ICTworks

The Global Digital Development Forum 2021 promises to be even bigger, better, and bolder than last year’s event. We will have thousands of participants from around the world attending interesting and engaging community-driven sessions across the English, French, and Spanish languages.

Submit Your Session Idea Now!

The Global Digital Development Forum will feature thoughtful keynote presentations, exciting lightning talks, captivating breakout sessions, interactive workshops, and enlightening solution demonstrations from your peers.

Please Submit Your Session Ideas Now for Consideration
English – French – Spanish Language Tracks

This forum will be a highly participatory, community-driven event so we are actively seeking practitioners from around the world with a wide range of ideas, experiences, and backgrounds to lead each type of session.

Special consideration will be given to sessions led by practitioners from low- and middle-income countries.

Suggested Session Construction

We want GDDF 2021 sessions to be different from the usual development conference events. We discourage organizations from simply presenting projects they implemented. Please propose true conversation topics with lead discussants from different organizations. We want to foster lively debate on key questions with multiple viewpoints.

Here are several session topic ideas to guide your design direction:

• What learnings from COVID-19 can we use to improve our HIV responses?
• How could agritech solutions improve food security in the Sahel?
• Who in South Asia is reducing digital gender divides and how?
• Where can educational outcomes be improved with assistive technology?
• When will we see constructive responses to disinformation campaigns?

Here is an example session description to show you want we’re looking for: an interesting session idea, a description of how you’ll engage participants in the learning, and who you’ll have from different organizations leading the discussion.

How can we improve malaria reduction in Nigeria using ICT4D?

The government of Nigeria seeks to reduce malaria cases through a campaign of indoor residential spraying and long-lasting insecticidal bed net distribution. How can we use technology to improve both?

This session will explore the use of geographic information systems and mobile data collection tools to target interventions, measure their progress, and evaluate success in Nigeria and Uganda. Participants will hear from Nigeria and Uganda project managers, then compare approaches as a group, and discuss tech uses and issues with GIS and M&E leads. They will leave with a checklist of when and how to design interventions with GIS and MDC, with a focus on remote project monitoring.

Lead discussants: Nigerian health system manager, Nigerian spray and bed net program manager, Ugandan bed net program lead, Ugandan GIS expert, Nigerian M&E manager – all from different organizations.

See past Technology Salon sessions for further inspiration on how to develop your session theme and recruit diverse discussants. Session ideas that focus on one solution or with lead discussants from one organization will not be accepted.

Session Ranking Criteria

We really do what to have interactive sessions that explore the deeper issues and challenges in digital development, and get past the usual death-by-Powerpoint presentations on specific projects.

We will look to 5 major criteria when we rank sessions for inclusion into the event, including:

1. Content Quality: Are the learning objectives clear? What are the participant take-aways?
2. Content Relevance: Is it aligned with conference themes? Will practitioners find it interesting?
3. Discussant Credibility: Are the lead discussants working on the topic? Are they front-line staff?
4. Discussant Diversity: Are they from the Global South? Is there a good mix of demography and backgrounds?
5. Session Engagement: Is the format interactive? Will it engage participants often and directly?

Learn more about this ranking when reviewing the session submission process on the GDDF website.