Get connected -- stay connected: WAVE and WAGGGS announce global competition

Thanks to a $50,000 grant from the Verizon Foundation, the Women’s Association of Verizon Employees (WAVE) is sponsoring a global competition with the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts (WAGGGS) this year.

The ‘Verizon Stay Connected’ competition, which launched on February 22, 2016 – World Thinking Day - is open to the 10 million Girl Guides and Scouts around the world. Girl Guides and Scouts will be asked to share their most innovative ideas for community projects which use technology to provide solutions which help the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDG).

Through delivery of the project in their community, and the use of technology to address local issues, girls will take action to change the world through the development of STEM skills. World Thinking Day (WTD) is the WAGGGS' annual celebration of Guiding and Scouting. Since 1926 it has been a day of International friendship, when the Association asks its members to speak out on issues that affect girls and young women and to raise money for 10 million Girl Guides and Girl Scouts around the world.

The theme for 2016 is 'Connect'.  The 'Verizon Stay Connected' program will form an integral element of overall WAGGGS outreach. WAGGGS was chosen to receive the grant as WAVE wanted to work with a global organisation, and an organisation where engagement would also involve direct connections between the charity and Verizon employees. WAVE also wanted to ensure that the grant supported WAVE’s mission of supporting professional development for women, whether within Verizon, or in Verizon’s stakeholder groups or communities.

A panel of judges, consisting from WAGGGS and Verizon representatives, will be tasked with selecting the top 2-3 projects to be funded from a prize fund provided by Verizon. The program launched on February 22, 2016 as part of the WTD celebrations and will involve engagement with Verizon staff and offices around the world as the year unfolds. The Verizon Foundation is focused on mobilizing resources around one mission: how do we use our technology to address some of the most pressing problems in education, especially for the underserved.

This program encourages girls to engage and achieve in science and math to deliver on that mission. For more information on WAGGGS, please click here. To find out more about Verizon’s initiatives in supporting STEM careers and much more, please visit verizon.com/about/responsibility. For information on Verizon’s approach to diversity and inclusion, please visit verizon.com/about/our-company/diversity-inclusion.