2024-10-18

Zonta's scholarships unique chance for young women

Zonta works to make life better for women and girls through advocacy work and service projects such as stopping violence against women, child marriage and creating climate justice in collaboration with various UN agencies. Our budget for the next two years is USD 4,617,000 of which 30% is for training programs.

This year, our scholarship activities have been made visible at our meetings and thanks to the increased commitment of the clubs, we have been able to reward outstanding scholarship holders.

Deborah Carlander, our unique STEM scholarship holder in 2023 (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) was given a lot of space at the Area meetings where she participated physically and digitally.

She earned her bachelor's degree in game development at the University of Skövde, and her bachelor's thesis led to her receiving the university's diversity prize, which is awarded every year. Her own diagnosis as high-functioning autistic meant that she saw the exclusion that women with neuropsychiatric disabilities, NPF, often suffer from, for example, in academic contexts. That is the background to Deborah's design of an anti-anxiety mobile game for women diagnosed with NPF. Many women are diagnosed later in life with depression as a result. They play often and Deborah saw the need for a special game for them. She got the idea and created the mobile game  Swim Calmly for them.

Deborah's professor at the University of Skövde saw her potential and realized that they had nothing more to teach her. He therefore encouraged her to apply to the renowned Keio University in Tokyo to complete her Master's and to practice at Tokyo's largest gaming company CYGAMES. She has now been to Tokyo and received very good words of wisdom from Cygames.

By highlighting these amazing women who also do something for their fellow sisters, Zonta gets a greater opportunity to reach out and be seen and to get more ambassadors for our organization. In addition, we can further support the fellows through our large global network so that they make their voices heard, take a seat in boardrooms and in leadership positions.

Christel Schultz