Next Up: Inspiring 8th graders to become IT talents (and getting a female IT student in the bargain!)

Gender equality Skills supply Education and training

We all want young people - not least girls - to understand the obvious: that IT is not just fun to play with (surf, Facebook, play) but that it is also the No. 1 profession of the future: stimulating, social and reasonably well paid. Unfortunately, young people do not have this image. Instead, the paradox thrives that they can never in their lives imagine doing anything resembling programming or system development, while at the same time happily and casually rigging the settings of their Instagram and WordPress accounts.

For a number of years, IT&Telecom companies have been running the Choose IT initiative, which is mainly aimed at upper secondary school students. By that time, however, it is often too late, as many have already opted out of study programs that lead to jobs in the IT industry.

However, we are now taking action and investing in secondary school students - sustainably and in the long term. Starting this fall, we want to hold an annual event, Next Up, where eighth graders in teams of five will compete for a day by solving a number of real "cases" at some IT companies. However, the competition day is only one part of the project, which is about - as part of the technology subject and the curriculum's writing on entrepreneurship - opening their eyes to how IT can be used to solve technical and societal challenges. Above all, we want to make young people understand something most of them are not aware of: that they can become the IT talents of the future.

Committed and sponsoring IT companies are needed for the project! Why - apart from generally supporting a good cause - spend resources on young people who can only become employees seven or eight years later? Well, here's another strong winning factor: the teams will be led by enterprising girls studying IT at university. As well as being good role models for the young people, they will also be ambassadors for the sponsoring companies. It's a great opportunity to capture hungry, skilled candidates who can be recruited in the near future - and help even out gender imbalances.

Seize the opportunity - join us at Next Up!