Andhaar | Anchor

A digital ecosystem to connect women, educational institutes, mentors, and employers to increase accessibility and accelerate educational and employment outcomes for women in STEM in Pakistan.

What is Andhaar? 

A digital ecosystem based on the concept of crowdsourcing to connect women, educational institutes, mentors, and employers; increasing accessibility and accelerating educational and employment outcomes for women in STEM in Pakistan. 

How does it address the challenge? 

It overcomes three key barriers across three key stages of an education to employment lifecycle for women in Pakistan; 

1. the misconception that opportunities or demand for Women in STEM doesn't exist

2. the financial barriers for women to invest in STEM education linked closely to the final third barrier;

 3. the misconception that employment outcomes for women in STEM don't exist.

It overcomes these three barriers during the three key stages of nurturing individuals across:

1) Seed: peaking an interest for women in STEM, simply by participating in an anecdotal capacity and exploring possibilities 

2) Water: connecting those women with educational and vocational institutions where their newfound interests can be met in a formal way, as well as funded, and 

3) Grow: connecting those women with employers, mentors, and a national (scale to global) ecosystem

If scaled, how will this change the world? 

The description for this challenge describes it perfectly: the rate at which women are losing jobs to automation is significantly outpacing the rate at which women are entering STEM professions. And this will create an even greater economic divide globally than already exists. By nurturing women across an end-to-end journey of seeding, watering, and growing within STEM we are enabling a global ecosystem or employer women, employers, civil society, and educational systems to begin self sustaining a solution to this phenomena.

1. Accessibility: Misconception that opportunities & demand simply don't exist for women in STEM in Pakistan.

Users can set up profiles on the platform, interact with mentors, organisations, & events - a central community for women in STEM.

2. Financial hardship: Financial barriers for women to invest in STEM 

Users can seek out funding opportunities for educational institutions, and allows employers, governments, and universities to source candidates to fund.

3. Economic outcomes: The misconception that employment outcomes for women in STEM don't exist.

Allows employers and female STEM students and professionals to connect, engage, and drive employment outcomes.

"Innovation" and "disruption" have become modern society's zeitgeist. We revel in the thought of adding new, bold, solutions to old complex problems. Often, its needed. Sometimes, its not. 

This solution quite simply uses a digital platform to connect non-digital actors - enabling all to accelerate outcomes for women in STEM. 

By providing a digital platform to connect non-digital actors (students, employers, civil society), we increase accessibility and reduce barriers for STEM participation in female populations of Pakistan.

By providing a digital platform to connect non-digital actors (students, employers, educational institutions, civil society), we increase accessibility and reduce financial and cultural barriers for STEM participation in female populations of Pakistan. 

1. Female students: can seek out educational opportunities, mentorship, funding and employment opportunities

2. Universities: can improve employability outcomes through stronger partnerships with future employers, civil society mentors, and female students.

3. Employers: can improve employment outcomes through increased visibility of women in STEM

Track sign-ups - 5,000 women sign up to the platform

Build relationships with universities and incubators in the region through a grass roots approach. Outcome is measurement by tracking official sign-ups to the platform - 8 university's, 5 start-up incubators, and 3 technical education centres sign up as mentors and donors

Build relationships with corporations in the region through a grass roots approach. Outcome is measurement by tracking official sign-ups to the platform - 10 companies sign up as prospective employers

"Innovation" and "disruption" have become modern society's zeitgeist. We revel in the thought of adding new, bold, solutions to old complex problems. Often, its needed. Sometimes, its not. 

Innovation never necessarily means innovation in technology. Sometimes it is as simple as connecting people and places to create systemic change.

This solution quite simply uses a better way to prioritise women in STEM across society, educational institutions and employers by overcoming barriers that exist in Pakistan. 

It's about reframing and reconnecting in small ways to solve big problems.

We would validate these assumptions through user testing, however small sample sizes and personal experiences show the following barriers for participation:

1. The misconception that opportunities and demand simply do not exist for women in STEM in Pakistan.

2. The misconception that education in STEM is rarely linked with employment outcomes for women - deterring female participation.

Our solution overcomes the unmet needs of women in Pakistan through simplicity and connectivity. We aren't reinventing the wheel, but we're connecting it to three others to enable a functioning car. 

The solution will be deployed via web in the first instance, however all partnerships with educational institutions, start up incubators and employers will be created face to face using a grass roots approach. Sign-ups for female participants will be encouraged and promoted through school and university visits. The solution is free, and affordable. The largest barrier to overcome will be for female students without access to internet. We can facilitate participation for such exceptional cases by connecting them to resources.

We will maintain our jobs as held currently to sustain ourselves financially while we research, pilot, grow and scale this solution. Gulandam works at PwC's Digital Incubator.

The ability to scale to communities in Pakistan where digital literacy and access to internet is limited will continue to be a significant barrier when attempting to scale the solution for high impact communities.

Economic prosperity in developing countries is complex. Its messy. Economic prosperity for women in predominantly patriarchal countries is even more complex. More messy. But human-centered design, innovation, and technology exist to tackle complex, messy problems. And communities like Solve connect people willing to roll up their sleeves, so no one has to do it alone. That is why I want to be a part of the community. Because no one can tackle problems like these alone.

We currently have a shortlist of partners in the Peshawar region we are engaging with, including start-up incubators and universities. No formal partners exist as yet, since the project is in the research phase.

None currently