Closing the Gender Gap on Council

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Presenter: Li Koo

Closing the gender gap on council: Challenges and opportunities in 2018

Li Koo, a former female municipal candidate, will speak to some of the challenges that women face in running for politics, and will highlight some ways that CivicTech’ers can use DemocracyKit and work with Women Win Toronto to help close the gender gap in the upcoming municipal election. She will be accompanied by Hema Vyas and Chris Cowperthwaite, highlighting the work of Women Win Toronto & DemocracyKit, respectively.

This week’s talk will be presented in partnership with the Open Democracy Project.

*** SOCIAL MEDIA CHEAT CODES:

@LiKoo_TO @HemaVyas @cswc @DemocracyKit @WomenWinTO #OpenDemocracy

*** BIOGRAPHIES:

Li Koo is a community activist and CivicAction Diversity Fellow. She is passionate about improving education, and has championed greater access to education through her work with the Smithsonian Institute, World Literacy Canada. Li currently teaches at George Brown.

Hema Vyas is co-chair of WomenWinTO, an organization preparing women who share a vision of building a more progressive and equitable city to run for municipal office in Toronto’s 2018 election. Long interested in the power of politics for change, she ran to represent Ward 18, Davenport as councillor in 2010.

Chris Cowperthwaite is Executive Director of Open Democracy Project, which works to empower everyday citizens to drive change through civic and political action. Open Democracy Project publishes DemocracyKit, an open online platform to share advice and campaign technology with campaign teams running for municipal office, and hosts the DemocracyXChange campaign and technology summit.

http://WomenWinTO.ca

*** THIS MONTH’S VENUE SPONSOR:

TWG

TWG’s mission is to help build the most innovative enterprises and startups in the world, and believe software is the most powerful way to do that.

https://twg.io/

Check-in details: Elevators will be locked. If someone is not present to take you up, then please send a message to our “doorbell” at 780-652-2649 (780-6LAB-6IX), and the organizers will get a notification.

Attendees are requested to sign-in.

Accessibility: The venue is fully accessible.

*** ABOUT US:

Our weekly civic tech hacknights bring together designers, coders, urban planners, government staff, mappers, policy-makers, students, communications strategists, and all other Torontonians who share an interest in making Toronto more responsive, prosperous, sustainable and equitable, through design, tech, and data. (Coders are welcome, but you don’t have to be a coder to contribute!) Come and be part of it!

Agenda:

6:30-7: Welcome and intros 7-7:30: Presentation and Q&A/discussion 7:30-9: Breakout groups (make something!)

For more info, visit http://civictech.ca Here’s our Code of Conduct: http://civictech.ca/about-us

Hope to see you Tuesday!