Australia Awards scholars from across South and West Asia engaged in discussion, commitment and action to promote gender equality in their home countries at the second Scholars Forum of 2019, held in Canberra.

Under the theme ‘Working together for gender equality in South and West Asia’, the two-day Forum brought together more than 100 participants, including 69 Australia Awards scholars.

Joining the scholars were Australia Awards alumni; senior diplomats from the South and West Asia region; and representatives of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT), women’s advocacy groups, international development organisations, and Australian universities, think-tanks and research institutions.

The Forum opened with a Welcome Reception at the iconic Parliament House. Key speakers across the two days addressed important issues relating to women’s leadership, security and peace building, economic empowerment, and ending violence against women.  
‍

Highlights included addresses by Dr Sharman Stone (then Australian Ambassador for Women and Girls) and Ms Janelle Weissman, Executive Director at UN Women National Committee Australia. Mr Paul Wojciechowski, Assistant Secretary of DFAT’s South Asia Branch, presided over the Forum as its host, while scholars themselves emceed proceedings.
‍

Scholars’ experiences at the event were supported by thoughtfully deployed technology such as a dedicated event webpage; a digitally rotating gallery of alumni (women in leadership and male champions of change) for inspiration; live polling to aid interactivity; and real-time professional image distribution to assist participants in sharing their experiences on social media.

Outcomes from the Forum included scholars:

• developing their understanding of the economic, developmental, social and human rights benefits of gender equality
• identifying key challenges and ways to improve gender equality in their countries
• designing personal commitments to champion gender equality
• developing professional networks with Australians beyond their academic pursuits.

A Regional Short Course in Executive Leadership saw 28 senior leaders from the government and civil sectors of Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka developing their skills for their nations’ benefit.

The week-long training, delivered by the Australian National University, took place in Canberra and included a two-day retreat in Mollymook, New South Wales. The Short Course introduced a multidisciplinary suite of tools and concepts to enhance participants’ existing leadership competencies.

As part of the course, e-mentoring took place with participants after they had returned to their home countries. Participant Mr Navaraj Dhakal from Nepal said that these e-mentoring sessions were one of the best experiences of his public service career to date.

Mr Dhakal added that he was applying lessons learnt in Canberra to build goodwill with other countries in the region, hoping it will aid him in resolving any trade-related issues in future.

Dr Alia Malik, a participant from Pakistan, felt that, as a worker in a small non-government organisation, she would not usually have access to the innovative concepts and toolkits used on the Short Course. On her return home, Dr Malik was looking forward to brainstorming ideas with her colleagues in Pakistan, drawing on her newly developed skillsets.

At the end of the course, participants envisioned that there would be many opportunities to apply their new knowledge with their colleagues and their community.

“I will apply foresighting and road mapping to develop a robust start-up ecosystem in universities in Gujarat,” said Anju Sharma, from India. Participants from Sri Lanka’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs agreed that they would be applying the principles of foresighting and strategic road mapping.

Mohiuddin Ahmad from Bangladesh said that he intended to use the newly learnt tools to experiment with “inclusive social protection” in the form of a pilot School Meals program, which he is hoping to help scale-up to all of Bangladesh.

“I enjoyed the experience and learnt a lot,” commented Mr Suman Dahal, also from Nepal, “and I am now part of an excellent alumni network.” Summarising his learning from the Short Course, he observed, “A visionary leader always worries about the future…[but] the adaptive leader assesses what kind of distant future we can have and what efforts we should make from today to materialise it.”

Mr Dahal shared his learnings within his workplace, the Ministry of Finance. He also wrote an article, published in a renowned Nepali journal, regarding his learnings from the Short Course.  

More than 70 Australia Awards alumni from South and West Asia gathered in Colombo, Sri Lanka, for the 2019 Regional Alumni Workshop—postponed to January 2020 for security reasons—to celebrate alumni achievements and success.

The three-day Workshop welcomed alumni from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, who all had the opportunity to share their success stories and experiences, gain skills on impactful storytelling, and strengthen their professional networks across the region.

The Workshop was opened by DFAT’s Tom Davis, First Secretary (Development Cooperation), Sri Lanka and Maldives, who delivered a keynote speech on the workshop’s theme of ‘Celebrating Alumni Success’. In his remarks, Dr Davis emphasised the importance of storytelling as a tool for advocacy.

The program included masterclasses delivered by Digital Storytellers, a Sydney-based film agency, and Curative (Pvt.) Ltd, an event-planning company based in Sri Lanka. The masterclasses provided opportunities for participants to improve their storytelling and public speaking skills.

On the final day of the Workshop, participants used their newly gained skills in storytelling and public speaking to participate in a country-level competition at which they presented their success stories to a panel of judges headed by Victoria Coakley, Deputy High Commissioner at the Australian High Commission in Colombo. Fourteen finalists from the country-level competition then went on to compete in the regional round of the competition. The winner of the regional competition was Afghan alumna Ghazaal Habibyar, who told an inspiring story about overcoming barriers and breaking glass ceilings to make a sustainable impact in Afghanistan’s male-dominated political sphere.

The participating alumni were selected through a competitive process. More than 300 alumni submitted stories on meaningful development contributions they had made in their own countries, partnerships they had developed with Australian organisations, or pioneering accomplishments they had achieved following their Australia Awards experience.

The Workshop furnished an opportunity for alumni in the region to connect with each other and share information and knowledge; provided a professional development platform to mobilise engagement with alumni by improving their storytelling and public speaking skills; and was designed to celebrate the achievements of Australia Awards alumni—while enhancing connections, both with one another and with Australia.