CIE was fortunate to have been selected by Microsoft India for the inaugural edition of Microsoft Women in Science and Engineering (MS-WISE) program in Bangalore. Four girls from PES University (all from 7th semester, Computer Science) were one of the 3 teams in this cohort which spanned a six-month duration, culminating in October.
MS-WISE has been successfully running in Hyderabad since 2014 and was launched to inspire women engineers to pursue rewarding careers in the field of technology. The WISE program aims to create experiential learning for female students to sharpen their professional skills.
The goal of this program was to familiarize and give hands-on experience on Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) covering 4 phases of SDLC. The teams were also exposed to Agile methods and included regular Scrum meetings.
Beyond the technical skills the students, the student-mentees had an opportunity to observe and learn from close interaction with women mentors who are seasoned professionals drawn from various functions and organizations at Microsoft India. It was great to see the time and efforts by senior Microsoft India management who were there all along to encourage these girls to make the best of this program but also to beyond this to embark on utilizing their full potential for an enriching career in technology.
I hope this program comes out on a bigger scale next year to encourage more girls to take up technology as a career and find ways to increase their confidence for a long-lasting and productive career.