UNESCO releases 2024 gender report of the Global Education Monitoring Report, titled “Technology on her Terms” | Current Affairs | Vision IAS
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    UNESCO releases 2024 gender report of the Global Education Monitoring Report, titled “Technology on her Terms”

    Posted 26 Apr 2024

    2 min read

    • The report looks at impact of technology on girls’ education opportunities and outcomes, and role of education on the shape of future technological development. 

     

    • Impact of technology on girls’ education:
      • ICT can overcome barriers to education access for girls in crisis context.
        • For instance, in Kenya, M-shule platform delivers education through text message without need for internet connection.
      • Digital divide: Girls and women are less able to access technology with 130 million fewer women than men owning mobile phone and 244 million fewer women having Internet access.
      • Social media negatively affects well-being and reinforces gender norms. Greater interaction on social media at age 10 is associated with worsening socioemotional difficulties with age among girls.
      • Cyberbullying is common and is exacerbated by the danger of deepfakes made using AI.

     

    • Role of Education in shaping technological development:
      • Average share of STEM is 15% among young female graduates and 35% among young male graduates.    
      • Underrepresentation in technological design and deployment: In 2022, women held less than 25% of science, engineering and ICT jobs.
      • Negative gender stereotypes, reinforced by low expectations from parents and teachers, impact girls’ STEM aspirations.

     

    Recommendations from the report:

    • Establish bodies to evaluate education technology and algorithms, to assess where they may be amplifying negative gender stereotypes or negatively affecting well-being.
    • Encouraging more girls to study towards scientific careers and promote female leadership in artificial intelligence and technology development.
    • Avoid infrastructure-only approaches and invest in gender-responsive education and training programmes to enhance digital literacy and skills for all.
    • Tags :
    • Women in STEM
    • Gender Gap
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