The Ministry of Communications and Digitalisation has started the training of 1000 girls in basic ICT skills, coding, cyber security and website development in the Northen Region under the theme, “Girls In ICT- Digital Skills for Life”.
The training will involve a five-day training of selected girls from schools across the Northern region to learn and explore the world of technology through the creation of websites, computer games and animation stories starting from 17th of July 2023.
According to a statement by the Ministry of communications and Digitalization, the ministry has already trained some 1000 girls in the Savannah region with other regions including the Eastern, Volta and Greater Accra to benefit from the training this year.
The Girls-In-ICT programme was introduced in 2012 by the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) to create a global environment that empowers and encourages girls and young women to consider studies and careers in the growing field of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs).
The Ministry of Communications and Digitalisation, under the stewardship of Mrs. Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, Minister for Communications and Digitalisation and MP for Ablekuma West adopted the initiative as a platform to equip girls between the ages of 9 and 15 years (Upper Primary to Junior High School) with knowledge and skills in basic ICT and Coding.
The programme is implemented with support from Ghana Investment Fund for Electronic Communications (GIFEC) as the technical resource provider, with training by the Kofi Annan Centre of Excellence (KACE).
The programme is also supported by MTN Ghana, National Communications Authority (NCA), American Towers Company (ATC), Ministry of Education, GIZ and others.
The program has the following components:
● Training of 100 selected Teachers from across the selected Region
● Training of 1,000 Girls-In-ICT from across all the districts within the selected Region
● A Mentorship session whereby women currently working in the ICT Field share their personal and professional experiences with the Girls-in-ICT, to encourage and guide them in their future careers and endeavours.
The training of the selected girls will be Climaxed with the following:
o Presentation of awards for best-performing Girls
o Remarks by coaches and mentors
o A Speech by the Honourable Minister
o Presentation of certificates to all girls
The press release also indicated that an open day experience where the best 100 girls from the selected Region where the Programme had been held, will be sent to Accra for a week to tour the Offices of Mobile Network Operators (MNOs), Companies in the ICTs industry, selected MoCD Agencies, and interact especially with women in the industry.
It is important to note the following achievements between 2017 and 2022:
● 8,000 Girls have been trained & mentored (Ashanti, Western, Central, Oti, Western North, North East, Bono, Bono-East and Ahafo).
● 800 Teachers trained to train more girls in ICT, beyond the programme
● 43 Cyber labs have been set up, with 120 more being set up this year.
● 1,267 laptops given to teachers and top-performing girls.
This year, the Ministry targets 5000 girls and 500 teachers from 5 regions to benefit from the girls in ICT programme.
The beneficiary regions for this year are Savannah, Northern, Eastern, Volta and Greater Accra.
In spite of these important achievements over the years, and the immense contributions to the MoCD in support of the Programme from various partners, the enormity of the gender digital divide remains a challenge, hence the need to scale up the programme to cover even more girls across Ghana.
Source: Padfm.com.gh /Gogu Edwin
