DLI Update – January-February 2019

Happy 2019 from DLI!

The Digital Leadership Institute Board and Executive Team are actively involved in outreach activities with partners and stakeholders around the world that promote ESTEAM* leadership by girls and women.  Find out about our outreach activities of January and February 2019 below, and please visit our calendar for events organised by DLI.

*STEM powered by Entrepreneurship and Arts

21 January 2019 – “Europe for Her” Conference with European Committee of the Regions (Brussels) : On 21 January in Brussels, Ms. Katja Legisa, DLI/Digital Brusselles Director, joined a panel on “Education and Careers,” as part of an event promoting a larger role for girls and women in Europe’s cities and regions, hosted by the European Committee of the Regions (CoR).


24 January 2019 – #SheDIDIT Learning Library: “Experts Speaking Out”  (Brussels) : On 24 January at Start IT Brussels, Ms. Che Van Dyck, DLI Founding Director,  joined a Learning Library mentorship gathering as one of seven women role models being showcased by the #SheDIDIT campaign, promoting entrepreneurship by women of diverse backgrounds in Belgium.


29 January 2019 –  GSMA Winter Celebration (Brussels) :  On 29 January in Brussels, Ms. Che Van Dyck, DLI Founding Director, joined a celebration of leadership by women in digital sectors hosted at GMSA in Brussels.  Ms. Van Dyck was part of a high-level panel for which the opening keynote was provided by Ms. Mariya Gabriel, EU Commissioner for the Digital Economy and Society.


3-5 February 2019 – W20 Japan  Preparation Meetings at OECD (Paris) : 3-5 February at the OECD in Paris, members of the DLI Executive Team contributed to preparation activities ahead of the W20 Japan 2019 meetings taking place in Tokyo 23-24 March 2019.


25-28 February 2019 – Mobile World Congress & Women4Tech Summit (Barcelona) : Ms. Che Van Dyck, DLI Founding Director,  joined the Ministerial Programme and Women4Tech Summit that took place 25-28 February in Barcelona as part of Mobile World Congress 2019


Be sure to visit our Calendar and Outreach Activities page, and sign up for the DLI Newsletter in order to keep up with DLI events and activities!

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DLI Awarded by Digital Belgium Skills Fund

The Digital Leadership Institute has been awarded support from the Digital Belgium Skills Fund (DBSF) for its work to increase participation of girls and women in digital studies and careers in Belgium. In collaboration with the King Boudewijn Foundation and through support of the European Commission, DBSF aims to increase social inclusion through digital skills, especially for young people.  Launched in 2016 by Mr. Alexander De Croo, Deputy Prime Minister of Belgium and Minister for the Digital Agenda, the Digital Belgium Skills Fund has a budget of €18 million which will be invested over the next three years on initiatives that teach key digital skills, including basic coding and cyber security.

Since its founding in Brussels in 2014, the Digital Leadership Institute has pioneered European and global initiatives to bridge the gender gap and digital divide, with a focus on delivering digital skills and career opportunities to the most under-served and socially excluded communities in the world.  With the support of DBSF, DLI is pleased to introduce our new team members and the exciting initiatives they will be leading in Fall 2017:

20 September-13 December – Digital Muse After School Programme: From 20 September to 13 December, DLI will organise the Digital Muse After School  program, a Wednesday afternoon (14:00-16:00) program in Brussels (EN/FR/NL) for up to 40 girls, aged 11 to 16 years old, in order to encourage them to pursue studies and careers in ESTEAM (Entrepreneurship and Arts powered by STEM).

Digital Muse After School Schedule:

The inaugural DMAS program will focus on project work that introduces digital-creative skills and career paths to participants around four themes:

 

  • 20 September-4 October:  “Talk2Me” – Smartphone App Development with MIT App Inventor for Android
  • 11-25 October:  “Teen Blogstar” – Web Design with WordPress
  • 8-22 November:  “See What I Mean” – Designing Infographics & Data Visualisation with Tableau
  • 29 November-13 December: “Future of Fashion” – Fashion Technology and Wearables with Adafruit

 

For more information about the DMAS program or to register please follow this link or contact Ms. Valentina Calà.

14-15 October – Move It Forward female digital starters weekend with Women in Music and the Arts:  On 14-15 October at BOZAR, in celebration of Women Code Festival, European Code Week, the International Week of the Girl Child and Ada Lovelace Day, DLI will partner with the Brussels Women in Tech Platform and the Brussels Electronic Marathon to organise our fourth Move It Forward Brussels event promoting female tech startup by teen and adult women from across Belgium, with women in music and the arts.

For more information about the Move It Forward weekend please contact Ms. Katja Legisa.

15 October – Digital Brusselles Music Showcase at BOZAR with Brussels Electronic Marathon:  As the closing event of the Move It Forward weekend and Women Code Festival, Digital Brusselles is thrilled to partner to support the Brussels Electronic Marathon with a musical showcase at BOZAR on Sunday, 15 October that is open to the public.  The showcase will feature women and non-binary artists from across Belgium as well as projects from the MIF weekend.

For more information about the Digital Brusselles Music Showcase with BEM17 please contact Ms. Katja Legisa.

 

16 October-30 November – “CyPro” Cyber Professional Training and Job Placement Program for Women:  In Fall 2017, DLI will launch the first cohort of its CyPro Cyber Professional Training and Job Placement Program for Women, an initiative that aims to increase participation of women with work experience in strategic IT fields such as cyber security, data science, cloud computing and CRM. Working with key content partners — including AWS, Cisco, and Salesforce — the program will offer participants an IT expert certification path in parallel with on-the-job work experience through paid placement in IT organisations.  The program will kick off with a free, expert-led, 6-week CyPro “First Steps” IT Career training series for women.  Delegates completing the entire program will be eligible for a globally-recognised IT Essentials professional certification.

CyPro “First Steps” Schedule & Instructors:

  • 16-20 October:  Intro to IoT with Ms. Mai Ensmann – Cisco Networking Academy Course Certificate
  • 23-26 October: Intro to Cybersecurity with Ms. Hiba Khalid – Cisco Networking Academy Course Certificate
  • 26-27 October:  Linux Unhatched with Ms. Hiba Khalid – Cisco Networking Academy Course Certificate
  • 6-28 November:  IT Essentials with Ms. Hiba Khalid – Cisco Networking Academy Certificate & CompTIA A+ professional certification
  • 29-30 November: AWS Technical Essentials with Ms. Hiba Khalid – AWS Educate Course Badge
  • 30 November 18:00-19:00 – CyPro “First Steps” Graduation Ceremony as part of 2017 European Ada Awards Ceremony at BeCentral in Brussels

For more information about CyPro, please contact Ms. Mai Ensmann.

21 October-18 November – Digital Brusselles Female Digital Starter Series:  Over the course of one month, the Digital Brusselles female tech incubator will host a free, four-part Female Digital Starters training series that will address themes unique to digital startup by women. If you have joined previous inQube events, these trainings will build on the skills have learned and help move you forward on your path to digital startup!  If you have not participated in past events, do not worry. The content of these courses is geared toward new and recent starters, and all participants will benefit to the maximum.

Female Digital Starters Schedule & Instructors:

For more information about the Female Digital Starters series, please contact Ms. Katja Legisa.

25 October – Digital Brusselles Female Tech Incubator Launch:  On 25 October at BeCentral in Brussels, DLI will launch the first female tech incubator in Europe, building on its pioneering five-year inQube work promoting female digital startup.  The Digital Brusselles incubator will support DLI’s world class “Move It Forward” weekends with ongoing tech and entrepreneurship training for community-members; provide a space for hot-desking, networking and events for female tech starters; and facilitate consultation with experts who will provide broad-reaching support for launching women-led tech projects into the Belgian startup ecosystem.

For more information about the Digital Brusselles launch event, please contact Ms. Katja Legisa.

 

30 November – 2017-18 European Ada Awards Ceremony: In celebration of the 202nd anniversary of the birth of Ada Lovelace, the world’s first computer programmer, DLI will host the European Ada Awards in Brussels.  For the fifth consecutive year, DLI will recognise outstanding women and girls in digital fields across Europe, as well as organisations working to increase the participation of women and girls in tech. This year, the awards ceremony will take place on 30 November at BeCentral in Brussels, and nominations in the following categories are open until 30 October:

For more information about the 2017-18 European Ada Awards, please contact Ms. Loredana Bucseneanu.

To keep up-to-date about these and other activities organized by DLI, please consult our calendar and follow us on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.  For press and media inquiries about Digital Brusselles or other DLI projects, please contact Ms. Katrien Geraedts.

DLI Spring 2017 Events

February is the kickoff to a busy season of Digital Leadership Institute activities that we hope you will join us for! We are always looking for volunteers, sponsors and partners to support our work promoting ESTEAM skills to girls and women, so have a look below to find out how you can get involved!

A list of upcoming DLI events may be found on our calendar too. Get in touch if you have any questions, or register at the links provided if you would like to participate.


Girl Tech Fest Volunteer Meeting

On Saturday 29 April 2017, DLI will organise the second annual Digital Muse “Girl Tech Fest” in Brussels targeting 250 girls ages 11-14, with a full day of hands-on ESTEAM* workshops that will be all GIRLS, all TECH and all FUN!

To accomplish this undertaking, we will need the support of our awesome network of schools, partners, sponsors and — most important of all — individual volunteers who can help run hands-on workshops, organize a “Digital Muse Lab” and carry out the various activities, large and small, that will make this an incredible day for all the girls who participate.


Cypro Info Session: A Career in Cybersecurity for Women

Are you a woman seeking to transition to a career that is more lucrative and challenging, and that provides greater independence, flexibility and opportunity for advancement? Would you like to investigate a career in technology but don’t know what skills you need or how to get started?

If your answer to any of these questions is “yes,” please join us for an evening of discussion (EN/NL/FR) and exploration with Ms. Rosanna Kurrer, Cofounder of the Digital Leadership Institute, and find out more about DLI’s new CYPRO program, a cyber professional training and workforce placement program for women.


Girl Tech Fest Brussels 2017

  • Date/Time: 29 April 2017, all day 
  • Venue: European School VI
  • Registration to Open Soon

DLI is organising the second annual Digital Muse “Girl Tech Fest” for 500 girls at European School VI to stimulate interest toward girls in ESTEAM*. The girls will engage with the intersection of digital and creative as researchers through inspiring keynotes, three small (12 girls max) workshops and a trip to the Digital Muse Lab. NL/EN/FR will be represented and accommodations can be made for other languages upon request.

*Enterprise, Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics

Looking forward to a new year of learning!

A New Year’s message from Rosanna Kurrer, DLI Cofounder, Digital Literacy Lead & g-Hive Community Manager:

Hi girl-techies!

This year was a year of firsts for our organisation, and for our community. We got our own space in March, and started doing workshops on coding and electronics, using Scratch and Processing, as well as using interactive electronics and electric paint with the Bare Conductive Touch Board.

In the coming year, we plan on rolling up our sleeves and getting more active in organising a workshop series, for those of you who would like to take their learning experience to the next level. We will be introducing project-based learning workshops in coding and app development.  They will be taking place bi-weekly (every two weeks) on Wednesday afternoons. More information on these workshop series will be shared in January. If you have a preference for time and day, please don’t hesitate to send me an email with your requests.

I am also preparing a series of morning workshops for those of you who would like to learn basic coding skills, while enjoying a morning coffee with like-minded ladies. This will be a series of informal workshops called the “Techie Brekky Tuesdays”. You got it, we will be meeting on Tuesday mornings (every two weeks) for a couple of hours of group coding, coffee-sipping and croissant-munching techie-gigs. Again, more info on this on my next blogpost in January.

In the meantime, our female digital starter weekend “Move It Forward – tackling Cyberviolence and Online Hate Speech” has been moved to January 23-24, 2016. We have a line-up of great workshops scheduled for these two days, including a host of inspiring coaches who will help you with your projects and start-up ideas!

One more event that you might want to know about, we are teaming up with the IBM Bluemix team to organise a Bluemix Girls Night at inQube and offer a hands-on tutorial on their Bluemix Cloud Platform. Their team of engineers will be coming to our space and will lead hands-on exercises on real-world Internet of Things applications that could be deployed on the cloud. These tutorials will help us understand how cloud computing works, what the Internet of Things is, and how we can use “the cloud” to bring our start-up ideas to the next level. Visit here for more information, and to register for this event.

Here’s wishing all of you relaxing days during the holidays with your loved ones!

And let’s all stay techie-curious, and greet the new year with renewed energy to learn!

All the best,

Rosanna :)

Christmas Baubles with young Spruce tree branch. This file is cleaned, retouched and contains clipping path.

*Originally posted to g-hive.org on 21 December 2015

DLI Update – June 2015

The DLI Board and Executive Team are actively involved in initiatives with partners and stakeholders around the world that promote ESTEAM (entrepreneurship, science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics) leadership by girls and women. Find out below about our work in June 2015, learn here about future activities we are involved in, and visit our calendar for upcoming events that DLI is organising.

KET1-2 June – Digital & Key Enabling Technologies Skills Conference (Brussels): On 2 June, Ms. Cheryl Miller, DLI Founder, contributed to a high-level panel on the subject “towards an e-Leadership ecosystem” at the first annual Digital and Key Enabling Technologies Skills Conference in Brussels.


bxl smart city3 June – Brussels Smart Cities Summit (Brussels): On 3 June, DLI Founder, Ms. Cheryl Miller, delivered a keynote address on the topic of “Smart People: Education and raising citizens’ awareness of new technologies” as part of a Smart City Summit presented by Mrs. Bianca Debaets, Brussels Capital Region Secretary of State for Regional and Community Informatics and Digital Transition, and hosted by the Brussels Regional Informatics Centre (BRIC).


SKFlogo4 June – SKF Belgium: On 4 June, DLI Founder, Ms. Cheryl Miller, visited SKF Belgium to facilitate the second meeting of the SKF Women Work group.


ladiescircle9 June – Ladies Circle (Brussels): On 9 June, the Ladies Circle of Asse & Grimbergen enjoyed a special evening of wine, discussion and 3D Design & Printing facilitated by DLI Founder, Ms. Cheryl Miller, at the DLI inQube space in Brussels.

 


unhrc17 June – 29th Session of the UN Human Rights Council (Geneva): As part of the 29th Session of the UN Human Rights Council taking place in Geneva on 17 June, Ms. Cheryl Miller, DLI Founder, contributed to a Global Alliance on Media And Gender Europe panel on “Issues and challenges facing women in media“.


29 June – Visit of Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook COO (Brussels):Facebook & DLI Meeting On 29 June 2015 in Brussels, DLI board members, Ms. Cheryl Miller, and Ms. Janine de Keersmaeker, joined Ms. Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook COO and founder of LeanIn.org, and a small group of Brussels policy-makers to discuss increasing participation of girls and women in technological sectors.

 


Be sure to visit our Calendar, Upcoming Activities page, and sign up for the DLI Newsletter in order to keep up with DLI events and activities!

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