Tech for Good: Refugee Rights

Join us for a celebration of 3 years of Tech for Good Dublin !

In March 2017 we held our first ever event with a talk from TechFugees about how technology was being used to help refugees around the world. We are revisiting this important topic for our birthday with new talks which will focus on the rights of refugees to access tools and services and feel safe online.

Our first speaker is Suad Al Darra who is a Data Scientist and founder of RefugeesAre.info - a news analysis platform focused on auto-detecting xenophobia against displaced people in the news using NLP & ML and Data Visualization techniques. Her work won Techfugees Global Challenges Awards 2018, and was mentioned in Techcrunch as one of 25 most innovative new projects using tech to help refugees and NGOs. She was also a finalist at the European DatSci & AI Awards 2019. Suad previously worked for UNICEF in applying data science methodologies to support emergency response. Suad holds a Master's degree in Data Analytics at the National University of Ireland, Galway. She currently leads Techfugees Ireland chapter to empower displaced people using technology.

Our second speaker is Charlotte Byrne who is the Education Officer at the Irish Refugee Council (IRC). The mission of the IRC is to create a just, fair and inclusive society for people seeking asylum. In 2018 Concern Worldwide secured funding from Google.org to buy technology (tablets and laptops with software installed) to be given directly to refugees who would benefit from the technology. Concern shared a portion of this grant with the IRC to support their Education Programs. Following a selection process the IRC gave the laptops to people living in Direct Provision around Ireland who could benefit from access to online resources, including free training courses. This project was a huge success and the follow-up stories from the recipients of the laptops are guaranteed to make you smile.

We also plan to have a birthday CAKE !! but promise we won’t make anyone sing ‘Happy Birthday’ (unless you want to).