In September 2019, the Universities of Vigo and A Coruña and the company Aldaba launched the Aldaba WIB Chair: Women, ICT & Business, with the aim of boosting and enriching the progress of ICT by promoting greater participation of women in its development and establishing two-way channels of collaboration between academia and industry. Among their initiatives, this summer they will hold a technology camp for girls and boys at the Higher School of Computer Engineering on the Ourense campus and at the Faculty of Computer Science in A Coruña, aimed at fostering STEM vocations and contributing to gender equality in this field.
This Thursday, the collaboration agreement between the chair and the Social Council of the University of A Coruña was signed in A Coruña to launch this Aldaba-TIC Camp. The event was attended by the president of the Social Council, Antonio Abril; the Director of ALDABA, Enrique Fernández Pérez; and the co-directors of the chair at UDC and UVigo, respectively, Virginia Mato and Alma María Gómez. The latter wished to underscore and thank the support received from the entities involved in carrying out this initiative.
Prepare a "mission" to Mars
The heads of the chair highlighted their satisfaction in presenting this camp, noting that it “is planned as a way to address one of the strategic lines of the Aldaba-WIB Chair: increasing female representation in the field of information and communications technologies (ICT).” ICT degrees, and especially computer engineering, they noted, “have a very low female presence that has only been declining in recent years: while female computer science students accounted for approximately 35% of the total in the 1990s, they now make up less than 20%. This means we’re missing out on the talent of all these women, and that the technology of the future could be biased because women’s perspectives are absent in its development. In this context, they pointed out that "many studies show that boys and girls have a similar interest in technology and mathematics until about age 6–8." From this point on, girls begin to lose interest and feel less capable in math and technology (even tho academic performance in the field is the same for boys and girls).
The Aldaba-TIC Camp will take place on the Ourense and A Coruña campuses during the last week of June (June 26–30), from 9:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m., with optional early-bird and lunch services. It will be taught by instructors from PlayCodeAcademy and will feature the participation of researchers Patricia Concheiro and Carmen Miranda (UDC), as well as Lorena Otero and María Encarnación González (UVigo). It is intended for girls and boys aged 6 to 12, and although it is co-ed, girls are given priority, with 80% of the total spots reserved for them. The camp workshops, which play with the idea of preparing a mission to travel to Mars, will be tailored to different age groups, but among the proposed activities are training reconnaissance drones, programming interactive apps and robots, and building a rocket and 3D-printed tools. To achieve this, the boys and girls will use tools such as Lego, Arduino, Scratch, 3D printers, and robotics kits. The ultimate goal is to awaken and develop participants’ interest in technology and to make them see it as something attractive and accessible, as well as to demonstrate its usefulness.
All spots are filled
The organizers of the activity highlight its initial warm reception, with available spots selling out just days after registration opened. 'We also received a large number of inquiries, so we believe that, at least in terms of how families have welcomed it, it’s already a success. This is also very important to us,' the co-directors of the chair recall, since if families encourage girls to become interested in studying computer science, 'we’ll have a much more egalitarian future in the profession, and everyone will benefit.'