Empowering Yemeni Women through Technology

In Yemen — one of the least developed countries in the Middle East — low literacy and education rates among women have contributed to a significant gender divide in the workforce. However, a newly launched technology training program is working to change this.

To help bring Yemeni and other Middle Eastern women into the IT field and the general economic mainstream, the Institute of International Education (IIE) — a nonprofit that works to promote education around the world — started the Women in Technology Middle East North Africa (WIT MENA) initiative. IIE launched its pilot WIT program in the Yemeni capital of Sana'a in early 2006 to offer Yemeni women from various backgrounds a free hands-on technology education.

Elly Hanauer, Program Officer at IIE's West Coast Center, which manages WIT MENA, believes that the program fills a crucial void by giving Yemen's women access to the kind of high-tech training they would not normally find locally.

"We believe this is a very timely program," Hanauer said, "because we're specifically addressing women's education in Yemen and women's empowerment, helping them to enter the workforce."

Founding the Program and Finding the Students

IIE formed the WIT Yemen program along with the assistance of a number of partner organizations and corporations. Funding for the venture was provided by the Middle East Partnership Initiative (MEPI) — a U.S. State Department program that promotes economic reform and the empowerment of women in the region — after IIE applied for one of its Women's Pillar grants.

In September 2005, IIE began recruiting students for the WIT Yemen program via a partnership with Yemen-based nonprofit SOUL, which works to improve the lives of the country's women and children through health, education, and social-development initiatives.

According to Lina Al-Eryani, WIT Yemen's Program Director, the organization used a variety of recruitment methods to attract applicants from different educational and social backgrounds. "To achieve that," she said, "the WIT team started extensive promotional activities through visiting schools, universities, colleges, government institutions, and NGOs."

SOUL also helped recruit applicants by working with a local cell-phone company to randomly send out more 180,000 text messages advertising the program, said Hanauer. In the end, IIE received more than 950 applications for the 400 available spots, a figure Al-Eryani calls "overwhelming."

While the WIT Yemen program placed no age restrictions on program applicants, women who were interested in the more advanced hardware and networking courses were required to have a fairly good grasp of the English language, as well as secondary school-level math skills. To be considered for the more basic curriculum, prospective students needed only fluency in Arabic and an interest in learning about technology.

Heather Aiello, WIT MENA' s Program Director, noted that many of women who were accepted into the higher-level curriculums were university educated, though a degree was not a requirement. Aiello believes that many of the program participants come from families that have encouraged them to further their education. "A lot of their families are maybe more progressive than those of some of the other women in Yemen," she said.

WIT Yemen participants study the Microsoft Unlimited Potential curriculum at SOUL's CTC.

Classes for All Levels of Expertise

Successful applicants choose from one of three different technology curriculums, each of which focuses on a specific skill set. For instance, women who need to learn computing basics can enroll in the Microsoft Unlimited Potential program, while those who already have a substantial technology background can choose from two Cisco-sponsored curricula that focus on more advanced hardware and networking issues.

Depending on which curriculum they select, WIT Yemen participants can expect to spend anywhere from two and a half to twelve months completing their main course of study. Classes, generally two hours long, are held several times a week at different time slots to give women with job or family obligations some flexibility.

Microsoft Curriculum Teaches Tech Basics

WIT Yemen's most basic course of study — the 112-hour Microsoft Unlimited Potential curriculum — teaches women elementary computer skills, such as how to use Windows operating systems; surf the Internet; and work with the Microsoft Office Suite. Additionally, the Microsoft Unlimited Potential curriculum teaches the fundamentals of Web design and digital media, including audio, video, and photography. Since the Microsoft curriculum is taught solely in Arabic, students are not required to know English.

The 250 women enrolled in the Microsoft Unlimited Potential curriculum attend classes at SOUL's headquarters in Sana'a. According to Aiello, Microsoft not only provided the necessary funding to open the community training center (CTC) at SOUL, but also trained the seven instructors who teach the students.

Al-Eryani explains that students enrolled in the Microsoft curriculum have varying levels of education and computer skills, which can pose significant challenges to the instructors. She noted that many of the participants are not used to learning on a computer and worry about making mistakes.

"To solve these problems," Al-Eryani said, "the instructors encourage students to try — even if they make mistakes. They have found that the most effective methods are the repetition of information, giving personal attention to individual students, and providing practical training, which raises students' confidence in dealing with computers."  

Cisco Curriculum Caters to More Experienced Students

While the Microsoft curriculum is geared toward women who may have little experience with computers, those with a higher level of technical aptitude can enroll in one of two Cisco Networking Academy Program courses. These two curricula, consisting of a mixture of classroom lectures and hands-on labs, are taught by Cisco-trained Yemeni locals and occur at the General Telecommunications Institute in Sana'a, a technical training facility developed by the International Telecommunications Union and the Yemeni government.

The Cisco Certified Network Associate (CCNA) curriculum — the longer and more advanced of the Cisco courses of study — focuses on teaching students how to construct and service both local- and wide-area computer networks. The four classes in the curriculum encompass concepts such as networking fundamentals as well as lessons about configuring routers and switches. Though students work through the classes and take exams using online learning modules, they also get hands-on experience building networks using Cisco hardware.

WIT Yemen's other Cisco curriculum, IT Essentials, is a two-part program that's also sponsored by Hewlett-Packard. In the first IT Essentials course, women learn skills such as how to diagnose hardware and operating-system problems; they also practice disassembling and reassembling computers and servers donated by Cisco. The second installment of the IT Essentials curriculum concerns the ways in which operating systems function in a network environment and teaches participants skills such as how to back up and secure a computer network.

Haifa Al Ansi, a 30-year-old college graduate, is currently enrolled in both the CCNA and IT Essentials curriculums. Though Al Ansi has already earned a computer science degree from the Science and Technology University in Sana'a, she enrolled in the programs in order to add hands-on technology experience to her education. After she completes the program and earns her Cisco certification, Al Ansi says that she hopes to embark on a career in the IT sector.

Three WIT Yemen students work at a laptop at SOUL's headquarters in Sana'a.

Tools to Help Women Succeed in the Job Market

Providing Yemeni women with concrete, hands-on technology training is a cornerstone of WIT Yemen's mission, but it's only part of the picture. To increase the chances that participants will embark on a successful career, WIT Yemen also provides students with a number of non-technical resources dedicated to helping them enter the workforce.

"We don't want them to only have the technical training," Aiello said. "We want them to have the training necessary to enter the job market or advance in the job market."

WIT Yemen offers several different workshops that tutor participants in professional development skills, such as resume-writing and job interviewing. According to Aiello, the program's most important workshops to date were those in which participants formed the Women's IT Association, an official Yemeni NGO that will serve as an advocacy group and employment network for female tech workers. During the course of the Women's IT Association workshop, participants received expert legal advice on setting up an association, as well as tutorials on how to form committees and write a mission statement.

In addition to her main courses of study, Al Ansi has also taken an active role in planning the Women's IT Association, serving as a member of the organization's preparatory committee. According to Al Ansi, helping to kick-start the Women's IT Association has been a positive personal experience, and she thinks the organization will be important for her and her fellow countrywomen.

"This association is significant," Al Ansi said, "because it will give women the chance to participate positively in society through the use of technology."

While the Women's IT Association is getting off the ground, students can begin job searches via WIT Yemen's Web site. At the site's password-protected Participants Area, women will find recent tech job listings taken from local newspapers, as well as those from YemenSoft Ltd., a software development and consultancy firm with offices throughout the country. Students can also receive new job listings via an email list or post their resumes online.

Besides workshops geared toward finding employment, WIT Yemen students are also required to participate in five community-outreach workshops throughout the course of the program. Alone or in pairs, participants visit schools and women's clubs to talk about the training they've received and careers in the IT field. Although their outreach visits tend to emphasize jobs in the technology sphere, participants also speak to women about the importance of joining the workforce in general.

Spreading WIT Throughout the Middle East

IIE recently announced plans to expand its WIT Yemen program beyond the capital. According to Aiello, IIE will be partnering with an undetermined Yemeni NGO to set up a CTC in either Aden or Taiz, two cities in southern Yemen. There, women will have the opportunity to study the Microsoft Unlimited Potential curriculum and develop their Professional Development skills, though the Cisco curriculums will not be available.

This new CTC will be planned under a cost-recovery model, meaning that IIE will train its partner NGO to operate the center so that it sustains itself financially. But first, the partner needs to acquire the necessary equipment. Aiello states that most NGOs that IIE has contacted lack enough computers to set up a CTC and asks that anyone interested in donating equipment to the WIT Yemen program email her.

At the time of publication, IIE was also preparing to roll out the WIT program in six other Middle Eastern countries, including Egypt, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait. Like the newly expanded program in Yemen, IIE will work with local organizations and NGOs to build self-sustainable CTCs so that a potentially large number of women will be able to benefit from the Microsoft Unlimited Potential curriculum.

Though the WIT programs in Yemen and the rest of the Middle East are certainly helping to educate and empower the women who are enrolled, IIE also hopes they have a lasting effect on participants' relatives and children.

"There are a lot of sayings that if you educate the mother, you educate the entire family," Hanauer said.

Al-Eryani agrees with Hanauer's assessment that the WIT program is helping to empower multiple generations of Yemeni women. "The basic training provides the chance for stay-at-home mothers to learn computer skills," she said, "thus enabling them to have access to knowledge and teach their kids."