Above: Shamla Maharaj photographed at Uwi, St Augustin in October 2016. Photograph by Mark Lyndersay/Trigger a Impact
Bitdepth#1508 for 28 April 2025
On Thursday, the Telecommunications Union within the Caribbean hosted the annual Woman in Tic on Tic day.
This yr’s theme was “Ladies in Tic for the inclusive digital transformation”, and CTU selected Shamla Maharaj, a incapacity lawyer, as a speaker introduced, earlier than eliminating an informative group for discussions on the topic.
Regardless of the occasions that mark this annual try and appropriate the style imbalance within the jobs associated to the stem, the technological work, the gender disappearance continues to be an issue within the area.
A Jamaican examine of 2018, “an examination of gender steadiness in tic
On the instructional establishments ”discovered that, whereas the form of college students who’re on the IT examination on the CXC was roughly equal, the disappearance of gender has expanded to 3 male college students for every scholar enrolled on the college stage.
The profitable relations between the sexes at commencement equalized the disappearance solely regularly, about 2.25: 1 being the connection between male college students and ladies graduating.
The outcomes of this examine are dramatically higher for IT college students in Jamaica than for his or her US and EU counterparts.

A 2020 analysis examine on the Nicholls College that investigated the “gender distinction in main info know-how elections” discovered that, whereas feminine graduates dominate universities, registration and success for feminine graduates of their TIC routes.
The state of affairs is identical within the European Union, the place greater than half of the college inhabitants is feminine, however solely 20 % of ladies graduating from ICT qualifications.
A report from Latin America and the Caribbean from 2024 and the Caribbean locations TT on the backside of the area within the share of ladies who comply with stem research at 27 %, however these researchers labored from the 2002 statistics.
An UNDP evaluation of 2022 of regional planning paperwork examined the TT paperwork from 2003 to 2020 and located that none of them recognized women and girls as a ticke.
For Shamla Maharaj, who’s now working as an analyst of product supply for the Caribbean area in Scotiabank, the know-how has made all of the distinction.
“Think about what could be your life with out Tic, with out Web, with out gadgets, with out digital studying, with out functions, with out entry to information alternative or for one another?” She requested the individuals within the CTU webinar.
“Now think about -you comply with the world with restricted mobility or browse in training with obstacles each row. This was my actuality as soon as and for a lot of it’s nonetheless the case.”
“As a lady who was born in a world through which I had few alternatives, as somebody who needed to innovate, I got here to see know-how as a rescue line for us all. I reside with extreme bodily disabilities, however at the same time as a toddler I didn’t wish to wait on this planet to create area.”
“I believed then, as I do now, that if I needed to advance, I needed to create my very own facility. The earliest expertise with know-how began at seven years, studying to make use of a typewriter. At the moment, I had no thought how profound the easy act to alter my life.
“I’m able to execute my distant accountability, providing outcomes, main an initiative all through the area and main the inclusion with the identical professionalism as in the event that they have been positioned in a company workplace.”
“The popularity of speech, the interpretation of language and the software program of the outline of the picture adjustments how folks with disabilities work together with the world, rising the accessibility and opening of the doorways.”
“Our faculties must entry know-how, nevertheless it has to show college students find out how to suppose. What’s the drawback to be solved and find out how to think about their resolution. The know-how needs to be a part of our program, nevertheless it also needs to embrace social, resistance and braveness.”
“We should have the mentality, help system and proper alternatives whereas wanting on the future. One factor is evident. Inclusive innovation isn’t negotiable.”

“On the international stage, girls symbolize solely 25% of those that work within the stem,” stated Vashti Maharaj, counselor, digital industrial coverage at Commonwealth Secretariat.
“Cultural and social, it’s thought-about that the boys are drawback options, and the boys are those who would go into know-how; the boys are those who do engineering. However that adjustments and I might encourage everybody to see these challenges as alternatives, particularly for ladies and women.”
“Many ladies have a pure benefit. We’re pure issues resolutions. Now we have pure social empathy. We’re pure, artistic thinkers and that is as a result of method we’re raised. These abilities would allow you to rise up and shine within the IT sector. It’s as much as us to construct this confidence, to create our methods and even when we now have this means.”
For Esther Callender-George, the president of Isaca Trinidad and Tobago, know-how is barely a part of the problem in Tic management.
“What helped me all through my profession isn’t technical abilities,” stated Callender-George, “he was capable of suppose critically.”

“You’ll meet challenges. You’ll meet tough folks. These items is not going to disappear, as a person, you need to discover ways to adapt to conditions, to adapt to alter, to maneuver, so essential essential pondering and self -awareness is essential.”
“You’ll enter the areas the place there are prejudices. You want to know find out how to acknowledge it and never let it attain you. You have to say, I can’t reply it. I’ll give attention to the message and never the messenger [particularly] In conditions the place you need to have that private drive, that psychological drive, that self -awareness. “
“The technical issues you’ll be able to study. You may get a diploma however the mind of individuals works in another way. Somebody may cram and go an examination. How do you translate it into your individual atmosphere that you can be?”