By Albert Futukpor
Tamale, July 4, GNA – A trainer of trainers’ workshop for a total of 100 teachers drawn from all the districts in the Northern Region has begun to equip them with relevant ICT skills to enable them train girls in the region as part of the government’s Girls-in-ICT Programme.
They will be equipped with skills in Fundamentals in ICT, Scratch Programming (Coding), Cyber Security, Gaming, Website Development, Project Presentation amongst others during the week-long training being held at Sagnarigu.
Mrs Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, Minister for Communications and Digitalisation, whose speech was read on her behalf during the opening of the training in Tamale on Monday, urged the participants to pay close attention to the lessons to ensure that they fully understood the entire course to enable them to effectively deliver the Girls-in-ICT Programme.
From July 17 to July 29, this year, the teachers will be called upon to train a total of 1,000 girls from various communities in the region in ICT skills after which the girls will partake in District and Regional level competitions in ICT, as well as a mentorship and climax session from July 31 to August 01, this year, where the best 100 girls to emerge out of the competition, will be given awards.
The Girls-in-ICT Programme is being implemented by the Ministry of Communications and Digitalisation with support from the Kofi Annan Centre for Excellence (KACE) in ICT, Ghana Investment Fund for Electronic Communications (GIFEC), National Communications Authority, GIZ, ATC and MTN.
It is an annual event, which seeks to encourage basic school girls and by extension the youth to take up careers in the ICT industry as well as become torch bearers in the ICT sector.
It was adopted in the year 2012 to give equal opportunities to young girls all over the country to gain exposure to existing opportunities in the area of ICT as well as to empower girls and young women to explore and pursue ICT on the theme: “Digital Skills for Life”.
Whilst digital skills have increasingly become an important part of everyday life, and the ICT revolution is fast transforming the entire world of living, available statistics indicates that a good number of the citizenry, particularly adolescent girls and young women have very limited digital skills and are thus disadvantaged in today’s digital economy hence the Girls-in-ICT Programme.
Mrs Owusu-Ekuful told the teachers that a lot was expected of them and urged them to continue the work of assisting and encouraging the girls to pursue ICT careers later in life.
She said, “Presently, more than 9,000 girls have so far been trained. I am happy to inform you that just two months ago, the Girls-in-ICT Initiative was climaxed in the Savannah Region after training about 1,000 girls and 100 teachers.”
Alhaji Shani Alhassan Saibu, Northern Regional Minister, encouraged all the participating teachers and ICT instructors to put in maximum efforts and pay attention to all details to enable them get insight into the basics of the training to enable them impact the knowledge onto the girls.
Alhaji Saibu urged them to play their roles to ensure the success of the programme, expressing the need for all stakeholders to make commitments to put into good use all the various efforts by government and Development Partners in the area of ICT to better the lives of girls.
Hajia Mrs Katumi Natogmah Attah, Northern Regional Director of Education, was happy that the region was hosting the programme again, saying it would enhance the capacity of girls to participate in the ICT space.
GNA