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REPORT OF DIGITAL POLICY ANALYSIS LEADERSHIP TRAINING FOR YOUNG WOMEN

Date: 6th to 8th November 2023.

Venue: Command Guest in, Bauchi, Bauchi State.

Introduction:

The 2-day training was conducted in Bauchi with more than 25 participants who were women from different institutions, mostly Academics, local activists, journalists, and women from the ICT space. The training aims to equip young women with the adequate knowledge to participate in the digital policy environment which will help in addressing the challenges of gender digital marginalization women who are mostly in rural communities are facing, it has been recorded that there is a huge gap between men and women when it comes to access to digital literacy, ICT infrastructure, absence more women in the decision-making process of the ICT and policy formation as well as limited space for women in the ICT industry, to overcome the above challenges, Centre for Information Technology and Development (CITAD) with support from Association for Progressive Communication(APC) took a step forward by training young women to be part of the digital policy related issue and take part in the decision-making processes of the ICT and digital technology agenda in the country. To spread the knowledge across communities’ participants will not only acquire the knowledge but to develop a strategy on how to engage their target audience by stepping down their learnings as well as developing a strategy for media and stakeholder engagements within their localities.

Objectives:

The objectives of the training are:

  1. Address the issue of the gender digital divide
  2. Mentor young professional women to be able to speak about police issues in the digital space.
  3. Develop the voice of youths to speak about ICT-related issues
  4. To equip participants to become activists in advocating for policies that will address the gender digital divide in the country and the Low representation of women in key positions like the board and managerial level.

Purpose of the Meeting:

The purpose of the meeting is to support young women with knowledge of how they can participate in policies related to ICT and digital inclusion.

Prepared the participants with skills to carry out engagement within their networks on issues related to technology that addresses the challenge of gender digital inclusion. 

Issues:

Issues discussed during the training are:

    1. Policy-Making Processes: in this session, participants were taken through the process of creating a policy, policy change, supporting policies, and supporting policy implementation in the digital space. The session also exposes participants to the different types of policy as well as educate them on their role and responsibility in the policy space.
    2. Digital Technology and Gender: this session exposes the participants to what digital technology and gender is, identifies the gender digital divide, discusses the impact of digital inclusion, the challenge of digital inclusion, the intervention made by CITAD on overcoming the digital divide, and participant role and responsibility in supporting digital inclusion and policy related issues surrounding it.
  • Gender Policy Analysis: This session explained how gender policy analysis works, the process of examining and evaluating policies, programs, and initiatives from a gender perspective, and addresses how policies may reinforce or challenge gender norms, roles, and power dynamics.
  • Engendering of ICT Policies in the Country: this is a session that takes the participant through the ways to ensure ICT policies and gender inclusion and how to identify if the policy is addressing gender issues.
  • Case studies: subjecting key ICT Policies to Gender Lens Analysis: this session teaches the participant the analytical tools to use in examining policies, programs, and strategies to determine how the policies empower women and men differently, the session also talks about identifying barriers, biases, and inequality.
  • Emerging Technologies and Gender Concerns:  this session takes the participants through identifying the new emerging technology and how to develop the existing infrastructure. 
  • TDigital Policy Architecture in the Country:  the session took participants through the digital architecture in Nigeria, how identifying digital policies works, and its impact on development. The participant learned the tips in which they can use to identify such policies and protect their identity online.
  • The Feminist Internet Principles: a session that discusses the 16 principles of the feminist internet, in this session participants learned about the guidelines for supporting women’s inclusion related to access, content, affordability, safety, security, and child protection among others.
  • Strategies for Creating and Amplifying Women’s Voices for Advocacy: this session discussed possible strategies that can be used to amplify women’s voices in terms of, it has been addressed that women have limited access to participation in the policy formation and decision-making processes of the ICT sector, therefore the session takes the participant through on how they can participate as well as influencing other like-minded women to participate and bring change to the issues s of gender digital marginalization.
  • Assessing and Making Effective Use of the Media: this session explained the use of media as a tool for addressing the issues related to policy advocacy, amplifying advocacy messages, and targeting relevant stakeholders through using media as well as participant roles in terms of collaborating with media.
  • Social Media Strategy: This session took the participant through the effective strategy to use while accessing social media platforms starting from the best approach to use when engaging stakeholders on social media, targeting the right time to post, and appropriate terms to use while posting. 

Exercise Carried out during the Training:

To ensure that participants participatory training, participants were broken into 3 to conduct an exercise on the following:

  1. Stakeholder Mapping: in this exercise, the participants were to do a stakeholder mapping. In this exercise, participants identified relevant stakeholders who can serve as their allies in terms of supporting ICT-related policies, some of the stakeholders identified by participants during the exercise are: government agencies and institutions, communities, media, legal bodies, and civil society organizations. Local CBOs, legislative, regulators, and technical community.
  2. How to influence Policy Making: in this exercise the participants were asked to showcase their learnings by designing a strategic plan on how to influence policy on their preferred issue. The participant based their learnings by categorizing it into three different stage
  • Policy formation on the gender digital divide: The participant addresses issues like overcoming the use of abusive words to women on social media, addressing cyberbullying targeting women on the internet, and equal opportunity in STEM courses.
  • Factors causing the gender digital divide: The participant discusses the factors that trigger the gender digital divide as well as identifies possible solutions to the problems. Some of the solutions that were identified by participants are sensitization and awareness creation, reviewing and remodeling of VAPP law.
  • Social norms: participants identify issues like Values, Beliefs, and Societal change as some of the factors to consider while addressing the issue of the gender digital divide and possible solutions to address the issue.
  1. developing personal media strategy: this exercise allows the participant to design their personal media strategy. The participant was able to come up with a personal strategy which is highlighted as follows:
  • Use both social and conventional media to empower women with adequate that will support their involvement in technology-related issues.
  • Creating a gender transformation content that advocates for equality, access, and taking part in the decision-making process.
  • Collaborating with media influencers to engage more women and encourage their participation.
  • Defining the goal, identifying the targeted audience, choosing the right platform as well and aligning goals.
  • Continues engagement and interaction with the target audience and amplifies advocacy messages.
  • Creating social media content by using graphics that highlight different STEM careers, and subject combinations, and targeting industries where those careers are needed to support linking women with that kinds of opportunities.
  • Organize online workshops and campaigns that address gender digital marginalization.

Recommendation:

During the training, it was recommended that:

  1. There is a need to address the digital marginalization of young women at the grassroots level where the issue of gender stereotyping mainly happened due to a lack of awareness of the importance of women in the digital space. 
  2. There is a need to encourage girls in STEM, promote digital literacy, ensure equal access, and foster an inclusive tech environment that can help address the challenges of digital marginalization.
  3. Supporting digital technology should be a collaborative effort among stakeholders and actors to amplify a call-to-action campaign and awareness creation.
  4. To help in addressing the gender digital marginalization, there is to localize and tailor the context that suits our localities.
  5. During the group discussion, participant limited their work to addressing only the stakeholders not mentioning their role, therefore there is a need to follow up with the participant regarding influencing policy making. 
  6. There is a need to showcase successful women in the digital space who can serve as sources of inspiration to other marginalized groups.
  7. There is a need to create a hashtag for the digital policy analysis training which will help in tracking social engagement. 
  8. More media engagement like the radio program on this program is needed to engage more women and other stakeholders in the community.

Lesson Learnt: 

  1. Need to sustain the current initiative by CITAD to be able to reach more women outside the training, this can be achieved through step-down training by participants.
  2. Need to sustain current relationships among participants for future collaboration and knowledge sharing.

Next Step:

  1. Essay writing/article.
  2. Advocacy to relevant stakeholders.
  3. Targeting policymakers and relevant authorities. 
  4. Experience sharing meetings.

Closing:

Participants were reminded that the expected outcome is to actively engage in digital policies that will bring possible solutions to the challenges women are facing, all efforts must be geared towards actualizing the outcome.

Media reports

 https://baushetimes.com/citad-trained-young-women-on-digital-leadership-skills/

 

https://apexnewsexclusive.com/centre-wants-digital-technology-easily-accessible-to-girls-women-for-better-society/

 

https://independent.ng/citad-trains-25-women-on-digital-analysis-leadership-gender-policy/

https://abcnewsng.com/2023/11/07/citad-holds-young-women-leadership-skills-training-in-bauchi/

 https://northeaststarlive.com/citad-trains-25-bauchi-women-in-digital-skills/