Although ICT is an essential part of our lives - whether we are men, women, teenagers, adults or older -
women represent only 7% of all ICT professionals. The Brussels-Capital Region believes that this is a worrying statistic that needs to be taken to the next level.
As part of this philosophy, the
Women Code Festival of WomenInTech took place last week, offering a range of workshops, training sessions and other training moments for companies and non-profit organisations from the Brussels-Capital Region. The goal? Introducing women to programming.
In short, a real Smart City initiative.
The
Brussels Regional Informatics Centre (BRIC) contributed by organising a free
introduction to programming in five different Digital Public Spaces (DPS) in the region in Uccle, Brussels-City, Ixelles, Saint-Gilles and Molenbeek. The workshop, which introduced programming by means of games and user-friendly applications, attracted a great deal of interest and was fully booked!
Afterwards, the participants unanimously agreed that the workshop had been an excellent opportunity to get to know the world of programming better. Moreover, they were very satisfied with the enthusiastic teachers of Fobagra, who provided the training courses.
Where it concerns the BRIC, the centre looks back on the event with hope for the future and finds that "the response indicates that women are undoubtedly interested in ICT training". Long-term, the centre wants to continue to organise these kinds of initiatives in order to support
social sustainability and gender equality in the ICT sector.
