Taungana

On 23 August 2014, 30 high school girls from rural Southern Africa will bravely travel from their communities (and countries) to Johannesburg for a 7-day STEM Career Expo!

The Expo theme is - Decoding STEM Careers!.

Africa is a developing continent with a great need for development in the STEM fields. Access to information and exposure to STEM education and careers is extremely limited for students in rural schools in Africa.  And, statistics continue to show the underrepresentation of females in STEM fields and sub-Saharan tertiary institutions.

This premier event will see a targeted 30 girls from rural South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe come to Johannesburg to get real-life exposure to STEM careers from high fliers in South African STEM giants, access to STEM career advancement opportunities and most importantly - they will be equipped to be STEM ambassadors in their own communities. Taungana Ambassadors will be visiting world-class STEM giants in and around Johannesburg. We cannot wait to announce our industry hosts in the energy, petrochemical, food, research science, aviation, mining, health sciences, pharmaceutical and STEM entrepreneurship segments.

Three Southern African Non-Profit Organisations all led by women have come together from the three countries to organise this event. STEM-IT-Forward from South Africa, Asikana Network from Zambia and Techwomen Zimbabwe.

What We Need & How You Can Help

With the Taungana Ambassadors selected and 20 of them eagerly awaiting their first ever passport stamps, we need your help to make this a phenomenal life-changing programme for the Ambassadors.

Help us open up doors for 30 future female African leaders this August in Johannesburg! With the bulk of the programme costs covered including transport, we need funds to meet:

•Accommodation: For 8 nights (with dinner and breakfast included) for our 30 Ambassadors and 5 volunteers.

  $10, 700

By demonstrating your commitment to a worldwide initiative you will enable us to build capacity in STEM which is a part of the UNESCO strategic initiatives.

Your generous sponsorship would be featured along with our current domestic, global and government sponsors taking part in bridging the gap within STEM fields.

We thank our current sponsors who have supported us in cash and in kind: TechWomen, Black Girls Code, Global Connections for Women, Subz Washable Pads, Sci Bono Discovery Centre, South African Agency for Science and Technology Advancement (SAASTA), Lil-Lets, Nuclear Energy Corporation of South Africa (Necsa) and our awesome individual sponsors.

Our WOW Factor!

"Empowering future African Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) leaders.

One girl at a time.”

Taungana is a regionally integrated approach to tackling the socio-economic and gender hindrances to STEM involvement for rural high school girls in sub-Saharan Africa with an initial focus on Southern Africa. Through its flagship annual STEM Expo and STEM Evangelism programmes in participating country rural communities, Taungana gives girls from rural South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe the opportunity to:

•   Explore world-class education and career paths in STEM
•   Connect with real women champions and role models in STEM sectors
•   Become STEM promotion Ambassadors within their communities
•   Receive the same access to STEM opportunities as their peers in advantaged communities
•   Become part of a mentored STEM network supporting their individual journeys in STEM
•   Be at the forefront of bridging the gap in technology access, literacy and usage at the grassroots level

"An estimated 2.5 million new engineers and technicians are required in sub-Saharan Africa alone to achieve the Milleniun Development Goals of improved access to clean water and sanitation. To achieve such aims, we need to attract every young mind to engineering, especially in the developing world, where attracting more women to fields in which they are underrepresented must be part of the solution."-unesco.org

Other Ways You Can Help

• Please help us make some noise about the campaign. Tell all your friends to help make a difference to a rural African schoolgirl with a passion for STEM.  Use the hashtags #taungana ; #1000@10
  
• Remember you can use the Indiegogo share tools!