Seeing is Believing: The Girls in Tech Conference
On Saturday, 128 grade six to eight girls from more than 40 schools across the Greater Toronto Area converged at UTS for the eighth annual Girls in Tech Conference, an exhilarating day of technology, community and possibility. They took part in workshops like Your Voice is Power, blending hip-hop music production with Python coding. They infused artistry into their coding projects using artificial intelligence in a session led by Hackergal. They explored mobile game development in Unity with a professional game developer from Girls Make Games, as well as learning about animation, micro:bits, animation and teachable machines in other workshops and learning from inspiring women technology leaders in career panels.
The Girls in Tech Conference is organized by girls for girls ‒ all of these amazing learning experiences came together thanks to UTS student organizers, who planned the conference. Back in 2018, a group of UTS girls with a passion for technology were concerned about the lack of women’s representation in the industry. In typical UTS fashion, they set out to be the change, creating a space where girls could meet positive role models face-to-face, learn about the possibilities for women in technology as well as meet other girls their age from across the city who share their high-tech interests.
Seeing is believing. When young women meet female engineers, programmers, entrepreneurs and leaders, hear their stories and then have a chance for hand-on learning experiences with technology, they begin to truly understand the potential and excitement of a career in technology.
Eight years later, the Girls in Tech Conference continues to be a highly anticipated UTS event, and the lack of women’s representation in the tech industry remains an ongoing issue. A 2024 report from the Tech and People Network (TAP) found that women’s representation in Canada’s tech sector made some progress over the last year, increasing from 36.9 per cent to 38.6 per cent of technology employees among 149 employers surveyed, but is still far from being on par with men. The phenomenon of girls losing interest in tech and science careers when they hit adolescence is still ongoing (although not common at UTS).
The Girls in Tech Conference creates a space for solutions. Keynote speaker Lauren Epstein, an investor and lawyer, inspired with her work finding, mentoring and investing in ground-breaking early-stage technology companies. Girls attending the conference had the opportunity to learn from 23 professionals in robotics, coding, animation, programming and much more, including alums Rachel Ma ’19 and UTS Alumni Association President Avanti Ramachandran ’09.
Our students who organized the event are role models as well, collaborating to create this extraordinary technology experience for their peers. This learning and community that takes shape at this conference has the potential to level the playing field, resonating throughout the lives of young women. Today they’re experimenting with micro:bits and Python coding; tomorrow anything is possible.
