HerStory Podcast Series
HerStory Podcast Series
Episode 32: Meet YCI’s HerStart partner, Bolgatanga Technical University (BTU)
In this episode, Katherine Prior, HerStart Communications and Social Entrepreneurship Fellow, speaks with Professor Daniel Ayoung of Bolgatanga Technical University (BTU) one of YCI’s HerStart partners in Ghana.
Professor Ayoung discusses the university's efforts to address gender issues on campus and the impact of entrepreneurship training programs on women at BTU and in the surrounding community. The conversation highlights BTU's focus on ecological agriculture, the transformative power of financial empowerment, and the positive cultural shifts facilitated by support from YCI’s HerStart program.
Welcome to Youth Challenge International's Hair Start Hair Story podcast series, youth Challenge International, OYCI launched the Hair Start Innovate the Future program in 2020. As part of our initiative to advance women's equality globally, our goal is to provide 10,000 women in Ghana, Tanzania, and Uganda with the resources and supports they need to successfully launch and grow their social businesses. We are sharing real stories of young women who are leading change in their communities. Y C's, hair Start Innovate. The Future program is funded in passed by the government of Canada to progress Canada's feminist International assistance policy. Learn more@y.org or hair start.org .
Speaker 2:Hey everyone, and welcome to this episode of the Hear story podcast. My name is Catherine Pryor and I'm a communications and social entrepreneurship fellow with the Hears Start Program in bogo Tanga , Ghana. Today I'm delighted to be joined by Professor Daniel, a young of BOGO Tango Technical University to speak about addressing gender issues on campus and the impact of entrepreneurship training programs with women at BTU and the in the surrounding community. Professor Daniel, A Young is an associate professor and librarian at B. He holds a PhD in Information Systems and computing from the Bruno University London and a Master's of Business Information Systems. Daniel works with the Herstatt team as a project lead for BTU's partnership with YCI Boca . Tanga Technical University is a public institution located in the Upper East region of Ghana. It was established as one of 10 technical universities in the country, which aimed to advance education and engineering sciences, applied arts technology-based disciplines and technical and vocational educational and training. The university offers 35 programs with around 1400 students enrolled. BTU has utilized the grant provided by Y's partner Innovation Fund to address gender issues and women's rights on campus. BTU's gender equity project aims to increase staff capacity on gender issues and women's rights through the implementation of new gender and sexual harassment policy and training program. Professor Daniel, a young , welcome to the Her Story podcast. Can you start off by telling us a bit about bga , Tanga Technical University and its focus areas?
Speaker 3:BGA Tanga . Tenga University is one of 10 Tenga Univers in Ghana and located in the northernmost part of Ghana. We share close border with Burkina Faso , just about , um, 50 minutes drive to Kin Faso and , uh, one of the smallest of the ker universities in Ghana with a little about 2,500 students. We are a technical university that is focused mainly in ecological agriculture. That is our niche area. So all the 10, 10 10 universities have a niche area and ours based on our geographical location, is on ecological agriculture. Basically looking at how to conserve the environment and also support in reducing the certification. As you're aware when you're coming up, we realize that we're more of a northern Savannah and ours is towards the desert. So our focus mainly is to preserve the ecology and , uh, most of our research and our efforts are driven towards ensuring that we achieve a better ecology for our region and Ghana as a whole.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for sharing the history of BTU and the vision moving forwards. Before we jump into your current focus areas, I would love if you could provide us with a brief background on your career path, which led you to your current position as a project lead for the Hears Start program at BTU.
Speaker 3:So, as a young man in , uh, my early formative years, I was inspired by my class teacher, especially my primary sixth classroom teacher. What inspired me basically was how he taught and made teaching easy. So I got interested in wanting to be a teacher. After graduating , uh, my secondary school, I actually went to do some teaching to teach primary school's children, and I actually enjoyed the environment where I was dealing with young ones and , uh, helping to see how they could also grow into, into burden young individuals. Following that , uh, I got admission into the University of Ghana and I took a course , uh, a major in information studies and minored in religion. And following that, when I graduated, I became a teaching assistant, still fulfilling the dreams I wanted as a teacher and I got a scholarship to study in the University of East London where I continued my information studies education and got , um, a master's in the Information Business Information Systems , um, looking at how to incorporate , um, technology into delivery of information. Then after graduation, I came back to Ghana and got a job with BGA Tonka University in 2009 as an IT lecturer. Um , and since then I have been teaching, went back to school in the UK again to do my PhD in computing information systems and came back to teach
Speaker 2:The partnership with her Start BTS partnership with her start largely focuses on gender equity issues, particularly in the last year. Would you be able to provide some context on gender challenges and the gender gap on campus and in the bar broader community here in Boca Tanga
Speaker 3:For the her start team in BTU? I think when we started doing the trainings for the young women , um, who were some , uh, majority were our students actually, then we went into the community, we kept on getting this resounding issue of gender issues, gender disparities and all that. We went ahead to use to , to the <inaudible> to try to see where we are as an institution with regards to gender and where we intended to go. So the , the team for that year actually resonated with us as an institution and when we did the work at , we realized that even though the , um, the institution had some idea about gender and sexual harassment issues, we had very little capacity in that area. So we were excited with the fact that , uh, her start was going to then support the institution through the fellows to help us at least create more awareness on gender issues. Uh , meanwhile we have been training some of the young women and we got to also appreciate from their point of view how their perceptions of gender shift the way they lived in the communities. And we realized that they needed to be a shift in the thinking if we needed a gender parity or gender equality in the university campus and subsequently going out into the community because we believe that the university community was a microcosm of the bigger or wider community because a lot of young individuals come from different parts of Ghana into the university. So if we were to change or to help shape the mindset around gender issues, then they will , after graduation go back into their communities and be agents of change.
Speaker 2:Could you explain how you believe the entrepreneurship training is going to help address gender gap at BTU and in Bulgar community?
Speaker 3:We come from a part of Ghana where poverty is really high and we all know that empowerment, financial empowerment can actually lead to empowerment in other areas of community. So when women are empowered, when women are emboldened, when women have got a financial capacity to then they are able to also make decisions. So the , uh, the entrepreneurship trainings that are given, which empowers the young ones to be able to establish their businesses in the long run, is to empower them to be able to take their own decisions in the first place. Because once a a , a lady or a woman is empowered, they're able to voice out their feelings, they're able to take part in decision making . But if you are controlled by somebody else, I think the decis the level of decisions you can make is also controlled. However, if you have the capacity to make your own decisions, if you have the financial muscle to be able to do what others will do for you, then it gives you the power to be able to sit at the table and also be able to enforce or ensure that certain decisions that affects you and that of your children are made in the interest or your interest. So this empowerment purpose for us is actually quite phenomenal because most of those who have trained have been able to uplift themselves, if not even financially, but emotionally, intellectually, and be able to also speak to some of the things that worry them a lot. But for those who have been able to support, as you're aware, they're already been able to decide what they want to do in society because they have been able to be , they have , they , uh, they get their own support, they're able to build their own wealth and based on the wealth, they're able to make decisions that come with financing. And that is what , uh, hair Start has given to majority of over 760 women. We have trained so far.
Speaker 2:I really love how you said this goes beyond just kind of the financial implications and even the educational, it goes into the communities and households. Could you expand a little bit just on the feedback you've received from the B two U community and from the participants who are undergoing training with her Star ?
Speaker 3:The feedback has been phenomenal. Now we know that the Catalyst fund at the end of the training doesn't, it's not enough to get to everyone. So we , we select the best. However, what we have done is to get feedback from those we even trained and based on the feedback we, what the positive feedback we're getting is that it has not only given them training, it has, it has , it is a lit is some sort of empowering in that most of them now know that even within the communities in VJ exist, there are a lot of business avenues because part of the training we're able to, we tell the students or we take them to how to identify problems in the community and how to find solutions where , which they can commercialize. So through the training process, we have gotten some of them who didn't get the final come out to tell us that, look, based on your training, I'm now able to appreciate some of the problems in my community and, and now have an inkling as to how to commercialize some of these problems. And then we need , we just, we need little support. Um , I think the last time we were going round after the training, we met a lady who just stopped me on the way and said that because of your training to today, I am starting a small business on my own, even though I didn't get a catalyst fund . For me, that was the best , uh, that was the best inspiration I got out of this training because even though they didn't get the money, they had started something small that will later develop into something important for them and then able to keep food on their tables instead of going out to get or to hold on for others to support them and then control them. For us as a team, that is what the student is about, to empower individuals to own their own start businesses rather than waiting for handouts.
Speaker 2:I've noticed that your approach to gender related issues is very expansive. You seem to have a lot of knowledge on gender issues. Has working with her start in impacted your approach to gender issues?
Speaker 3:Yes. Working with the Her Start has impacted my, my outlook on gender tremendously. Obviously we've been given , we've, we've gotten some trainings from her start on gender and gender related issues and how gender programming should be done for us to be able to deliver the Headstart , uh, program. Um , obviously that has taken almost all of us in the team to even take courses beyond what Headstart for us to appreciate , um, what do you call it , uh, how to approach some of our students. Um , so I will say that her start has been the most single influencing factor in changing my perception of gender issues and ex and , and extended into sexual harassment issues. And that actually fed into our policies, our gender policy, our sexual harassment policy, and our drive to ensure that the university community actually follows best practice in ensuring that no one is left behind. Everybody has or is seen as an equal. And then we are trying to stamp out sexual harassment on campus. So yes, the collaboration with YCI and Hair Start has changed or shaped me, my team and probably a lot of people in BTU say perceptions about gender issues .
Speaker 2:Obviously this work is super rewarding, but it doesn't come without its challenges. Would you be able to share the most challenging part of addressing gender related issues on campus?
Speaker 3:You know, gender issues , uh, things that are, let me use the word difficult to discuss. So wanting to to actually shift a mindset is a very daunting task. I remember when we put up what some of our posters you saw , we've seen the posters on the staircases talking about gender equality and how it affects , um, um, I , I understand that a prominent person seeing the symbols laughed and says, this is going to be a very impossible task. He was asked why, and he says, well, based on our cultural values, it becomes difficult to want to seek gender parity. But we were not discouraged by that because we believe that every culture is dynamic. And once previously a culture saw gender as , lemme say, the power imbalances swaying towards the other. That is , we're not getting into an a in a , in an era where that thinking has to shift if we need to go, because we believe that the female gender has more to contribute if given the opportunity to do so because the capacities are the same in our opinion. And since we started the training, we've seen that shift, especially when we started training with the administrative staff and what came out of the trainings. It meant that there were a lot of things that were bottled up that was seen as a no-no that was seen as things that cannot be discussed. Our trainings give us, give that avenue for people to voice it out and to know that they have the support should they want to do what is right by them .
Speaker 2:Last week, we both had the privilege of attending a workshop with about 150 BTU students where we addressed , um, teaching the new gender and sexual harassment policies, which the her start team has helped BTU co-create , um, to tackle these gender issues on campus. How do you think the workshop went and do you think that , um, her start well supported BTU? Well, in tackling these challenges on campus,
Speaker 3:For me it was quite revealing students who were there and didn't see management felt comfortable to talk, and a lot of things came up that ordinarily will not be heard or students will not be heard saying some of these things. So definitely YCR has given us a platform which has allowed us to have an insight on how students think about the university with regards to gender, which has never happened before. So this is actually the first time that has happened where students have been given the opportunity to express their views on how they feel gender issues are being handled . And it was phenomenal. We got to hear a lot of information that would , we would ordinarily not have heard. And because it was an at , it was a diffused atmosphere, I will call it, with no responsibility, people got to speak their minds for me, it gave us opportunity to reinforce our desire to support the young ones and to let them know that should they be empowered to report instances of gender dis uh , discrimination or sexual harassment, the avenue was there for them to seek, to get redress and for them to be able to live in an inclusive environment where they can get the best out of their education.
Speaker 2:Looking forward into the future, what goals do you have for BTU?
Speaker 3:We want to see A BTU where everybody feels safe. Everyone, whether male or female feels safe, that whatever they see will be taken on this merit and not based on who is saying it. We want an environment where , um, gender is not a hindrance to growth. We want an environment where students can achieve the best of their capacities without fear, without being worried that they'll be discriminated against. And the ultimate goal, the ultimate goal through this gender policy or through the <inaudible> policy, is to get people reporting to the right channels when they fail offended. So our, our goal is that at least more young women and more young men will be empowered to be able to put up their best because they, they will feel safe in an inclusive environment.
Speaker 2:That's excellent. Thank you so much Pro for sharing your wisdom and your experience and your inspiration for our viewership. Thank you.
Speaker 4:Thanks
Speaker 1:For joining us today and learning about how you challenge International has partnered with young women to advance gender equality globally and create a social entrepreneurship ecosystem with a positive impact for all. If you enjoy this hairstyle, innovate the Future podcast episode, please subscribe and share our episodes on social media . Social . A special thanks to the fellows that volunteered their time in Ghana, Tanzania, and Uganda, who help create these episodes. Y Cs has start , innovate the future and fellowship programs are funded through the government of Canada's volunteer corporation program, providing skilled Canadians, opportunities to volunteer with global partners and advance Canada's feminist international assistance policy. Join us and thousands of young people around the globe creating a better future together. Learn more@yci.org or has that good org .
