GetBundi to provide 500 African women with free coding training as part of TechSis 2023

500 African women will get online coding instruction from GetBundi Education Foundation, the company's corporate social responsibility division, between June 1 and August 31, 2023.

The free coding classes will be offered amid an enormous digital skills gap in Africa, particularly among women, and at a time when having access to digital tools and skills is becoming more and more necessary for services like health, education, social protection, and financial services.

The effort, dubbed "TechSis 2023," which is a reversal of the male-dominated field known as "Tech Bros," seeks to eliminate the gender gap in digital talent in Africa. GetBundi Education Technology and GetBundi Education Foundation course coordinator Mrs. Juliet Ijei stated that free enrollment for the Coding classes will begin on April 24 and expire on May 23, 2023, or when the first 500 women had registered.

Juliet explained the motivation behind TechSis, claiming that it was created to help women and girls get a better deal in the male-dominated tech sector and to equip them to take their due position at the pinnacles of the new economy.

Without a question, men predominate in the IT sector globally, and Africa is no exception. Only 30% of African women are found in the IT sector, according to research, making them significantly underrepresented, Juliet stated.

She claims that although there are overwhelmingly more women on the continent of Africa than males, women make up only a small portion of the digital and technology workforce, accounting for only around 22% of workers in this sector in Nigeria.

Juliet said that prejudice and preconceptions have persisted as barriers to women being fairly represented in the technology sector and that women frequently exhibit reluctance to pursue degrees in technology or any tech-related skills, allowing men to rule many IT firms.

Given that an estimated 230 million jobs in the area would require digital skills by 2030, this suggests that women in sub-Saharan Africa are at significant risk of losing out on such employment.

"This phenomenon of female digital exclusion, where women and girls are disproportionately left behind in accessing and using digital technologies and services, is a pervasive problem hindering the realization of a fully inclusive digital future," she claimed.

GetBundi has volunteered to train 500 African women who are 18 years old or older in coding, a talent that is in high demand, for free to close the digital gap, according to Juliet.

She said that the free coding instruction will put the ladies in a good position to land well-paying employment and establish a source of income for themselves. Women and girls will be able to study programming languages including JavaScript, Python, Scratch, and ethical hacking thanks to this project, according to Juliet.

"The GetBundi Foundation will annually organize the TechSis project in several digital skill areas to facilitate the effective inclusion of women in the tech sector. The participation of more girls and women in the technology industry in Africa would surely be impacted by GetBundi's program to educate women to code”, she added.

The inaugural address would be delivered by Prof. Florence C. Emenalo, Director of the Centre for Women and Gender Studies at Imo State University in Nigeria, according to Osita Oparaugo, the founder of GetBundi Education Technology.

"We fight educational inequity, especially when it comes to STEM and digital skills, and we won't let up until the GetBundi Education Foundation helps millions of African women. This time, the focus is on coding, and by the fourth quarter of this year, 1,000 women will be targeted by digital marketing”, according to Oparaugo.

"The opportunity is what GetBundi Education Foundation is providing to women throughout Africa," he added. "The ladies are here, the thirst to learn is there”.

The mission of GetBundi, a government-approved educational technology platform, is to leverage technology to open up STEM and Digital Skills education to all people in Africa. The commissioning of a STEM lab at Wesley Girls Senior Secondary School in Yaba, Lagos, was made possible by a recent partnership between the Lagos State Government and GetBundi Education Technology. An continuing collaboration between the two organisations was in its pilot stage throughout this time.