Next year the State Department will host a TechGirls mentoring program for teenage girls in the Middle East and North Africa, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced yesterday at a luncheon celebrating the conclusion of the TechWomen program.
The TechGirls program will mirror the TechWomen program, bringing students to the United States to learn about innovative technologies and share ideas with American mentors with the goal being to encourage young women to follow careers in technology – a field typically dominated by men.
The TechWomen program brought women from Algeria, Egypt, Lebanon, Morocco and the Palestinian Territories to the United States for a five-week mentorship with 24 U.S.-based technology companies. Later this year, the U.S. mentors will travel to the Middle East to conduct workshops for women in the technology sector and girls interesting in pursuing a tech-based career.
“Innovation thrives on good ideas and women have a lot of good ideas,” Clinton said yesterday. “And we don’t want those ideas to just die. We want them to be shared and help others.”
Full speech:
