A social enterprise, Perth{web}Girls aims to increase gender diversity in the tech community and to empower women in male dominated industry. By offering free workshops and coding foundation skills for beginners, the organisation is focused on opening up pathways for females in the tech world. Currently women represent just 25% of the industry globally; a worrying figure given it is one of the fastest growing industries internationally with predicted growth of 5.0% internationally throughout 2018 according to CompTIA.
Perth{web}Girls founder Kate Kirwin hopes to encourage more women to explore career opportunities and business developments in the field of STEM and tech innovation. “The enthusiasm for learning beginner level coding is infectious - we had girls as young as 9 creating websites at our recent regional workshops.” By offering free education and skill expansion, along with meetups and mentoring, communities of women in the coding arena are being developed throughout Western Australia.
“The great thing about coding is that you really can do it anywhere where there is internet. We have run events in some of the most remote parts of Western Australia including Port Hedland, Newman and Bunbury.” Once interest has been sparked and basic skills learnt, creativity, collaboration and further education can flourish regardless of distance and location, so long as a solid digital connection is in place. With limited career opportunities in traditional bricks and mortar businesses in regional Australia, there are increasing numbers of employees setting up workstations from home and shared workspaces with other remote workers.
One such venture is 45 minutes north of the Perth CBD. The Yanchep Beach Joint Venture (YBJV) is the region’s premier master commercial developer in one of Australia’s largest transformative urban development projects. As part of The Yanchep Project, the Central Business District will provide more than 20,000 new jobs to the area. Y.hub is a co-working space inside the Yanchep Research, Innovation and Enterprise Centre, and has been established to facilitate and grow social and economic activity. An incubator of economic possibilities, the coworking space (powered by Spacecubed) provides a professional and flexible space for new and established businesses and startups.
Yanchep Beach Joint Venture CEO Mr. Gin Wah Ang said “As WA’s next Strategic Metropolitan Centre, Yanchep’s population is growing rapidly. This creates opportunities to improve local educational and employment outcomes through future-skills training. We are proud to provide the support necessary for Perth{web}Girls to deliver this key service from Y.hub”.
Perth{web}Girls will be running its first event on the 2nd February at Y.hub. Free to participate for women of all ages and experience levels, the workshop will educate on coding basics whilst building the newest WA community of tech-savvy women.
Thanks to support from a number of partners including Soroptimist, this event is free and includes the full day’s activities, mentoring, and networking; as well as lunch and a post workshop cupcake for those that need a sugar hit to boost creativity. Sign up now.
