67th Commission on the Status of Women Parallel Event: Partnership in Equipping Women and Girls with Technological Resilience, Discernment and Protection from Digital Dangers
Written by: Naomi Ito
On March 9, 2023, the Women’s Federation for World Peace International hosted a parallel event for the 67th Commission on the Status of Women (CSW67). As the priority theme of the CSW67 was, “Innovation and technological change, and education in the digital age for achieving gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls,” the topic for the parallel event was, “Partnership in equipping women and girls with technological resilience, discernment and protection from digital dangers.” More than 40 attendees joined on-site and more than 90 attendees joined live online.
The first speaker, Dr. Karen Smith, is the CEO of Global Development Enterprise and NGO Academy, providing practical guidance to leaders driving transformative social change. She brought awareness to the importance of developing our “soft” power skills which are communication, emotional intelligence, resilience and negotiation. Soft skills are vital to have but they take time and are hard to develop. Gender inequality is just one of the social issues of the bigger issue that we are facing because of the pace of the growth of technology. Our traditional structures of institutions cannot grow as fast as technology is changing. She made the presentation understandable by breaking it down into pieces and explaining the mechanism of our human emotion and survival instincts.
The second speaker, Ms. Atefeh Riazi, is the chief information officer of Hearst and serves as the United Nations assistant secretary-general and CITO. She brought profound contributions by emphasizing the importance of raising our children with the right message so they can be educated to have a voice in the tech industry. Tech is changing the world and has brought impact on social, economic and financial issues but many do not have a voice because they are wired to think that they are not worthy to have a voice. She encourages women to have a voice and engage in the important issues we are facing today.
The third speaker, Mrs. Adriana Gascoigne, is the founder and CEO of Girls in Tech and serves on WAPPP and Harvard Kennedy School’s Women in Public Policy Program board. She established Girls in Tech to be a global force delivering local education and opportunities for women with the goal to eliminate the gender gap in technology. She focuses on giving women and girls the opportunity to be trained and educated in STEM. She brought inspiration to the crowd by presenting her initiatives of educating and building confidence in women, and through her works with organizations and companies by advising on how to support the development of women in tech.
The fourth speaker, Engr. Christine Rose Bulayo, is the regional secretary-general for WFWP Asia Pacific 1. She is also a computer engineer and a senior high and college instructor. She brought her unique perspective of ways we can integrate permaculture and digital technology with a holistic approach. Permaculture is an approach to development of ecosystems intended to be sustainable and self-sufficient. She presented how we can integrate digital technology into our daily lives and create a safe, green and digital environment where both men and women can equally participate.
At the end, there was a roundtable discussion and a Q&A session involving the attendees to participate through questions. Overall, the participants felt educated and enlightened by the content and inspired by some of the initiatives that the speakers presented. The event brought experts and practitioners from various fields of tech to share their wealth of information, and discussed the ways to ensure that all women and girls are equally and properly equipped and protected to be resilient, discerning, knowledgeable and empowered in this digital age.
