Calendar
Young Women's Initiatives
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Skills Ontario’s Young Women’s Initiatives is a collection of engaging and hands-on events and programs that provide skill development and mentorship opportunities to young women in grades 7 to 12. Skills Ontario hosts Career Exploration Events across Ontario from October to April, and Canada’s largest young women’s conference at the Skills Ontario Competition each year! Scroll down to start exploring! For the 2021-2022 school year, Skills Ontario will continue to host all our regional Career Exploration Events and our Young Women’s Conferences in a virtual format! Stay tuned! Skills Ontario has some exciting news coming up surrounding new programming, a Women in Trades Resource Hub, and other amazing offerings that will be announced throughout the 2021/2022 year! |
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International Day of the Girl Series GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS™ Collaborating Organizations |
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Thank you to our Young Women's Initiatives Partners:
This program is funded by the Government of Ontario.
Program Partner
Progressive Contractors Association of Canada
Supporting Partner
International Day of the Girl Series
October 4th – 11th
The International Day of the Girl was established by the United Nations in 2012 and is recognized as a day to acknowledge girls and their rights, education, and opportunities. Let's seize the opportunity to reimagine a better world inspired by girls – energized and recognized, counted and invested in.
Skills Ontario is offering a series of free online events to celebrate the International Day of the Girl. We expanded beyond the official date of October 11th, 2021 to offer various opportunities for girls and their parents/guardians and family members to participate in! Skills Ontario will be celebrating through a three-part series:
1. A week of at-home challenges to try out the skilled trades and technologies for chances to win prizes!
2. A virtual hands-on workshop kids can do with their family to learn new skills!
3. A For Girls, By Girls! virtual conference, where viewers can hear from girls and learn about the
skilled trades and technologies!
Part 1 of the Series - International Day of the Girl Challenges
*No registration required
October 4th – 8th, 2021: Calling all girls!!! Skills Ontario would like to show the world what you can do! We are challenging girls to try out activities relating to the five skilled trade and technology sectors:
- Motive Power: Sail Cars Challenge
- Industrial: Popsicle Stick Playground Challenge
- Service: Fashion Design Challenge
- Construction: Marshmallow Towers Challenge
- Technology: Coding Challenge
You can choose to participate in as many challenges as you’d like – there are five in total, relating to each sector. Let’s show the world that girls can build, construct, create, and do anything they put their mind to!
Submissions can be videos and/or pictures of your project. You will need to highlight what you as a girl can do and why girls rock! This can be done in either voice recordings within a video, or through a written document that is photographed with your project.
Submissions are to be posted on Twitter between October 4th – 8th. Tag @skillsontario and use the hashtag #SkillsIDG2021. If you do not have Twitter, or are uncomfortable posting, please email your submission to ywi@skillsontario.com.
To join in on the fun and enter for a challenge:
- Follow us on Twitter here!
- Read the rules and guidelines for the challenge you'd like to participate in
- Tweet your submission to us at @skillsontario with the hashtag #SkillsIDG2021
Challenge winners will be contacted October 12th and will be required to sign a consent form and return it via email before October 19th so that Skills Ontario, its partners, your school and class can celebrate your submission!
Part 2 of the Series - International Day of the Girl Workshop
Monday, October 11th, 2021: 1:00pm
Please note this event takes place on the Thanksgiving holiday.
This activity requires registration and is free to participate in.
Skills Ontario is excited to be offering an Animation Workshop for the family! Participants will have the opportunity to learn and work through foundational skills using Google Slides (or PowerPoint) to create a short video. Come and create a short animation using skills that can be applied to all future projects! Details subject to change. Please keep checking the website for updates. Parents/guardians are required to register.
Target Audience: Grades 6 -8.
Please note, younger students are welcome, but may require a parent/guardian or older sibling to assist with some of the steps throughout the workshop.
Part 3 of the Series - International Day of the Girl Celebration Event: For Girls, By Girls
Friday, October 8th, 2021: 10:00am – 10:40am
Classes (teachers/students) can watch the Premiere Event, featuring a Live Chat, during the AM showing; and
Friday, October 8th, 2021: 6:30pm – 7:10pm
LINK HERE
- Parents/Guardians/Families can watch a BONUS showing of the event in the evening.
This activity requires registration and is free to participate in.
Skills Ontario will be hosting the For Girls, By Girls! virtual conference to celebrate the International Day of the Girl! This event is dedicated to empowering girls through relatable and engaging content. For Girls, By Girls provides viewers with the opportunity to hear from girls in elementary and senior elementary to discuss their perspectives of how they perceive the skilled trades and technologies, what they want to be when they grow up and why, what their favourite tool is, what they think certain trades actually do, and what interests them!
This will be a great event that allows girls to relate to what they’re watching, with the opportunity to learn alongside their teachers, classmates, parent(s)/guardian(s), and other family members. There will also be encouraging messages from highly respected and influential leaders and tradespeople including an inspirational keynote from Kyara Cabrera Fong, Auto Body & Collision Repair Apprentice. Skills Ontario is thrilled to commemorate the International Day of the Girl. Join us as we celebrate you and everything that girls can do!
If you have any questions, please contact lchester@skillsontario.com.
Young Women's Conferences
Click HERE for more information regarding the Young Women’s Conferences.
Skills Ontario Career Exploration Events
Career Exploration Events – Daytime Student
Skills Ontario is proud to once again present a series of Career Exploration Events for young women in senior elementary and secondary school. These events provide participants the opportunity to integrate experiential workshops and networking with mentors
We will be hosting our programming in a virtual format for the 2021-22 school year until further notice.
Going virtual has allowed us to reach a larger audience and to offer more spaces. This has allowed full co-ed classes as well as young women to learn about the skilled trades and technologies! We know this year will be another challenging year and we strive to keep everything as simple and consistent as possible as we all continue to navigate working around COVID-19. For this year’s events, we will be posting event dates and workshop specifics as events are secured, providing a detailed event agenda for each event.
Events are hosted on Google Meets and do allow for co-ed participation in order to follow school policies where classes are unable to divide. Each event will still be allocated a “location” as previous years. This is navigational to school boards/colleges.
Below is a list of our Young Women’s regional 2020/21 event offerings we will have detail available as the events are solidified so that we can provide a full overview of the event.
NOTE – Once a date is secured, it will be posted online and will not change unless an unforeseen circumstance occurs. At that time, a notice will be posted to our website and all registered participants will be notified. All event details will be updated as each date is secured in the chart below.
*New this year fully francophone events, dates to come.
| Virtual Region | Grades | Co-host | Date | Flyer | |
| Sault St. Marie | 7-12 | Coming Soon | Coming Soon | Coming Soon | |
| Timmins | 7-12 | Coming Soon | Coming Soon | Coming Soon | |
| Thunder Bay | 7-12 | Confederation College | October 27th |
Coming Soon | |
| Kenora | 7-12 | Coming Soon | Coming Soon | Coming Soon | |
| Guelph | 7-12 | Conestoga College | December 3rd |
Coming Soon | |
| Barrie | 7-12 | Coming Soon | Coming Soon | Coming Soon | |
| Tiverton | 7-12 | Coming Soon | Coming Soon | Coming Soon | |
| Belleville | 7-12 | Loyalist College |
February 8th |
Coming Soon | |
| Kapuskasing | 7-12 | Coming Soon | Coming Soon | Coming Soon | |
| Ottawa | 7-12 | Algonquin College |
February 24th |
Coming Soon | |
| Brampton | 7-12 | Coming Soon | Coming Soon | Coming Soon | |
| Whitby | 7-12 | Durham College |
March 3rd |
Coming Soon | |
| Sudbury | 7-12 | Cambrian College | February 10th |
Coming Soon | |
| Niagara | 7-12 | Coming Soon | Coming Soon | Coming Soon | |
| North Bay | 7-12 | Canadore College | December 7th |
Coming Soon |
School/Student Registration
Events will be free and any that require a registration fee, will be listed with the event date/register button.
IMPORTANT: In select events, some workshops may require an informed consent form to be signed by the parent/ guardian depending on the workshop activity. This will be indicated with the event.
Teachers and board contacts are to register students in grades 7-12.
How Registration Works
Each Teacher or Board contact will register an entire class/cohort/bubble as one (1) ticket for the regional event they choose. In the “regional” events, if a co-host is listed, workshops will be based off their programming/campus. The region you select does not have to be the region closest to your school board.
One ticket allows for one device to join the event. This link is NOT to be shared. Each event has a maximum number of devices that can log on. Teachers are asked to share their screen with their class, either in-person in a classroom (i.e. from a projector or TV hooked up to their device) and/or in a virtual classroom by screen sharing. If a teacher has a class/cohort/bubble that is a combination of in-person and virtual students, we recommend that the device is connected to a projector or TV at the front of the class, while also logged into the virtual classroom and screensharing. If this is not possible to share in this recommended option, please contact rkappes@skillsontario.com – we are happy to discuss different options!
This system allows the most opportunities for students to join and attend each individual event. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email - this will not include the link to the event. A few days prior to the event you registered for, another email with the link to access Google Meets will be sent to you. Again, please ensure that this link is not shared.
If you have any questions, please contact rkappes@skillsontario.com.
Register a Guest
A guest is classified as a dignitary, community partner, sponsor, or other interested party who is not part of a school registration. Please email ywc@skillsontario.com to register.
Becoming a Mentor and/or Hosting a Workshop
Are you a woman who works in the skilled trades and technologies and looking to share your experience and skilled trade and technology? Volunteer as a mentor or to host a workshop at one of our events! Email ywc@skillsontario.com.
Collaborating Organizations
Skills Ontario is on the forefront of making change in our province! We are thrilled to be partnering with women in skilled trade and technology organizations and groups to stand together and make an impact. We are united with the same goals and initiatives and will promote exciting opportunities for women through skill development, mentorship, networking, and experiential learning opportunities at our Young Women’s Career Exploration Events and Young Women’s Conference.
