13
RAMADAN 2011
The Arab American News
A
er having launched TechWomen last year,
Hillary Clinton announced the launch of Tech-
Girls, an educa onal ini a ve for girls from
Arab countries interested in technology.
The U.S. Secretary of State made the announce-
ment last month at the closing luncheon honoring
the first class of par cipants from TechWomen.
The TechWomen program, Clinton told par ci-
pants, is spawning a new program: "We're calling it
TechGirls, and it will bring teenage girls from the Mid-
dle East and North Africa for an intensive month of
educa onal ac vi es here in the United States."
"Technology can be a great facilitator," Clinton
said. "It can also be used by governments and oth-
ers to prevent people from being able to communi-
cate. So we have to stay a step ahead so that people
are never deprived of their opportunity, as we saw
how important that was in both Tunisia and Egypt
over the last months. We're seeing it in many other
se ngs as well."
The TechWomen program is a public-private part-
nership that brought emerging female leaders in
technical fields from predominately Muslim coun-
tries to the United States for one month. The women
were paired with 24 leading U.S. technology compa-
nies in Silicon Valley and the greater San Francisco
area for a project-based professional mentorship.
The par cipants, who
range in age from 25 to 42,
were
from
Algeria,
Tunisia, Egypt, Jordan,
Lebanon, Morocco and
the Pales nian Territo-
ries. They spent five
weeks, all expenses paid, at
24 U.S.-based technology com-
panies, among them: Cisco Systems,
Hewle -Packard, Intel, Facebook, Google, Twi er,
Yahoo, AT&T and Adobe Systems.
Select U.S. mentors will complete the professional
exchange program and travel to Lebanon and Mo-
rocco this year to conduct workshops for women in
the technology sector as well as for young girls who
have expressed an interest in tech-based careers.
"Being a woman in the field of technology is not
always easy. Being a woman in any field is not always
easy, but there are so many opportuni es in tech-
nology that we just have to forge ahead," Clinton told
the group of 37 Muslim women and their U.S. men-
tors.
Clinton encouraged the first class of TechWomen
to help other women in their home countries, un-
derlining that the work between TechWomen and
the United States is just beginning.
— AP
Clinton promotes technology
for Arab girls
Clinton: "Technology can be a great facilitator."
TechWomen program is a public-private part-
nership that brought emerging female leaders
in technical fields from predominately Muslim
countries to the United States for one month.
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