Thousands of Female Students in Lebanon Join the Movement of ‘Girls Got It’

  • W460
  • W460

Over 600 female public and private school students had an opportunity to learn about coding, computer programming and robotics at a series of workshops aimed at empowering young women across Lebanon to lead in the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), a press release said on Saturday.

The workshops, now in their sixth edition, are part of Girls Got IT, is a joint initiative between five Lebanese NGOs, led by Lebanese League for Women in Business (LLWB) in collaboration with the Lebanese Ministry of Education and Higher Education (MEHE), supported by UNICEF, funded by the Kingdom of the Netherlands.

More than 2,500 students have been part in the ‘Girls Got IT’ program since its start in March 2016.

“This time, we have hit a record mark, 600 young female students came together in one place, to join the ‘Girls Got IT’ national movement. Our aim is to keep adding to this number, which has exceeded 2,500 bright young minds, influenced and inspired to make a change,” said Asmahan Zein, President of the LLWB.

The March 10 event was held at University Saint Joseph (USJ), Humanities Campus, under the Patronage of Minister of Education Marwan Hamade, and in the presence of UNICEF Executive Director Henrietta H. Fore.

The Girls Got IT workshops are part of UNICEF’s Generation of Innovation Leaders Program (GIL), which seeks to educate youth and empower them with technical skills that are vital for success in the workplace.

Through its founders and partners, GGIT aims to bring together young female students from rural and urban areas of Lebanon, and gives them the opportunity to take part in workshops run by successful business people and entrepreneurs in relevant fields.

In addition to a keynote address by UNICEF Executive Director Fore, the speaker lineup at this edition of ‘Girls Got IT’ included the Founder of Tabshoura Nayla Fahed, Founder of Dot Com Lebanon Wissam Sabbagh, Tala Nsouli from McKinsey, Zeina Bou Harb from Ogero and Founder of Jamalon Alaa Alsallal. A total number of 27 different workshops were on offer, covering fields and topics such as robotics, graphic design, video gaming, programming, engineering and architecture.

The ‘Girls Got IT’ was created to encourage girls to select IT and STEM subjects as career choices and to break the cultural stereotypes of women in STEM by exposing young girls to technology skills, role models and success stories. A secondary goal is to support the technology start-up ecosystem in Lebanon and empower youth, turning them into active citizens and contributors to their society.

The next edition of ‘Girls Got IT’ will be announced soon. For more information visit: http://www.girlsgotit.org/

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