A woman-led initiative grooming STEM passion in Nigeria's north

The online education platform Flowdiary is bridging a language gap in the industry by offering training courses in Hausa, so young people in Hausa-speaking communities across Africa can learn the necessary skills for a career in technology.

BitLab Innovation Hub offers a STEM program geared at out-of-school children, which provides hands-on training to prepare them for careers in technology. The school has trained 105 children so far.

Flowdiary is an e-learning platform that offers various digital skill courses in the Hausa language for free or at a very low cost. Flowdiary has more than 8,000 students enrolled across the country, training them in web development, graphic design and other digital skills that help them further their education and secure internships that help them advance their career opportunities.

A U.S.-based nonprofit is providing access to online IT training courses at an affordable cost to allow those who are interested to learn skills in the IT field, thus helping them get jobs. The nonprofit also helps address barriers those in Nigeria face, like lack of internet access and necessary tools like laptops.

Data Lead Africa offers a training program specifically designed to help prepare Deaf people for careers in technology and data analysis. Students are provided laptops with assistive technology and sign language interpreters who facilitate the training.

The Union Public School District is making efforts to encourage and support more students from underrepresented backgrounds to take advanced math courses. Instead of sticking with the traditional one-time placement test that determines a student’s math trajectory from sixth grade onward, Union schools offer in-school tutoring and longer class periods to support students who show promise in advanced math.

Since starting up in Nigeria in 2018, the Kayode Alabi Leadership and Career Initiative, has reached about 6400 rural teenagers through their Skill2Rural bootcamp project. The multi-day bootcamp rotates between a selected school, internally displaced persons camp, or a community center. Participants have co-created about 70 prototypes to minimize issues related to poverty and unemployment within their communities.

WeCodeKC offers educational training and mentorship to help Black and brown students from low-income neighborhoods break into the tech industry. Participants can learn different programming languages, build their own robots, work on cybersecurity projects, get help with internship and job searches, and more.

The free summer boot camp organized by the Dumena Foundation teaches young students how to build and design circuits and also educates them in tech fields like robotics, engineering, and programming. Since launching in 2019, the organization has trained over 3,000 students across 22 schools in the region in order to bridge the gap in tech education and get students on track for careers in the field.

Reach Out to Girls (ROG) works to inspire girls, particularly those in rural areas, to embrace STEM, through mentoring programs and training. Through ROG, professional women in STEM fields serve as mentors and, so far, ROG’s programs have directly benefited more than 200 girls.