Tamale-Ghana, Aug. 02, GNA – Ms Christiana Wehle Awiah, a 14-year-old form two student of the St Paul’s Roman Catholic Junior High School in Tamale in the Northern Region, has emerged the overall winner in the Girls-in-ICT Programme held in the region.
She scored 100 points to beat 999 other girls, who participated in the contest, which climaxed in Tamale on Tuesday.
Two other girls: Amanda Daal, aged 13, from Kpandai District, and Husinatu Mohammed, aged 14, from Tamale took the second and third positions after scoring 99 and 98 marks respectively during the contest.
The three girls each received a laptop, a plaque and a certificate besides a cash prize of GHc3,000 for the overall winner while the second and third place winners also received GHc2,500 and GHc2,000 cash prizes respectively.
An ICT laboratory will also be established in their respective schools.
Each of the remaining 997 girls also received a laptop and a certificate, and all the 100 girls would benefit from an open day experience where they would be sent to Accra for a week to tour the offices of Mobile Network Operators, Companies in the ICTs industry, selected Agencies of the Ministry of Communications and Digitalisation to interact, especially with women in the industry.
The Girls-in-ICT Programme was held in the region from July 03, to August 01, where a total of 1,000 girls, drawn from basic schools in all the 16 districts in the region, were trained on basic ICT skills such as Scratch Programming (Coding), Cyber Security, Gaming, Website Development, Project Presentation amongst others to help them explore careers in the digital space.
As part of the training, examinations were held for all the participants to select the top 100 performers for the awards during the climax of the programme (Girls-in-ICT programme).
This event, which was on the theme: “Digital Skills for Life,” was organised by the Ministry of Communications and Digitalisation, and sponsored by MTN Ghana, German Development Cooperation, Kofi Annan Centre of Excellence in ICT, GIFEC, and American Towers (ATC).
Ms Awiah, the overall winner of the examinations, speaking after receiving her award during the climax, described her feat as a life-changing experience saying, “Before last week, my desire was to be a lecturer in human languages but with this exposure, I intend to explore the possibility of lecturing in computer languages.”
She said “Although I knew how to play around the computer, this is my first time learning how to code. How wonderful I felt knowing I can instruct the computer to create games, animations, stories and websites. The training has given us the ability to think critically in solving problems step by step.”
Mrs Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, Minister for Communications and Digitalisation, who handed over the awards packages to the winners, congratulated the girls.
She said the initiative was impactful and could transform the lives of the girls and the people of the country.
Mrs Owusu-Ekuful emphasized that “we want to create the right environment for the training of girls in ICT to participate in the digital economy” saying since 2012 when the Girls-in-ICT Programme began, 11,981 girls and 1,200 teachers across the country had benefited from it.
She encouraged the girls to continue to practice the lessons to perfect their skills and become the torchbearers in ICT in their communities.
Alhaji Shani Alhassan Saibu, Northern Regional Minister said the event marked the beginning of empowering and inspiring the girl-child to venture into the ICT space for jobs and other relevant opportunities.
Professor Seidu Al-Hassan, Vice-chancellor of University for Development Studies lauded the Girls-in-ICT Programme and said it was preparing the girls for the future, which was important for the development of the country.
