CARICOM Digital Dialogue to mark Girls in ICT Day

A CARICOM Digital Dialogue will mark International Day for Girls in ICT this year on 23 April.

The online event that begins at 10am and ends at 1pm will be held under the theme ‘Regional Resilience of ICT, STEM and Youth’. The Dialogue, organised by the CARICOM Girls in ICT Partnership, will be conducted via Zoom and live-streamed on the CARICOM Facebook Page as well as on today.caricom.org

Deputy Secretary-General of CARICOM, Ambassador Manorma Soeknandan, Ph.D., will make opening remarks at the event. Barbara Reynolds, Ph.D., will deliver the keynote address. Dr. Reynolds is an Education, EPR, Human rights and Gender Consultant. She has served as Deputy Vice-Chancellor – Planning and International Engagement, and Deputy Vice-Chancellor – Academics at the University of Guyana from August 2014 to September 2019.

The Digital Dialogue will have two main presentations. The first centres on Girls and ICT: Actualising CARICOM’s potential. The second focuses on ICT, Youths and Covid-19.  CARICOM Youth Ambassadors will also participate and provide reflections and insight on ways to attract more CARICOM youth to ICT/STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) careers.

International Girls in ICT Day is an International Telecommunication Union (ITU) initiative and is observed every year on the fourth Thursday of April, under the theme: ‘Expand Horizons, Change Attitudes’. The main objective is to create a global environment that empowers and encourages girls and young women to consider careers in ICTs and STEM-related fields.

The CARICOM Girls in ICT Partnership comprises Ministries of ICT, Youth, Education and Gender in CARICOM Member States and Associate Members, and regional and international organisations. Those organisations are: Guyana Animation Network (GAN) Inc, European Union – Guyana, STEM Guyana, Women and Gender Equality Commission (WGEC) – Guyana, Cyril Potter College of Education (CPCE), University of Guyana, University of the West Indies, United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF), United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), CARICOM Youth Ambassadors corp. (CYAP), Caribbean Telecommunications Union (CTU), Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC), International Telecommunications Union (ITU), Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) Commission, Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), Caribbean Association of National Telecommunications Organization (CANTO), and Caribbean Cybersecurity Centre (CCSC).

CARICOM Ministers responsible for ICT had endorsed the partnership in November 2019. They recognised that a regional partnership was a good initiative to advance the work to attract more youth of the Region to ICT and STEM careers to support CARICOM resilience.