Neema: Academic who inspires girls to break the glass ceiling

Journalist

Mwananchi Communications Limited

What you need to know:

Computer scientist and lecturer at the Nelson Mandela African Institution of Science and Technology, Dr Neema Mduma shares with The Citizen Rising Woman reporter, Salome Gregory, about how her efforts towards women in academia expose girls to science and technology careers particularly data science, machine learning, and artificial intelligence.

I’ve always preferred - and actually practised - transformational and participative leadership styles. Simply because I like to inspire and empower others to also become leaders. But, also, it’s good to encourage and engage people you lead in order to make them feel included, as well as motivate them to become tomorrow’s leaders. So participatory leadership is very important.
Gender diversity and not prioritising the development and retention of women in leadership positions: There are so many companies in our country that are not prioritising developing and retaining great women leaders. “In an African setting, women were discouraged - and, at some point, were not allowed to become leaders. So, from the family level, this culture found its way to the companies. That is why you find men occupy top management positions in many companies.”

In your view, why are there fewer women in STEM career in Africa?
This is due to several reasons which discourage girls from studying science and - it involves gender bias and community perception. So, I created BakiShule to address this problem in ways that predict the drop out status and as an initiative, BakiShule arranges visits and organises events and free talks in secondary schools with the aim of promoting STEM careers and encouraging girls to study science from an early stage.
“BakiShule - which uses data on school attendance, distance, gender and other factors to predict the dropout status of a student - is a tool that can serve as an early warning sign and, therefore, teachers and parents can intervene early to save the situation”.
Statistics show that school dropout rate is higher for girls (30 percent) than for boys (15 percent). Through these events, girls participate in different activities - such as science fairs, watching short documentaries of outstanding women scientists - to show them that it can be done.