Team from Pak went California to presented their project and ranked amongst the top five in TechWomen. It is an Initiative of the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs where emerging leaders gathered to present their action plan and processing the solution to that one problem.
Team comprises on 5 members from Pak including Asmara Rahat, Asna Javed, Ayesha Mumtaz Khan, Farhat Yasmeen, and Zeenat Anjum with expertise fluctuating from IT to AI and digital media.
Their initiative was Bacha-o which reflected the problem of child sexual abuse using a digital platform. Their mission is to make every child safe which has been on a rise as per the recent report by the Pakistani government.
The team plans to create a portal to promote the awareness of this issue and take more from the ‘Mera Bacha’ which is an existing government portal for reporting child sexual abuse cases.
The team from Pak gave interview to TechWomen “We will manufacture wristbands for child protection, create community hubs and an AI chatbot for children, and deliver training for parents and teachers on recognizing and reporting child abuse”.
During the action planning process, the teams showcased their projects alongside Impact Coaches and developed their cases over the duration of four weeks. The teams were then given a chance to win themselves a seed-grant that would support them in implementing their projects back home.
While other teams also presented innovative ideas that were a problem in their relevant countries. Team from Kazakhstan was hoping to open their country’s first ever interactive science exhibition for kids. Team from South Africa was looking to educate the young men about gender violence in their country. Team from Lebanon talked about the country’s water crisis and wanted to develop science based groundwater quality management and guidelines. Team from Zimbabwe was looking to support and encourage girls with disabilities to participate in STEM.
The TechWomen program has seen 10 fellows since 2017 from Pakistan with impactful stories in hopes of empowering women and young girls especially.