The underrepresentation of women’ in STEAM has been a major area of concern to educators and researchers over the past 50 years and according to the National Science Foundation, the field is still overwhelmingly male. Even though the sector is rapidly growing and creates hundreds of thousands of new jobs every year, the share of women in this sector is decreasing,while the EU is projected to have a high shortage of digital skills of its citizens by 2020, and thus Europe calling for more initiatives in a European level. The RoboGirls project focuses on building the capacity of teacher educators to organise and implement innovative hands-on STEAM activities and events(such as lesson plans, workshops, thematic school days) with the use of robotics and coding to narrow the gender gap, empower, encourage and actively engage girls to digital technologies so to be able to act and play an active role in the digital age.Through the empowerment of girls, their self-esteem and confidence in relation to the use and capabilities they think they have towards digital technologies will be enhanced, making them consider following a relevant career in the future and be active in the future of the digital sector. To achieve that, RoboGirls consortium will develop innovative pedagogical material, dynamic resources, gamified tools, and organise and implement and a series of blended learning trainings, events and implementations for teachers and students. To meet the abovementioned needs, the objectives of the RoboGirls project are to: •Enhance girls’ confidence and self-esteem towards STEAM, motivating them to consider a relevant career in the future •Build the capacity of teachers to implement hands-on STEAM activities using robotics and other technological tools following gender equality approaches •Develop innovative quality learning material, resources and OERs for teachers to promote girls’ empowerment and engagement in digital technologies •To increase and nurture girls’ interest in the digital sector through the development of gender- inclusive teaching activities and open educational resources focused on robotics and coding with a real-world context. The target groups of the project are teachers, primary and secondary students, school leaders, school staff, academics, women in the ICT sectors and digital technologies, education policy decision makers, volunteers, and parents in a participatory and empowering manner. To achieve the above, the RoboGirls consortium will develop a Guide for Teachers that will includes the latest strategies and successful methodologies to bridge the gender gap in education and employment, along with successful proposed activities and methodologies to be used. Also, an e-Learning toolkit with a pool of different kinds of pedagogical material and resources for teachers will be developed, while a comprehensive MOOC will be develop and be available freely to anyone interested. Among others, trainings with the use of gamified tools, OERs and popular robotics kits will be conducted. For this reason,the RoboGirls consortium is comprised of partner organisations coming from 5 different countries across Europe: Croatia, Cyprus, Greece, Spain, and Ireland, including universities with long-standing experience in providing robotics and coding activities to students(University of Zagreb,University Autonoma Madrid), research and development organizations experts in pedagogy and STEAM approaches(CARDET,Rural Hub), many schools (as associated partners and members of the Robogirls Committee) and an SME with vast experience expert on the development of professional MOOCs,e-learning,gamification, and innovative learning environments(INNOVADE). Students will directly participate in the RoboGirls implementation activities including lesson plans, workshops,thematic school days, and other relevant events. They will also interact with an online, gamified career choices simulator for girls to affect their career choices.Through a series of activities it is envisioned that they will enhance their self-esteem and self-confidence towards using robotics and coding and in extend they will feel motivated and encouraged to use digital technologies for learning. This way, girls might consider following a career in STEAM and the digital sector and will be empowered to have a role in the future. All the above contribute so that they have higher opportunities in their future career. Finally, girls will develop various skills through their engagement in robotics and coding such as creativity, problem-solving, self-esteem, collaboration skills, and self- confidence. Students will be reached even after the end of the project since teachers that will be trained/ informed is expected to continue using the project’s material after the end of the project's lifecycle.
The objectives of the RoboGirls project are to: 1. Enhance girls’ confidence and self-esteem towards STEAM, motivating them to consider a relevant career in the future 2. Build the capacity of teachers to implement hands-on STEAM activities using robotics and other technological tools following gender equality approaches 3. Develop innovative quality learning material, resources and OERs for teachers to promote girls’ empowerment and engagement in digital technologies 4. To increase and nurture girls’ interest in the digital sector through the development of gender-inclusive teaching activities and open educational resources focused on robotics and coding with a real-world context. The target groups of the project are teachers, primary and secondary school students, school leaders, school staff, academics, women in the ICT and digital technologies, education policy decision makers and other stakeholders.
According to UNESCO's Institute for Statistics, women are the minority of researchers, publish fewer research papers, are paid less, and do not advance as much in their careers as men. Additionally, gender inequalities at the EU-28 level (and at the level of individual countries) are more noticeable in scientific and engineering occupations (e.g. in 2017, 4.5% were men and 3.1% were women). The reasons why women do not choose STEM are numerous, including stereotypes, gender bias, sociological-cultural complexes, lack of female role models, less experience and lower confidence in their capabilities in the field. At home, boys are more encouraged to take up technology and IT and are more likely to have a tech-savvy father. The RoboGirls project wants to initiate changes, give girls positive examples, increase their confidence and self-esteem towards STEAM motivating them to consider a relevant career in the future, and therefore have a long-term impact on reducing the gender gap. As part of the project, we developed a series of activities for students and teachers in order to achieve this.