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Toronto has a directory of ‘Women and Color’

Have you attended a technology conference or speaking series and noticed the gender parity within the audience? How about on the panels or the keynote speaker lists?

Over the past year, I’ve attended a number of conferences within the fields of technology, marketing, and business. I was startled to see so few women represented. In the crowd, there was often one table or two of women, all clumped together and isolated from everyone else. Those women who were part of the panels, were often asked the questions about gender in the workplace, as if they were token members

And this is just women as a whole gender. I can count the number of women of colour who took the stage on one hand. While feminism may have been the word of the year in 2017, STEM fields still have a long way to go in achieving gender and race equality.

When I read about ‘Women and Color’, a directory of women and people of colour who are available to speak at such conferences, I was floored! How has this database existed for two years without people knowing about it?

The directory was created by a product designer named Mohammed Asaduallah, who was just as frustrated as many women to find the lack of diversity within the tech industry. Asaduallah and a team of volunteers help maintain the site by adding in new profiles of women in Toronto. The profiles include a photograph, job title, a short description of the person’s expertise through tag words, contact information, and a link to their Twitter account.

Asaduallah hopes to grow Women and Color and add profiles from cities across Canada and even venture into the United States.

 

At your next conference or speaking series, perhaps consider reaching out to one of the numerous qualified women in this directory. It’s time to stop using women as “tokens” at technology events and start seeing them as the qualified and capable experts they are.

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Christiana Figueres
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Christiana Figueres to speak in Toronto about climate change and PPPs

After numerous hurricanes ravaged the Caribbean and insanely sporadic weather hit North America the last few months, talking about the connections between climate change and public infrastructure has never been more important.

On Oct. 11, Christiana Figueres, United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, will be speaking in Toronto about protecting public infrastructure in an era of global climate change. The event is being hosted by the Canadian Council for Public-Private Partnerships (CCPPP) and is being called a “pre-conference keynote”.

Figueres is the Global Chair of Mayors for Climate and Energy and Convener of Mission 2020. Previously, she held the position of Executive Secretary of the United Natinosl Framework Convention on Climate Change. She also helped negotiate the 2015 Paris Agreement Her speech will address the implications and consequences of global climate change, while looking to the future and preparing for the public infrastructure needed to make cities sustainable.

Tickets to her keynote (12 p.m. to 1:45 p.m.) are available here.

The event is a prelude to the CCPPP’s 25th Annual Conference on Public-Private Partnerships, set to take place on Nov. 6-7 at the Sheraton Centre in downtown Toronto. To find out more information about the conference, go here.

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