ongoing support.

Connecting young women and girls and giving them a global voice through the power of WorldPulse community.

Increasing the economic opportunities for women and girls in ICT -enabled skill training, employment, online work or improved businesses through the use of internet.

Creating a movement to address the challenges of the Internet gender gap by building, fostering and collaborations with partners.

The digital empowerment program of Girls Education Mission International will help in transforming the lives of girls and young women by leveraging further the WorldPulse project activities. This involves:

• Making digital empowerment center available to communities specifically targeting young women and girls between ages 12-35.

• Implementing and scaling the Intel® Learn Easy Steps training (She Will Connect) program into the GEM empowerment program available for access to women and girls to participate and gain skills in compelling and engaging ways both in the training and in becoming trainers of others.

• Developing an innovative approach to delivering digital literacy skills by integrating a global social network of women as Worldpulse into the Digital empowerment training process.

• Integrating the trained girls and women into GEM’s programs.

Watch out for the Girls Education Mission International's soon-to-be-launched Digital empowerment program

Happy Girls in ICT Day 2019!

Keturah Shammah

Executive Director

WorldPulse Ambassador

Jos, Nigeria