After France in 2018 and Italy early 2021, Techfugees’ flagship programme, the #TF4Women Fellowship, aimed at accelerating the professional inclusion of refugee women in digital and tech jobs, is now live in Greece as well!
In the past 4 years, 59 talented women across Europe have developed their technical skills in sectors such as data analysis, digital marketing, web development, and design.
70% of them had landed a job 6 months after the end of the programme.
Following this success, we open a third Techfugees Inclusion office in Athens in order to implement and adapt the #TF4Women Fellowship to the Greek reality, scaling our impact.
What are the particularities of the Greek context?
If Greece is one of the first European countries reached by displaced persons during their exile, around 103.000 refugees “only” establish themselves here.
60% of them are women and their children and the huge majority of them are unemployed, compared to men refugees, or domestic workers as well as cleaners in the tourism and hospitality industries. Like in France or in Italy, their employment options have been reduced substantially even if they used to work in high qualified jobs in their home countries. The number of working mothers, who are often single parents at the same time, is huge, and the worldwide pandemic of Covid-19 has increased their vulnerability.
At the same time, there are more open positions every day – around 400 today – in the tech job market and companies struggle to attract the diverse talents they need to develop goods and services for worldwide online markets.
It also worth mentioning that in 2019, women constituted only the 16.4% of ICT Specialists in Greece, while Greece ranked 26th among 28th EU Member States.
That’s why Greece is a relevant field to implement the #TF4Women Fellowship programme: since day one, our objective with this programme has been to build a bridge between these two realities designing a targeted support which allows the Fellows and their families to be empowered thanks to professional inclusion in their host country.
What does the Greek #TF4Women Fellowship look like?
The #TF4Women Fellowship is based on three pillars: mentoring, training support, and networking activities.
Every Wednesday, the Fellows follow an online two-hour weekly thematic session in order to improve hard and soft skills and increase their employability. Some IRL sessions will also be organised to reinforce the power of human communities ✨
Every refugee woman selected to join the Fellowship will have free access to the online platform Coursera in order to develop her technical skills at her own pace. They will also be supported by a duo of tech, digital or HR experts volunteering as mentor or trainer in the Fellowship to monitor their progress during the 6 months of the programme and help them build a toolkit for job search and develop their knowledge about the local job market.
Networking activities will also be regularly suggested to the Fellows in order to explore the variety of work environments offered by tech and digital jobs and build their professional network to increase their chances to get employed by companies in Greece.
Techfugees also offer linguistic support to encourage the Fellows to develop their educational and practical skills in English through courses, as well as pairing them with volunteers that will be acting as linguistic tandems for bi-monthly informal chats, to gain self-confidence.
To make sure that the refugee women are fully helped to succeed, Techfugees also cover the potential costs of baby-sitting and transportation. A socio-psychological support plan will also be deployed in Greece as well as a lean programme to equip every Fellow with laptops and wifi boxes allowing them to work as smoothly as possible.
Join the first ever batch of refugee women supported by Techfugees in Greece!
We aim to engage around 12 refugee women in the programme. So we absolutely encourage you to apply if:
- You are a woman or you identify as a woman;
- You are either a refugee or you have applied for your asylum;
- You are 18+ years old, which makes you capable of working, as an adult, in Greece;
- You are comfortable communicating in English, including in writing (if you can also use the Greek language, it is a plus!);
- You are willing to commit for 6 months to participate in the programme by devoting time and effort;
- You want to access a technological or digital job in specialties such as web development or design, data analysis, web marketing, IT Support, WordPress & Woocommerce etc.
- You know how to use basic functionalities on a computer & basic software (Google Workplace…);
- You want to develop your job-search skills and knowledge about the local labor market.
Apply now by filling in this form!