Cesar Arellano Garcia
Newspaper La Jornada
Tuesday, January 24, 2023, p. 9
In the country, only 8 percent of executive management positions are held by women, 29 percent of all engineers are female, and only 27 out of 100 of those who access scientific careers are women, indicated Lorenzo Jiménez de Luis. , resident representative of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) in Mexico.
UNDP together with Zurich Mexico and its foundation (Z Zurich Foundation) presented the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) project, a strategy for equality and local development, in order to strengthen the skills of more than 30 thousand students and 120 tutors, in addition to connecting them with 500 women entrepreneurs from the states of Puebla, Veracruz, Yucatán and Mexico City.
The objective, they pointed out, is for them to achieve a fuller participation in society and in their own life projects by transcending obstacles, barriers and restrictions that arise or are reinforced from gender dynamics.
The initiative will have two main components: the first will work in person and online with upper secondary school communities, hoping to reach more than 30,000 students and 120 tutors, from the states of Puebla, Veracruz, Yucatán and Mexico City. The initiative will facilitate both learning about gender from a STEM approach, as well as the development of skills to design student projects with inclusive social impact, as well as spaces for experimentation for impact practices.
The second component is to connect with 500 women from communities in Puebla and Veracruz, whose enterprises have an impact on local ways of life.
The communities were selected among those that have been part of natural disaster recovery programs, implemented by UNDP and ZZF, which will seek to strengthen business and sustainability skills. The entrepreneurs will work hand in hand with the student communities integrated into the project to strengthen learning and promote social cohesion.
The complete plan is scheduled to be carried out from 2023 to 2025 hand in hand with local governments, entrepreneurship organizations led by women, representations of upper secondary education subsystems, school management personnel, teaching personnel, tutors, and the student community.
