The Chairperson of WITIN, Mrs Martha Alade, said this in a statement on Thursday made available to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos.
Alade said the initiative was part of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Girls in ICT project and Tech Needs Girls campaign.
She said that the mobile app challenge was opened for secondary school girls between the ages of 13 and18.
The chairperson said that the girls would work in teams of fives to develop mobile apps, conduct market research, write business plans, and create a ``pitch’’ for funding.
Alade said that each team would work with a classroom teacher at their school and a female mentor/role model from the technology industry.
``WITIN will lead mentors in Nigeria who will guide teachers to train teams from now till April on how to build the apps.
``The training culminates in a global competition where teams compete for funding to launch their company and take their app to the market,’’ she said.
Alade said the programme's goal was to promote women in technology by inspiring girls to see themselves not just as users of technology.
``But they should aslo see themselves as inventors, designers, builders and entrepreneurs in the technology industry,'' she said.
Alade said the girls would be taught life skills, such as how to identify a problem, design and test a solution, collaborate with a team, and communicate to different audiences.
She said that the challenge would reinforce academic concepts, such as digital representation of information, algorithmic thinking and programming, and the societal impact of information and information technology.
``Over this period, girls will be trained two hours a week to develop a potential solution to a problem and programme a mobile phone application to solve it.
``The app must solve a problem in their local community. This could be a health problem that affects their community, a social problem, or even a lack of a resource.
``They will learn how to study their competition, identify ways in which they can gather users and earn revenue, `` she said.
Alade said that the winning team would be celebrated in Nigeria on April 25, a day designed as ``The Girls in ICT Day’’
She added that the team would also travel to the Silicon Valley, California to compete globally on May 1.
Alade said the overall winners would receive 10,000 U.S dollars in funding and support to complete their app development and release it to the market.
The WITIN Chairperson said that in the end, the girls would have learnt about collaboration, teamwork and important skills in the technology industry.
The News Agency of Nigeria reports that to sign up for the challenge, all that was needed was a team of five girls, a computer, an Android phone and a teacher or adult to support the team
(NAN)
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