Leadership is the focus of this year’s celebration of International Girls in ICT Day.

The Commonwealth Secretariat will be hosting a webinar on Thursday, 25 April 2024 at 17h00 - 18h00 BST, to further its commitment to accelerate gender equality and the empowerment of girls through technology.

The International Day for Girls in ICT, on the theme of 'leadership', emphasises empowering girls with ICT skills to advance gender equality and STEM involvement. The Secretariat aims to foster discussions on improving girls' participation in ICT education and policy-making, enriching the tech ecosystem.

These dialogues will support broader gender equality efforts at the Commonwealth Women's Forum in Apia, Samoa in October 2024, bolstering the impact of the #GirlsInICT campaign.

Speakers:

* Rt Hon Patricia Scotland KC, Commonwealth Secretary-General
* Itumeleng Senekane, Executive Head, Customer Value Management, Big Data and Loyalty, Vodacom
* Vashti Maharaj, Acting Head & Adviser, Digital Trade Policy, Commonwealth Connectivity Agenda
* Necta Richard, Humanitarian Technologist
* Tamara Dancheva (Moderator), Senior Manager, International Relations, GSMA

The webinar will build on other Commonwealth projects to support inclusion in technology. One initiative is the recently launched Commonwealth AI Academy, in partnership with Intel, a series of six online courses is now available on the Commonwealth eLearning Platform.

Another initiative, a collaboration with Open Weaver, aims to allow small and medium-sized businesses to build websites and mobile applications using the platform’s no-code solutions.