Aitizaz Hassan

CodeGirls Pakistan, a women’s training bootcamp organisation, is going to launch “CodeGirls TechFest 2022” in Islamabad and Karachi where the IT students and professionals will be provided with an opportunity to showcase their talent and skills. Talking to WealthPK, Shamim Rajani, a well-known technologist and Chief Operating Officer (COO) of Genetech Solutions, a software solutions company, said CodeGirls is essentially a transformative women empowerment program.

She said the program was planned to enable more young women to enter the tech sector. Shamim said the purpose of the event is to improve gender parity in Pakistan’s tech industry.  CodeGirls strives to empower young girls with coding and business skills that help them kick-start their careers, become financially independent, and excel in the tech industry. The tech expert said that women empowerment is not about selecting a female chief executive officer (CEO) because of her gender, but it means evaluating her for the role without factoring in her gender.

She said the main aim is to see the CodeGirls succeed on their merits and not because of their gender. The first three cohorts have amply established that, given the opportunity, these young women can excel and have the potential not just to transform the IT landscape in Pakistan but the society as a whole.  The Genetech COO made it clear that CodeGirls was no gimmick. “CodeGirls are not there to train and leave their graduates wandering around.

They cater to the practical segment of women looking to become technologists, change makers, and pioneers,” she said. Shamim said that 100 students and IT professionals will join the hackathon. The competition will be conducted in web development, UI/UX, mobile app development, software testing, skill-building, access to opportunities, community building, health and wellness, and financial inclusion. “10 winner and runner-up participants will receive the cash prize of Rs50,000 and Rs25,000, respectively,” she said.

Shamim said there will be four sessions in the hackathon in areas of stellar presentations, business canvas model, customer development and product development. “It is a painstaking and lengthy process, but when we see our graduates dotting the industry in impactful roles, it is all worth that. And the idea behind tech-fest is to connect these dots so that they make a strong mesh of women developers, inventors, mentors, and recruiters, as well as inspire and open doors for more girls and women who still need to find their foothold,” Shamim Said.

ConsulNet Corporation, a software training firm, founded the program with its partners United Global Initiative -- a global community development foundation – and WomenInTechPK. CodeGirls is funded by some of the leading tech giants, influencers, tech community members, and business entrepreneurs. To date, more than 844 young women have graduated from the CodeGirl program with 170-plus job acquisitions and a starting salary of over Rs40,000.

Credit : Independent News Pakistan-WealthPk