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<p>We recognise that the Tech Sector, including the Information Technology industry,
can only reach its true potential if it is fully representative of society. This Government
is committed to this mission, which is why we have supported the Tech Talent Charter
since 2016. They are leading the movement by gathering data and reporting on diversity
statistics from 741 organisations across all sectors, fostering collaboration and
innovation to create a more inclusive and diverse tech workforce. TTC’s annual diversity
in tech report is a key resource that encourages businesses to hire diverse talent,
as well as sharing the best D&I practices across the sector.</p><p>We recognise
that digital skills are fundamental to ensuring everyone can make the most of a digital
future. As the department that leads on digital skills, we are focusing on broadening
and deepening the pool of talent. The Digital Skills Council convenes stakeholders
from across the sector to deliver industry led action on driving the growth of the
digital workforce, including widening the skills pipelines, and ensuring Tech roles
are accessible for all. One of the council’s objectives is to promote mechanisms to
provide increasingly diverse access to digital roles and digitally enabled roles.</p><p>The
Office for AI has also set up the AI and Data Science Conversion Course programmes
to provide a Masters degree in AI and Data Science. The first scholarships were announced
in 2019, and earlier this year, the government announced a further 2,000 scholarships.
These will support underrepresented groups from non-STEM backgrounds to develop new
digital and AI skills, and secure employment in the UK’s cutting-edge sectors. To
date, 57% of these scholarships have been awarded to those from an ethnic minority
background, and 38% of these scholarships have been awarded to Black students. Emerging
findings also indicate that the scholarships are driving increased diversity in the
cohort on these conversion courses compared to traditional Masters’ provision in the
sector. 76% of the scholarships were awarded to women, leading to a 32% increase of
women on the courses, against comparable benchmarks.</p><p>DCMS also launched Cyber
Explorers, which supports 11-14 year-olds, and looks to boost their understanding
and interest in a cyber career. The programme has prioritised representation on the
platform, including characters from a range of diverse backgrounds and careers. This
has focused on amplifying reach in population areas with high ethnic minority densities
and areas with multiple indices of deprivation. This is alongside our work to support
the CyberFirst Girls Competition, which opened its latest intake last month.</p><p>With
DCMS funding, Tech Nation developed its Libra growth programme in 2021.The programme
offers targeted support to minority ethnic tech founders in their scaling journey.
Tech Nation has also developed a publicly available Diversity and Inclusion Toolkit,
which supports scaling companies in implementing diversity and inclusion strategies
in order to make the tech sector as a whole more accessible for those from minority
ethnic backgrounds.</p><p> </p>
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