Celebrating girls in ICT

(CARICOM Secretariat, Turkeyen, Greater Georgetown, Guyana)      Girls in the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) are preparing to join their counterparts worldwide on Thursday 24 April, to call attention to the opportunities available to them in the field of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs).
On Thursday, International Girls in ICT Day will be observed under the theme Expanding Horizons And Changing Attitudes. The observance is an initiative observed by International Telecommunications Union (ITU) member states since 2010 to create a global environment that empowers and encourages girls and young women to consider careers in the growing field of ICTs. The ITU is the United Nations’ specialized agency for ICTs.

The CARICOM Secretariat is hosting activities to mark the day under the theme ‘Celebrating Girls in ICT’. The focus will be on an interactive session and exhibition at the Turkeyen Headquarters of the Secretariat. About 100 women and girls, including CARICOM Staff, Youth Ambassadors, University of Guyana students, youth groups from various regions in Guyana and secondary school students are expected to convene there for the programme.

Participants will have the opportunity to interact with girls and women in the field, ranging from programme analysts, web application developers, and information architects to engineers, pilots and photographers.

Grenada, Montserrat, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname and Trinidad and Tobago were the first CARICOM Member States to observe Girls in ICT Day events in 2012, while Grenada and Trinidad and Tobago continued the tradition in 2013. Member States are expected to again join in activities to observe the day.

The Community is placing more emphasis on ICTs given the importance of the sector to development and the mandate issued by CARICOM Heads of Government in March 2014 for increased attention to be placed on ICT in 2014 and 2015.  One of the priority areas in this regard speaks to bringing technology to the people and transforming them to digital citizens, with an emphasis on women and girls.