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Tackling GENDER IMBALANCE GIRLS INTO ICT DAY WE TURNED GIRLS INTO ICT DAY INTO A WEEKLONG CELEBRATION OF ALL THINGS COMPUTING ON OUR BLOG THIS YEAR. Our major announcement over the week was that we would be recruiting two Modern Apprentices - one in ICT, the other in Digital Marketing. Women are under-represented in IT occupations, making up just 17% of ICT specialists in the UK. We are trying to address this by sparking an interest in computer coding and technology at a young age, particularly through our popular CoderDojo coding clubs. Take a look at our blog and read the inspirational stories of Google’s Senior User Experience Researcher, Heather Traher, The Data Lab’s Chief Executive, Gillian Docherty, brightsolid’s Service Desk Analyst, Claire Beattie, and our very own ICT technicians, Helen Blakely and Dawn Rowe. We also spoke to two of our current students: Shireen Robb, HND Technical Support, and Lauren Brock, HNC Computer Games Development. 14 SHIREEN ROBB, HND TECHNICAL SUPPORT STUDENT HEATHER TRAHER, GOOGLE GILLIAN DOCHERTY, THE DATA LAB The magazine of Ayrshire College HELEN BLAKELY AND DAWN ROWE, ICT TECHNICIANS