LAUNCH OF EQUALS POLICY PAPER
“I’D BLUSH IF I COULD:
Closing gender divides in digital skills through education”
Digital skills are essential and will become indispensable. Nevertheless, the record on digital skills education is grim: women and girls are being left behind. Today, women and girls are 25% less likely than men to know how to leverage digital technology for basic purposes, 4 times less likely to know how to programme computers and 13 times less likely to file for an ICT patent. At a moment when every sector is becoming a technology sector and digital technologies are reshaping day-to-day life, these gaps should make policy-makers, educators and everyday citizens ‘blush’ in alarm.
In response to this, UNESCO is launching the EQUALS Policy Paper* entitled I’D BLUSH IF I COULD: Closing gender divides in digital skills through education. This publication aims at exposing biases and putting forward ideas to close a digital skills gender gap that is, in most parts of the world, wide and growing. It also explains the role gender-responsive education and training can play to help reset gendered views of technology and ensure equality for women and girls.
*This publication was prepared by UNESCO for the EQUALS Skills Coalition, one of three Coalitions that comprise the EQUALS partnership. EQUALS is a global partnership of governments and organizations dedicated to promoting gender balance in the technology sector by championing equality of access, skills and leadership for women and men alike.