The Nigerian Women In Information Technology (NIWIIT) recently held its 10th-anniversary celebration, 7th National Conference, 8th AGM and 5th election in Lagos, and it was an event to remember.
The President of NIWIIT, Dele Bayo-Osibo was expectedly present at the event and he called for more solutions to enhance women’s participation in the development of our nation by taking steps to change the way the female gender access and uses technology.
According to Dele Bayo, the association was formed to tackle youth employment in Nigeria, with a major concentration on empowering girls with digital skills that can improve their standard of living. According to her, the programme organized by the Nigerian Women In Information Technology (NIWIIT) will help develop the digital skills of the girls via lots of locally adapted courses. Also, every female participant will get job-related training on data entry, digital accounting, graphic design, web design and other digital skills.
Her words, “Technology remains a key driver in increasing access to education, considering the age we live in. The time has come for a total reform of the sector to meet global competitiveness.”
“Nigeria must be more equitable and inclusive of women. One way to make that happen is hiring and retaining more women in tech roles. Cultural biases and limiting stereotypes about the emotional adaptability of women skew the hiring process against women.”
“Organisations can fix this by creating and enforcing inclusivity laws where women have a fair chance at employment based on their skills alone.”
The CEO of MainOne and Keynote speaker at the event, Funke Opeke also chipped in by adding that investing in women-focused programmes is absolutely key to the growth of our nation.
Her words, “Hiring more women is important, but it’ll not miraculously fix the gender imbalance in tech job roles. For instance, in Nigeria, more women are out of school compared to men. How do women compete fairly if they aren’t well equipped? That’s why it’s important to invest in women-focused initiatives. These initiatives provide the relevant skills and mentorship to improve the education and employability status of women.”
“Meanwhile, females have abilities to navigate the new communication devices with different functions on all social media platforms, like computers, phones, tablets, iPhones Android, Bluetooth, radio, TV and others.”
The President, Nigeria Computer Society (NCS), Adesina Sodiya, added that his association has done its bit to promote digital skills in the tertiary institutions and IT development across Nigeria while hailing NIWIIT for taking another major step towards changing the average mentality of a Nigerian girl.
source https://www.jbklutse.com/the-nigerian-women-in-information-technology-niwiit-set-to-empower-nigerian-women-with-digital-skills/
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