Women’s First Coding Club in Gaza

After getting nominated as the top tech female in Gaza to join an intensive training at Klarna; the online payment company in Sweden; I wanted to build a grassroots female tech community in Gaza by training women and girls in tech and business. I launched the first Women-Only Coding Club as my first initiative to impart knowledge about agile working methodologies, development operations and product development to the female tech community.

I started meeting the young women who are passionate about improving their career path and spreading the word about tech. I’ve done the outreach and all the events at Gaza Sky Geeks as I was a member of its community and volunteering with them building the women’s stand supporting the diversity in the varies events and activities.

GOALS:
1. Increase the number of female developers in Gaza
2. Expose the mindset of the Gazans to consider the women as a strong asset in tech and create new culture and mentality around supporting that
3. Enhance the entrepreneurship and develop females-founded startups
4. Launching several Webinars and workshops that connects the young women in Gaza with their peers abroad to share experience and grow up their minds
5. Improve the team working as a very important skill and develop a high level of communication within the women and the environment around

ACTIVITIES:
1. Computer science principles online course to develop the logic of the women’s mindsets as a start of the coding journey from scratch
2. Project-based exercises and assignments
3. Technical and entrepreneurship workshops and circles of discussions
4. Soft skills sessions and clients’ communication meet-ups
5. Coaching and mentoring

OUTCOME:
1. Women pool of Software developers of Web, Mobile, and desktop applications
2. Strong grassroots of an inclusive tech community
3. Role models and success stories of women who can lead the community and support other women to grow the ecosystem and increase the women’s presence effectively