Celebrating #GirlsinICT day with our Coding Club Girls'Achievements: Working to empower girls in tech and close the digital gender gap
On 23 April, Lyra joined UN Women and girls around the world to mark the International Girls in ICT Day, drawing attention to the critical need for more girls and women in the ICT sector.
With technology playing a role in all kinds of careers, from art and history to law, primary teaching and graphic design, learning tech skills at a young age will set girls up for economic independence. And, the ICT sector needs more girls and women. According to She Codes For Change, only 20% of girls enter STEAM careers, and this number is much lower in rural areas, where access to technology is non-existent. The jobs of the future will be driven by technology and innovation—65 percent of children entering primary school today will have jobs that do not yet exist.
Lyra partners with 8 rural schools on the Digital learning program. None of these schools are online, so all teaching is offline, using world class educational materials and hotspot devices. The students and most teachers had never touched a tablet or a computer before.
Since introducing its Digital Learning program in 2017, Lyra has helped 4,000 students (2,200 girls) and teachers develop skills and passion for technology and coding. These skills support the girls to develop curiosity, independence, equality and to share their knowledge within their local community.
Pictured, are Lightness and Dorcas with Roselyne, Lyra’s National Director. Lyra has sponsored Lightness and Dorcas to attend a six months Advanced IT and Entrepreneurship training for underprivileged girls and young women offered by Apps and Girls in Dar es Salaam. With this program, students will gain important tech skills that will help them navigate the workplace of the 21st Century, and be able to create their own technology-based start-ups thus elevating women’s socio-economic empowerment.
Lightness and Dorcas are both girls who stayed in Lyra Hostels, and will become the very first Lyra Digital Mentors who will support Lyra’s Digital learning program. Over the next two years, Lyra will continue to train an additional number of Digital Mentors (all Lyra alumni) to ensure sustainability of Lyra’s Digital Learning Programme.
19 girls and 6 teachers from 6 Lyra supported schools participated at the Regional International Girls Entrepreneurship Summit. This is a coding competition, where the Lyra sponsored coding club from Ilambilole school girls' coding team won 2nd place. We were so happy to see that all Lyra teams entering the competition came within the 20 best project ideas.
In 2020, Lyra will implement coding clubs in ten rural schools, teaching design thinking process, idea generation, coding and programming, in partnership with NLabs – an Apps and Girls initiative.
You can read more about our Digital Skills program here>>