We live in a world where society presents women with numerous hurdles to jump in order to get to where they’re already qualified to be.
This is no different in the education industry, despite women making up 70 per cent of educators. In our previous article, we discussed the issues faced by women in the education workforce.
Today, we’ll take on a more positive angle to talk about how technology empowers and helps women in the education workforce.
How Technology Empowers Women in the Education Workforce
Most tech sectors are male-dominated, but EdTech is a little different. With 70 per cent of educators being women, the scales are tipped slightly less.
However, women still face discrimination on a daily basis — whether it’s getting mistaken as an assistant or not being taken seriously.
Noodle Factory’s CEO and Co-founder, Yvonne Soh, is no different. On her first day of work as a systems consultant, her own colleague asked if she had enough strength to lift the server.
While physical strength is essential in certain industries, educators are more focused on mental strength and skills.
Technology helps to level the playing field, giving women equal strength to do the heavy lifting.
We know that it can be difficult to listen to negative, belittling talk that puts you down.
This is why Yvonne believes building empowering communities can help female educators to find support.
You can do so by joining online forums and groups to meet like-minded educators all over the world.
“While you can let bad experiences shape you and your life, you can also choose and learn to ignore unnecessary criticism,” Yvonne shares.
When women enter motherhood, there’s often a societal expectation for them to stay home and take care of their children and family full-time. While that is completely fine, not every woman wants to give up her career completely.
As such, many mothers have struggled with work-life balance as they have to take care of the household after a full day of work.
Technology allows female educators to work remotely so they can still prioritise their families’ needs.
Yvonne says that “technology allows women to work anywhere, at any time, and still be connected to their team”. “Family women are also able to re-enter the workforce on their own terms,” she adds.
By freeing up precious hours, female educators can take some much-needed rest. A teacher who uses Noodle Factory’s services said that she managed to get some rare downtime on the weekend to finally catch a movie.
All-female educators have faced their fair share of struggles.
If you’re looking to enter the educator workforce, don’t fret. Yvonne urges everyone to keep an open mind, be persistent, be patient, and take action.
“You can’t achieve anything if you just think about it,” Yvonne says.
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This article was written as part of celebrating our Co-Founder and CEO, Yvonne Soh, who was nominated as one of the 100 exceptional women in STEM for the We are the Future Tech initiative during the 15th Innovation Forum, co-organised by Netexplo and UNESCO on April 13th 2022.
Watch Yvonne's interview for the We are the Future Tech here:
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