Category Archives: Hopper – Anita Borg Institute

Looking for 2 More Panelists!

More information about Hopper 2007:
http://gracehopper.org/2007/.
See my
About page for contact information if you are interested or know
somone who is.

I am the moderator of the “Girl Geeks in High School – Technical Experiences of Future
Inventors” panel at the
Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing 2007. Sun is a Platinum Sponsor
of Hopper 2007 and I am managing our participation. Sun has eleven panelists, and
runners-of-BOFs at Hopper this year.
I have 4 excellent and impressive “Girl Geeks in High School” panelists already confirmed:

• 1 recent grad from
  Harker who is now a Freshman at
  CMU
• 2 from Castilleja
• 1 from Menlo School

However, these amazing young women are all from private schools and I would also
like to include two girls from public schools in the Silicon Valley.
I am in touch with both Paly and
Gunn but no luck yet.

Who am I looking for?

• Two rising Senior girls attending a Silicon Valley public high school.
  The two can be from different public high schools.
  Will accept an exceptional rising Junior.
• Must be seriously involved in Robotics and/or Computer Science and/or Programming and/or
  Engineering.
• Must be able to attend the Hopper Conference in Orlando, Florida,
  October 17-20, 2007. Our 1-hour panel is on 18 October – Thursday. I can’t offer travel
  funds but I can guarantee an exceptional and inspiring experience for the participants.
• Must be mature and responsible enough to travel by herself or have
  a family or faculty member willing to come with her to Disney World.
  Two Moms of confirmed panelists are already attending.
• Must want a remarkable accomplishment to include on her college applications.

Hopper is an amazing annual conference for women in computing. I am on the Technical
Advisory Board of the Anita Borg Institute which,
with the Association for Computing Machinery
(ACM), presents the Hopper conference. This is the third year I have run a panel at
Hopper (the other two were on mentoring): I recommend the conference most highly.

Hopper offers many activities, panels, and talks aimed at college students
as well as academics and people with jobs in the computer science industry. About half of
Hopper’s attendees are students (grad and undergrad). Hopper offers 1-day registrations or
full 2-1/2 day registrations. The conference is based at the Hilton Disney World. Just for
fun, Hopper offers these five good reasons to attend:

1. It’s a geek utopia.
2. Awesome keynote and invited technical speakers
3. It’s in Orlando!
4. You can bring your family. We’ve arranged tours for your
   companions and child care for children.
5. It will give you a reason to add another friend to your MySpace.

Panel Session Summary

What is it like to grow up a geeky girl? This panel provides direct communication from a
panel of Silicon Valley girls about their recent computing, technical, and robotics
experiences: what worked for them (or did not work) in terms of teaching, course content,
approach, coaching, school resources, and technical internships. How does growing up in a
world-class center of technical innovation effect young women in particular?

Girls are included from a broad range of educational backgrounds: both private and public
high schools, girls-only and co-educational schools. The primary audience is those in
industry interested in their employee pipeline, plus high school and undergraduate
academics who want to hear directly from young women just about to start college about
what their high schools offered and what was effective in their technical education and
experience. The broader audience includes everyone interested in girls’ technical
education, particularly with a view toward encouraging innovation.

Questions for the panel include:

1. What teaching methods or tools particularly benefitted you, especially in encouraging
   your innovation?
2. What turned you off to computer science and math; what turned you back on again?
3. Does having your own laptop make a difference? (how?)
4. Does teaching theory work best for you, or were hands-on experiments, labs, and
   programming more effective? (examples?)
5. How does it make a difference if math, science, and technical teachers are female?
6. Do you have to be good in math to love programming?
7. How do you deal with social pressures and bias, did you feel you had to to “outboy the
   boys”? (stories?)
8. How do your parents feel about your involvement in technology? Are your parents
   technical?
9. What have you done so far with your technical or computer skills?
10. What do you see as your future in science or technology, and why?

More information about Hopper 2007:
http://gracehopper.org/2007/.
See my
About page for contact information if you are interested or know
somone who is. Thanks for your consideration!

The acceptances for The Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing
(October 17-20, 2007 in Orlando, Florida) have been announced. I am
still hearing back but Sun will be represented in at least eight
panels and Birds of a Feather meetings:

1. “Girl Geeks in High School – Technical Experiences of Future Inventors”
   (panel submitted by Katy Dickinson, Director in Sun’s CTO group, and daughter
   Jessica Dickinson Goodman, soon-to-be Freshman at Carnegie Mellon University)
2. “Successful Latinas Opening Doors to the Future: Advancing Latinas in
   Computing” (panel submitted by Gilda Garreton, Staff Engineer in Sun Labs;
   the panel also includes Ivonne Valdes, Sun Director in Global Services)
3. “Latinas in Computing” (BOF submitted by Gilda Garreton, Staff Engineer in
   Sun Labs)
4. “The Road to Executive Leadership” (includes a Sun panelist Kathy Jenks,
   Director in Sun Software)
5. “Mentoring Makes MAGIC for Middle and High School Girls” (BOF submitted
   by Ira Pramanick, Sun Senior Staff Engineer in Software)

6. “Advancing Your Career, Advancing Your Life” (panel submitted
   by Robin Wilensky, Architect in Sun Global Sales & Services)

7. “Innovation Inside Corporations” (includes a Sun panelist Yvonne Wilson,
   Sun Principal IT Architect)
8. “Managing your career 2-5 years out of school” (includes a Sun panelist Sukyoung Ryu, Member of the Technical Staff in Sun Labs)

Here is the Hopper web site:
http://gracehopper.org/2007/

In March, my daughter Jessica and I submitted a panel proposal to the
Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing 2007.
Hopper 2007 will be held October 17-20 in Orlando, Florida. Our panel title
is “Girl Geeks in High School – Technical Experiences of Future Inventors”. The
2007 Hopper conference theme is “I Invent the Future”.

Jessica and (I hope) at least one other girl from
Harker High School will join the panel. I also just received a confirmation in email
from a potential panelist who goes to Castilleja
girls’ school. (My department’s summer intern also attends Castilleja High School.) In
addition, there are several girls also interested in participating who
attend Palo Alto High School (“Paly”), where my son is a
Freshman.

If our panel is accepted, it will include young women from a range of educational
backgrounds: both private and public high schools, girls-only and co-educational schools.
Some of the girls will have just started their Freshman college year. This panel will
present the views and stories of young women from the unique technical environment of
the Silicon Valley about what it is like to grow up geeky. We hope this will help the
audience understand more about what is possible: the current state of high school
technical education for girls in some of the best schools in one of the most technical
places in the world.

The October 2006 Hopper conference included a panel called “Priming the Pipeline – Girls
Speak Out About Pre-College Computer Science” which was remarkably well attended –
standing room only! In October 2006, there were many more questions for the four girl panelists
than time allowed. Since then, there have been two books published aimed at understanding women
in technology and how they got there: She’s Such a Geek! Women Write About Science,
Technology & Other Nerdy Stuff (2006, Newitz & Anders) and Changing Our World –
True Stories of Women Engineers (2006, Hatch).
This indicates a strong continuing interest in how girls become geeks and what prepares
them to grow up to be innovative Engineers and Scientists.

Hopper is an amazing annual conference for women in computing. I have presented two
Hopper panels in past years, both on mentoring. I very much hope this panel proposal
is accepted. Hopper offers many activities, panels, and talks aimed at
undergrads as well as to benefit women with jobs in computer science, both in industry and
academia. Usually, there are more students (grad and undergrad) than any other category of
Hopper attendees. Hopper offers 1-day registrations and computing scholarships – see

http://gracehopper.org/2007/participate/scholarships-student/ – as well as
regular registrations.
The young women on our panel are sure to have an excellent and educational experience.

I know of at least five women in Engineering here at Sun who
are preparing proposals to submit to the
Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing 2007. The submission deadline was just extended to 9 June.
Hopper 2007 will be held October 17-20 in Orlando, Florida.

Starting this year, Hopper is an annual event and will be held together with the Richard Tapia Celebration of Diversity in Computing. As the web site
says: “Past Grace Hopper Celebrations have resulted in collaborative proposals, networking, mentoring, and increased visibility for the contributions of women in computing. This year’s theme is I Invent the Future“.

The Anita Borg Institute for
Women and Technology (ABI) and the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) present the Hopper conference. 2007 is the 7th Hopper, will be the
4th I have attended, and the 3rd to which I have submitted a
proposal. I had panels on mentoring at the last two Hopper conferences.

I am on the Advisory Board for the ABI. Sun hosted the ABI Ambassadors meeting here in Menlo Park yesterday. We discussed best practices in networking groups of women in Engineering at
Sun, Cisco, and HP. Sun’s group is called SASWE (“Succeeding @ Sun As a Woman Engineer”) and has been working since 1995. The ABI Ambassadors
also heard an update on Hopper 2007. The plans sound exciting!

More than 30 Sun women attended and worked at the Hopper conference in San Diego in 2006. (See my
blog entries for 2006 photos and commentary.) The flash of energy and
delight that resulted from their participation was exhilarating.

Greg Papadopoulos (Sun CTO and Executive VP) took the opportunity of Hopper 2006 to write a piece in CNET called “Perspective: Engineering field must have diversity”. I am
very much looking forward to Hopper 2007.

Error Correction!:

I got the date wrong on my 23 March posting, the Hopper submissions
deadlines are now:

• Ph.D. Forum – April 29
• Panels, Workshops, and Presentations – April 15
• Technical Posters – April 29
• ACM SRC – April 29
• BOFs – April 29
• New Investigator Technical Papers – April 29

Hopper Registration opens June 1

More information:
http://gracehopper.org/2007/

We have Sun’s Hopper photos collected and posted now. Here are some
highlights:

1. Recruiting table:

2. Radia Perlman and fans:

3. Lobby group:

4. Badge of many colors:

5. Recruiter team:

1. Pictured, Left to Right: Sreemala Pannala, Tanya Jankot, Katy Dickinson, Sudesna Dash, Sonia Leon, Meenakshi Kaul-Basu, Wendy Dow, Margaret Stern

3. Pictured, Left to Right, Top: Margaret Stern, Meenakshi Kaul-Basu, Susan Landau, Sudesna Dash, Tanya Jankot, Katy Dickinson, Left to Right, Bottom: Sonia Leon, Geetha Vallabhaneni, Sreemala Pannala, Radia Perlman

5. Pictured, Left to Right: Faith Harris, Wendy Dow, Kim Smith

Images copyright 2006 Katy Dickinson

ghc2006