AfChix - Women in Technology Group

Background

The AfChix Mailing list is composed of a group of African Chix (Women) in Computer Science / Information Technology that was previously called Linux Chix Africa (since 2004) and participants of the AfNOGChix series of workshops (since 2007). Linux Chix Africa was the brainchild of Dorcas Muthoni and Anna Badimo - two great African women in Computer Science / Information Technology that had a dream of how to support women in Computer Science / Information Technology to prosper. This group has since evolved to what is now called AfChix and its activities have been championed by Dorcas Muthoni with a focus on the following:

1. Career Fairs in Kenya targeting high school girls with the objective of enticing them to take up careers in Computer Science and related areas
2. Support for women to attend global and regional Computer Science / Information Technology related conferences for exposure
3. Targeted partnerships for training women in technical fields such as Linux Systems Administration, Network Infrastructure & Services, Internet Education among others
4. Management of the Afchix mailing list to share information and opportunities with women in Computer Science / Information Technology.

Purpose of the AfChix Group

The goal of AfChix is to create a vibrant network of African Women in Computer Science and related areas for the purpose of supporting each other. Specific objectives include the following:

1. Facilitate networking and sharing of opportunities with women in Computer Science / Information Technology - recognizing that there is power in purposeful collaboration and networking.
2. Establish a platform for mentorship targeting upcoming young women in Computer Science / Information Technology.
3. Identify opportunities and broker partnerships for professional training / development and exposure of women in Computer Science / Information Technology

Our website is: http://www.afchix.org/ and our blog is: http://afchix.blogspot.com/

Django Girls is a non-profit organization that empowers and helps women to organize free, one-day programming workshops by providing tools, resources and support. Each Django Girls event is a free, one-day workshop for 30-60 people about building your first application using HTML, CSS, Python and Django. A typical workshop takes 8 hours and people work in small, 3-person groups with a coach dedicated to each group.

The core belief of the the group is that technology is for people and everyone should be able to use and build it.

The workshops organized take place all over the world from Rio de Janeiro, Tunis, Austin, Brlin to Geneve. Don't forget to sign up for the upcoming events. The attendance is completely free of charge.

You can find more information on the link below.

 

Undergraduate scholarships for girls. Makerere University is forging partnerships with government, private sector and individuals of good will to raise scholarships to enable bright but disadvantaged girls to access University education.

Contact:

GMD Offices Secretary's Office. P.o.Box 7062 kampala
Uganda.

Ph. 256414540184, 0712422485.

Or visit: http://www.gender.mak.ac.ug/

Samasource offers computer-based employment to women and youth in cases where gender roles may prevent them from pursuing traditional employment such as India, Uganda and Kenya.  Employees work in the following areas: content services, data services, image services, and machine learning.

Women In Technology Uganda

Women in technology Uganda is an initiative that seeks to encourage, inspire and train more women in the tech field through networking, training, mentoring and partnering so as to increase the number of women in tech, the number of techwomen entrepreneurs and more girls to take science courses at university so as to reduce the gender gap and compete favorably with our male counterparts for jobs and improve the livelihoods of women in Uganda.

To achieve our goals we have structured PROGRAMS in place that Include

MENTORING:

Our mentor’s program aims to is to support, stimulate and challenge, using their own extensive skills, knowledge and experience to help you view your business or career in a different light, spot opportunities for development and implement the changes needed for a strong future.
If you have a skill and would like to mentor a young woman or would like to be mentored please contact us.

NETWORKING:

This program’s aim is to build relationships with fellow women that are where you are in your career, more advanced than you and to show case women in Technology that are making it big to act as a learning and encouraging fraction for women that want to advance their careers and tech businesses. We bring
together women from different ICT backgrounds, those that are in top management at ICT firms, students seeking to understand the professional world of IT. We hope in the relationships created from these events we create friendships, business partners and professional prospects for our members. This
platform addresses topics of issues that we face as women that hinder our development in the tech world. One issue at a time we will overcome our fears and contribute to this world of tech. through these events great partnerships are formed.

TRAINING:

For businesswomen, we help fill the gap in the economy for both small and growing businesses by equipping businesswomen with skills that will improve their business using technology. The women we work with have the potential to take the next step towards becoming successful entrepreneurs or are running small businesses that have already had some success but are looking for ways to expand their success with the limitations presented to African women in business.

Our second group of training is for young girls/women that have an interest and passion in coding, developing and designing, our trainings are both in mobile and web applications. We have hands on learning apprentice approach where you get to work on real projects as you learn or perfect your skill as a woman in technology.

Our third category is to create clubs in secondary schools to enourage young girls to join the tech field by showing them exciting tech ideas and sharing success stories of fellow women in tech, when they leave secondary school our hope is to bring them into WITU for our other programs to keep supporting their passion for tech.

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

The main benefits of being a member are:

• Opportunities to contribute to improving the lives of many people by contributing time and skill to the activities that support, mentoring, education, IT industry
• Opportunities to support and assist in the varied activities of the WITU
• Access to women business mentors from our pool of Mentors
• Opportunity to give back to society by becoming a mentor to a young girl
• Opportunity to become a trainer at our WITU trainings and becoming a role model to another WITU member
• Opportunities to attend Business Luncheons and Dinners arranged by the WITU
• Opportunity to join our development team of experts to work on paying projects
• Join a growing network of women owned tech businesses
• Opportunities to attend luncheons and dinners with other Tech Companies and distinguished society members
• Regular association with peers and colleagues from a mix of providers, users, entrepreneurs, investors and professionals from across the IT industry and within allied support industries and organizations

In addition there are:

• Regular gatherings every third Friday of the month in Kampala city at Hive colab
• Get your company advertised on our site
• Our members have access to new Tech career opportunities in the country through our Jobs Board
• As a member you get referral to paying projects from our partner Organizations
• Access to Finance for specific startups
• Build your IT career through our business networking events and trainings
• Find Partners, co founders for your start up as an IT entrepreneurs

 

Women of Uganda Network (WOUGNET) is a non-governmental organisation initiated in May 2000 by several women’s organisations in Uganda to develop the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) among women as tools to share information and address issues collectively.

WOUGNET’s mission is to promote and support the use of ICTs by women and women organisations in Uganda, so that they can take advantage of the opportunities presented by ICTs in order to effectively address national and local problems of sustainable development. The new ICTs, in particular, email and the Internet facilitate communication with each other and the international community. Indeed, access to information about best practices, appropriate technologies, ideas and problems of other groups working on similar concerns have been identified as critical information and communication needs of women organisations in Africa.

While our emphasis is directed towards Internet technologies, we are also interested in how these technologies can be integrated with traditional means of information exchange and dissemination including radio, video, television and print media. Our goal is to improve conditions of life for women by enhancing their capacities and opportunities for exchange, collaboration and information sharing.

WOUGNET activities are carried out under three major program areas:

• Information Sharing and Networking
• Technical Support
• Gender and ICT Policy Advocacy

Contact:

Susan Mubbala, Program Manager
Margaret Kasiko, Sec General - (077)436378