The first ever Pokhara batch of the Women Leaders in Technology (WLiT) fellowship officially graduated on December 11, 2022. It was the most awaited moment for every fellow who had dedicated their utmost energy, passion, and late-night commits to the curriculum milestones over the past year. The atmosphere of this auspicious occasion was completely filled with layered, raw emotions.
There was profound happiness among fellows for completing their first major technical residency, pure satisfaction radiating from team members seeing their community expansion strategy successfully paying off, the absolute pride of parents tracking their daughters’ engineering advancements, and the fulfillment of partner enterprise executives witnessing their interns' structural development.
The graduation program officially initiated with an opening operational brief from Program Officer Eeda Rijal, followed by deep tactical reflections from core WLiT team members. Then, the parameters shifted to our fellows to share their experiential program paths.
Milestone Breakdowns Highlighted by the Cohorts:
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Enterprise Placements: The initial presentations systematically charted the technical stack workflows and code production journeys encountered during their respective local corporate internships.
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Hour of Code Outreach: A highly impactful group tracked their deployment logistics across 15 different government public schools in Pokhara, cascading technical digital literacy frameworks directly down to foundational grassroots levels.
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1:1 Mentorship Interventions: The third group breaking out data mapped their growth parameters, technical architectures, and confidence shifts built during structural Mentor-Mentee pairings.
Following the mid-day session recess, a vital informative presentation breaking down legal definitions, preventative policies, and psychological support lines regarding "sexual harassment" was facilitated by Advocate Prapoosa. This was immediately followed by an empirical security data session led by Safer-I Nepal, where WLiT alumna Sonika Baniya analyzed critical findings from their research study: “Data Privacy and Data Collection Concerns in Social Media Platforms Among Emerging Adults in Nepal.”
Melisa Takeda, the Deputy Cultural Affairs Officer at the U.S. Embassy, additionally took the stage to detail her direct engagement with the WLiT programmatic vision, emphasizing her immense fulfillment in witnessing young women systematically break into and thrive across competitive technology sectors.
To conclude the day, the entire ecosystem joined in celebration by cutting the graduation cake and formally welcoming the cohort into our lifelong global alumni infrastructure. Fellows were presented with physical certificates recognizing their exceptional engineering and leadership excellence throughout the exhaustive 9-month training tracking cycle.
“You all are incredibly special to our community framework, and this technical journey does not end at graduation.”
— Eeda Rijal, Program Officer