Background
Gender Evaluation Methodology (GEM) is an online guide for conducting gender evaluations of initiatives that use Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) for social change. The tool helps to assess if ICTs really improve women’s lives and gender relations as well as promote positive social change. As more and more projects on ICTs are being supported the world over, it becomes imperative to examine if they are indeed benefiting or accentuating existing gender biases and stereotyping of women.

APC’s Women’s Networking Support Programme The Association of Progressive Communication’s Women’s Networking Support Programme (APC WNSP) offers the GEM Tool as part of its work in Gender and ICT learning and advocacy. The APC WNSP is an international network of individual women and women’s organisations promoting gender equality in the design, implementation, access and use of ICTs (Information and Communications Technologies) and in the policy decisions and frameworks that regulate them. The programme was initiated in 1995. Four years later, they initiated a two year research, training, resources and documentation project called ‘Lessons Learned.’

The goals of the programme are:

• to promote the consideration and incorporation of gender in ICT policy-making bodies and forums
• to initiate and implement research activities in the field of gender and ICTs
• to advance the body of knowledge, understanding, and skills in the field of gender and ICTs by implementing training activities
• to facilitate access to information resources in the field of gender and ICTs

Navigating the GEM online tool and resource
Created under the creative commons license, the http://www.apcwomen.org/gem/ is a free online and downloadable guide (provided due credits are given for use and adapting the learning resource) provides users with an overview of the evaluation process, explores gender and ICT issues, and outlines suggested strategies and methodologies for incorporating a gender analysis throughout the evaluation process. The programme has received support from the International Development Research Centre (IDRC), Canada, United National Fund for Women (UNIFEM) and UK Department for International Development (DFID, UK). The entire guide can be downloaded, and thus can become off-line tool for people who do not have continued or broadband connectivity.

Once you have obtained the training, an online network linking up with the GEM Practitioner’s Network enables regular exchange of methodologies and ideas with other GEM for ICTs. Understanding GEM is the next section that one must familiarise oneself with to understand the philosophy, and the critical issues before beginning to use the GEM tool itself. The tool is a step-by-step guide to the methodology.

GEM is not simply an evaluation tool. While it is a guide to integrate gender analysis and frameworks into evaluation of ICTs for social change projects, it can be a useful tool for project planning as well. It aims to promote positive change at the individual, organisational, community and broader social levels. It is an evolving tool. With experiences of the practitioners constantly providing inputs and feedback, and case stories, the dynamic tool enables the users to walk through different experiences throughout the process of learning and orienting themselves.