GirlCode’s Virtual Career Day will be hosted on Monday, 8 March 2021 in celebration of this year’s International Women’s Day that is themed #ChooseToChallenge.
The career days are part of the numerous offerings that the non-profit extends to its beneficiaries and were established to enable girls to gain access to various tech companies.
At the career days, GirlCode introduces the girls to its corporate partners who in turn share their company information with them. They give advice to the girls on different job categories within their businesses, discuss the importance of education, the ideal calibre of candidates they look for on recruitment drives and most importantly, they advise them on the skills they must possess to make them successful in their careers upon completion of their studies.
GirlCode has partnered with Deloitte to host their first Virtual Career Day for university students looking to get into technology careers.
“Many organisations use the careers days as a platform to explore available talent and scout them for possible learnerships or graduate programmes. With COVID-19 restricting physical gatherings, hosting a physical career day would prevent many attendees from getting an opportunity to learn about Deloitte and what the company does. Hence, we decided to host a virtual career day,” says GirlCode CEO, Zandile Mkwanazi.
“The Covid-19 working conditions have become a norm for many companies and we at GirlCode are determined to continue supporting and empowering girl-students by facilitating our activities through technology. After all, technology will continue to be the key driver, a differentiator in many businesses and an enabler of business survival. Like this year’s International Women’s Day theme #ChooseToChallenge, we want our GirlCoders to challenge the status quo and know that they too can break glass ceilings like Ruwayda Redfearn, the Deloitte’s Africa Board Chair.
“We want our girls to know that they belong in the tech space, make it possible for them to find women role models in tech and facilitate access to those role models,” adds Mkwanazi.
“Our involvement with GirlCode began in 2019 because we believe in the work that they are doing. Digital is the way of the future and we want the girls to have opportunities in this space. This is part of our WorldClass ambition to impact 10 million lives in Africa through skills development needed for the digital economy. The career days help IT students to learn and explore opportunities and make valuable connections at organisations such as Deloitte,” says Bonga Nyembe, managing partner for responsible business and public policy at Deloitte.
GirlCode anticipates hosting 200 students for the Deloitte Virtual Career Day and encourages students to register at https://zurl.co/8Vbw. The closing date for registration will be 4 March 2021. For enquiries or further information, keen attendees can email the GirlCode’s operations manager Tapiwa Muza via email at tapiwam@girlcode.co.za.