Impact Stories from Economic Impact Policy Area

Fellows speak at “Be Woman” Central Asian Forum

Fellow(s): Darika Aldasheva, Zharkyn Chsheglova

Country: Kyrgyzstan

Cohort: 2022

Policy Area(s): Economic Impact, Empowering Women and Girls, Entrepreneurship, Professional Development

Fellows Darika Aldasheva (Kyrgyzstan, 2022) and Zharkyn Chsheglova (Kyrgyzstan, 2022) both recently served as guest speakers at the at the first Central Asian Women’s Forum: Be Woman, held on March 5 in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. Convening experts in many fields, including business, government, media and education, Be Woman provided a platform for women to share and inspire growth-minded engagement in the economy, business and culture of Central Asia and beyond. Darika and Zharkyn spoke on the panel discussion, “Women in IT: the path to a digital future.” “Despite our diverse backgrounds, ” Zharkyn shared, “we empowered each other for success and forged a resilient network — a force that is both invisible and profoundly influential.”

Report Date...: 3/11/2024

Alumnae & Mentors host Tech Community Impact Week in Abuja to honor International Women’s Day

Fellow(s): Binta Moustapha, Fatima Abdulaziz Sule, Flora Asibe, and Rumana Kabir, Kathy Giori, Katy Dickinson

Country: Nigeria

Cohort: 2014, 2015, 2018, 2019, 2020-2021, 2022, 2023

Policy Area(s): Economic Impact, Education Diplomacy/Mentoring, Empowering Women and Girls, Entrepreneurship, Environmental Sustainability, Youth Engagement

Collaborating with a variety of governmental organizations, NGOs, educational institutions, non-profits and startups, Nigerian fellow Binta Moustapha (Nigeria, 2014) led the organization of fellows Rumana Kabir (Nigeria, 2023), Fatima Abdulaziz Sule (Nigeria, 2018), Ebenezer Ajah Chris (Nigeria 2023), Tolulope Erinosho (Nigeria, 2022), Flora Asibe Ohazurike (Nigeria 2021), Stella Uzochukwu (Nigeria, 2019), and Carolyn Seaman (Nigeria 2015), alongside mentors Kathy Giori and Katy Dickinson, to bring Tech Community Impact Week to Nigeria from March 2 to 9, 2024. With the aim of providing activities, discussions and networking opportunities for anyone from novice to established leader in science, technology, engineering and mathematics,the dynamic lineup of events included panel discussions, speed mentoring, physical computing workshops, and courtesy visits to schools, universities, and influential organizations and companies, mainly aimed at uplifting and empowering women and girls in tech. Highlights of the week included an opening event at Baze University Jabi Abuja with akeynote address delivered by Katy and a design-thinking workshop led by Kathy, a local celebrity panel discussion moderated by Kathy at Cosmopolitan University Abuja, a panel discussion featuring Flora, Fatima and Katy, speed mentoring with Katy and Rumana, and several hands-on physical computing workshops and demonstrations at three local schools and the FabLab in Abuja led by Kathy with fellows acting as teaching assistants. Partners and sponsors of Tech Community Impact Week included 100 Women in Tech Nigeria, Bridge 4 Innovation, Climate KIC, Creeds Energy, Developers FabLab, ECOWAS Liaison Lead, FCT College of Education Zuba, Mentoring Standard, MicroBlocks, National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) of Nigeria, Office of the Director of ICT Federal Ministry of Education Abuja Nigeria, She&Tech, SheTechAfrica, Wademos Regional Advocacy, and Young Scholars Initiative of the Institute of New Economic Thinking (YSI INET). Events coincided with the celebration of International Women’s Day on March 8. Mentor Jessica Dickinson Goodman and fellow Eyitayo Alimi (Nigeria, 2019) supported as co-organizers remotely.

Report Date...: 3/04/24

Fellow green tech org wins $1000 Social Impact Award

Fellow(s): Olamide Ayeni

Country: Nigeria

Cohort: 2017

Policy Area(s): Economic Impact, Entrepreneurship, Environmental Sustainability, Professional Development

Fellow green tech org wins $1000 Social Impact Award

Fellow Olamide Ayeni (Nigeria, 2017) recently won the Social Impact Award and a $1,000 USD prize at the Bob Mark Business Model Pitch Competition for HOPCYKU, a sustainability-as-a-service organization for which she serves as Chief People Officer and co-founder.

Hosted by Michigan Technological University, where Olamide is currently pursing a Master of Engineering and Industrial Management, the competition offers professional business coaching to students of all disciplines and the chance for them to present four-minute entrepreneurial concept pitches before an audience and panel of judges. Winners are awarded prize money for their businesses.

HOPCYKU, formerly Pearl Recycling, is a circular economy company expanding from a waste-to-furniture upcycling startup into a more holistic green tech organization.

Report Date...: 02/12/2024

Fellow joins board of Asian Credit Fund

Fellow(s): Sevara Siradjeva

Country: Uzbekistan

Cohort: 2016

Policy Area(s): Economic Impact, Empowering Women and Girls, Entrepreneurship, Professional Development

Fellow joins board of Asian Credit Fund

Fellow Sevara Siradjeva (Uzbekistan, 2016) has recently joined the board of the Asian Credit Fund (ACF). It is the third largest microfinance institution (MFI) lending to rural borrowers in the nation of Kazakhstan and boasts a portfolio of more than 60% women clients.

Sevara joins the board with over 12 years of experience in tech industry digitalization and product development. Throughout her career, she has expertly developed and launched tech products in global markets, including the U.S., the UK, the United Arab Emirates, Russia, Georgia and Uzbekistan.

Beyond her professional endeavors, Sevara has also served as a mentor for women and girls in STEM, particularly in her home region of Central Asia. She recently joined TechWomen on the spring 2023 delegation to Kazakhstan and intends to join the spring 2024 delegation to Tajikistan.

Report Date...: 02/12/2024

Short film covers visionary career of fellow Elmira Obry

Fellow(s): Elmira Obry

Country: Kazakhstan

Cohort: 2022

Policy Area(s): Economic Impact, Entrepreneurship, Professional Development

Short film covers visionary career of fellow Elmira Obry

Fellow Elmira Obry (Kazakhstan, 2022) was recently featured in 20-minute short film entitled “Elmira Aubrey: STEM Thinking as the Skill of the Future” as part of the series, “Success Stories of Central Asian Women,” produced by Silk Way.

“When you teach a woman, you teach an entire generation,” Elmira shares at the outset of the feature, recounting her earliest exposures to technology via visits to the workplace of her father, a statistician who worked with enormous computers “the size of ATMs,” she reminisces. Her father, also interviewed in the video, facilitated these visits as part of his drive to keep his children invested in education, to which he credits Elmira’s enduring desire for knowledge and education. Elmira went on to graduate high school with Honors in Mathematics and then study Public Relations, Management and Finance in higher education.

Throughout the film, colleagues recount her visionary thinking that positioned her team within their organization, the Astana International Financial Center’s Bureau for Continuing Professional Development (BCPD AIFC), to lead the 2019 development of Edtech, a digital platform for technology personnel training, which skyrocketed at the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic. Fellow Aknur Karaby (Kazakhstan, 2022), also appears in the film to discuss their mutual experiences in the TechWomen program as well as with other programs for women and girls in STEM.

Today, Elmira is the CEO of the BCPD AIFC, as well as MOST Business Intelligence, and the Founder of BRANDWORKS and QWANT> School of Advanced Technologies.

Report Date...: 02/05/2024

Fellow admitted to JAMII Femmes for entrepreneurs

Fellow(s): Imane Ben Khelifa

Country: Algeria

Cohort: 2015

Policy Area(s): Economic Impact, Empowering Women and Girls, Entrepreneurship, Professional Development

Fellow admitted to JAMII Femmes for entrepreneurs

Fellow Imane Ben Khelifa (Algeria, 2015) recently announced her admission to the 2023-2024 cohort of the prestigious JAMII Femmes program.

JAMII Femmes, a collaboration between the Women in Africa social impact initiative and the Coca Cola foundation, aims to develop 7,000 women entrepreneurs from Algeria, Egypt and South Africa through four key steps: a competitive selection process, three months of self-paced, online courses offered by the Honoris Academy and United Universities, a set of comprehensive exams to earn Certificates of Entrepreneurship and Leadership, and. finally, an immersive, in-person bootcamp. During this final step, they will engage with experts and mentors on workshops, projects, networking and competition with grants topping out at $10,000 USD.

“My journey from Techwomen alumna to being accepted into the JAMII Women program is a testament to the transformative power of mentorship, education, and perseverance,” Imane shared in recent communications.

Report Date...: 02/05/2024

Mentor(s): Reshma Singh

Company: Berkeley Lab

Mentor Type: Impact, Professional

Policy Area(s): Economic Impact, Empowering Women and Girls, Environmental Sustainability, Professional Development

Mentor joins steering committee for FEED conference

Mentor Reshma Singh has recently joined the steering committee of the 2024 Forum on Energy Efficiency and Decarbonization (FEED), which will be hosted in New Delhi, India this February 28 and 29.

Presented by the Alliance for an Energy Efficient Economy, FEED allows stakeholders in India’s energy ecosystem to come together in alignment with the agenda of the G20 New Delhi Leaders’ Declaration and COP28.

Reshma is a leader and innovator in the clean technology sector with over 12 years of experience. She holds two clean technology patents, is a published author, and works as a Senior Advisor for the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Building Technologies Office. As a program lead at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, she heads several tech-focused entrepreneurship initiatives including IMPEL, Cradle to Commerce, and the Climate Smart Women Energy Leaders program (CS-WEL).

Report Date...: 01/22/2024

Fellow delivers keynote speech at youth conference

Fellow(s): Ayesha Hammad Zaman

Country: Pakistan

Cohort: 2022

Policy Area(s): Economic Impact, Entrepreneurship, Professional Development

Fellow delivers keynote speech at youth conference

Fellow Ayesha Hammad Zaman (Pakistan, 2022) recently appeared as a keynote speaker at the Pakistan National Youth (PNY) Conference, which took place on January 13 in Lahore. The PNY Conference serves as a platform to encourage innovation, creativity and future-oriented career development for youths through job fairs, live podcasts, emerging technologies, workshops and other related activities.

“As a visionary leader, she illuminated the ever-evolving landscape of technology, offering invaluable perspectives on maximizing performance in the dynamic tech field of the future,” PNY Conference published in a recent post.

Ayesha is a pioneer in the tech skills-building sector. She is the founder of SkillsTodo, a tech training and placement platform, and co-founder of Pakistan Tech Forum, which works to amplify Pakistan’s IT exports.

Report Date...: 01/22/2024

Fellow(s): Aderonke Sakpere, Shlomit Shyeter and Corinthe Bailey

Country: Nigeria

Cohort: 2023

Policy Area(s): Economic Impact, Entrepreneurship, Professional Development

Fellow launches 10-day HCI workshop with sponsorship from Google Research and support from mentors

Fellow Aderonke Sakpere (Nigeria, 2023) has co-launched a two-week capacity building workshop in Human Computer Interaction (HCI) with sponsorship from Google Research and support from mentors Shlomit Shyeter and Corinthe Bailey.

Addressing the issue of HCI underrepresentation in Nigeria, this initiative was borne out of Aderonke’s professional mentorship project from her TechWomen 2023 program. The mentorship-driven workshop will take part in two 5-day phases, the first of which will offer participants a comprehensive overview of HCI while also leading them through the initial stages of design thinking and prototyping for a capstone project. The second 5-day phase will allow participants to fully develop their projects, providing access to and practice with large language models, qualitative and quantitative analysis, artificial intelligence platforms and much more. At the close, participants will present their capstone projects and learn about graduate school admissions.

AfriCHI Community and Afrisnet, where Aderonke serves as a member of the board of directors, served as partners of the workshop. Google’s Explore CSR awards aid higher education efforts to support students from historically marginalized groups to pursue graduate studies and research careers in computing.

Report Date...: 01/15/2024

Fellow(s): Aiymzhan Baitureyeva, Kyzzhibek Ryszhanova, Uldanay Moldagaliyeva and Zhibek Akasheva

Country: Kazakhstan

Cohort: 2023

Policy Area(s): Economic Impact, Entrepreneurship, Environmental Sustainability, Professional Development

Team Kazakhstan profiled in article on seed-grant victory

Team Kazakhstan 2023, composed of Aiymzhan Baitureyeva, Kyzzhibek Ryszhanova, Uldanay Moldagaliyeva and Zhibek Akasheva, was profiled in DigitalBusiness.kz for their recent $3,000 seed grant win, which will be used to develop Irrigate Smart, a mobile AI application to assist farmers and the state in efficiently and fairly allocating water resources to agriculturalists across the country.

In addition to highlighting the TechWomen program, the article delves into their efforts gaining community and government buy-in, and how they plan to utilize their diverse career skills and expertise towards business development, AI implementation, scientific documentation, information systems development and data protection.

“As soon as we succeed at home, the project can be scaled,” Uldanay explained. “There are water problems not only in Kazakhstan. Almost every country in the world has the same questions.”

Report Date...: 01/15/2024

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