Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing
Encyclopedia
The Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing (GHC) is a series of conferences designed to bring the research and career interests of women in computing to the forefront. It is the world’s largest gathering of women in computing. The Grace Hopper Celebration is presented by the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology
and the Association for Computing Machinery
. The 2011 conference will be held in Portland, Oregon.
and Telle Whitney founded the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing. With the initial idea of creating a conference by and for women computer scientists, Borg and Whitney met over dinner, with a blank sheet of paper, having no idea how to start a conference, and started to plan out their vision. The first Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing was held in Washington, D.C., in June 1994, and brought together 500 technical women. Ten conferences have been held from 1994 to the present; the second was held in 1997 and the conference has been held annually since 2006. The sold-out 2010 conference attracted 2,147 attendees from 29 countries. Beginning in 2011, the conference will be held in a convention center to accommodate its growing size.
2010 featured tracks on Open Source and Human-Computer Interaction. The Technical Theme Track for 2011 will focus on Large Scale Computing.
, Carol Bartz
, Duy-Loan Le
, Maria Klawe
, Frances E. Allen
, Mary Lou Jepsen
, Barbara Jane Liskov, Susan Landau
, Jennifer Mankoff
, Susan L. Graham
, and Fernanda Viegas
. Speaker presentations are available to watch online after the conference.
Student Research Competition (SRC) at the Grace Hopper Celebration, the largest SRC of any technical conference.
, BlogHer
, and Elaine Weyuker
.
’s Committee on the Status of Women in Computing Research (CRA-W) sponsors a series of sessions at the Grace Hopper Celebration aimed at undergraduates, graduates, and early career researchers. Sessions cover topics such as applying to graduate school, publishing papers, networking, work-life balance, and more.
, Google
, and Symantec.
Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology
The Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology is a nonprofit organization founded by computer scientist Anita Borg. The institute’s primary aim is to recruit, retain, and advance women in technology. The institute’s most prominent program is the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing...
and the Association for Computing Machinery
Association for Computing Machinery
The Association for Computing Machinery is a learned society for computing. It was founded in 1947 as the world's first scientific and educational computing society. Its membership is more than 92,000 as of 2009...
. The 2011 conference will be held in Portland, Oregon.
History
In 1994, Anita BorgAnita Borg
Anita Borg was an American computer scientist. She founded the Institute for Women and Technology and the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing. She was born Anita Borg Naffz in Chicago, Illinois...
and Telle Whitney founded the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing. With the initial idea of creating a conference by and for women computer scientists, Borg and Whitney met over dinner, with a blank sheet of paper, having no idea how to start a conference, and started to plan out their vision. The first Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing was held in Washington, D.C., in June 1994, and brought together 500 technical women. Ten conferences have been held from 1994 to the present; the second was held in 1997 and the conference has been held annually since 2006. The sold-out 2010 conference attracted 2,147 attendees from 29 countries. Beginning in 2011, the conference will be held in a convention center to accommodate its growing size.
Conference Structure
The Grace Hopper Celebration consists of a combination of technical sessions and career sessions and includes a poster session, career fair, awards ceremony, and more. The conference features 650 presenters. Potential presenters submit proposals for panels, workshops, presentations, Birds of a Feather sessions, New Investigators papers, PhD Forum, and Poster Session, including ACM Student Research Competition.Tracks
The Grace Hopper Celebration features 10 tracks:- Invited Technical Speakers Track
- Academic Track
- Industry Track
- Technical Track
- Conference Theme Track
- Student Track
- Career Track
- Steering Committee/Award Winners Track
- Technical Theme Track
- Birds of a Feather Sessions
2010 featured tracks on Open Source and Human-Computer Interaction. The Technical Theme Track for 2011 will focus on Large Scale Computing.
Speakers
The Grace Hopper Celebration features prominent women in technology as Keynote Speakers, Plenary Session Panelists, and Invited Technical Speakers. Speakers have included: Sheryl Sandberg, Shirley JacksonShirley Jackson
Shirley Jackson was an American author. A popular writer in her time, her work has received increasing attention from literary critics in recent years...
, Carol Bartz
Carol Bartz
Carol Ann Bartz is an American business executive, the former president and CEO of the Internet services company Yahoo!, and former chairman, president, and CEO at architectural and engineering design software company Autodesk....
, Duy-Loan Le
Duy-Loan Le
Duy-Loan T. Le is an engineer and the first woman and Asian to get elected to the rank of Texas Instruments Senior Fellow.-Early life:Born in Saigon, South Vietnam, in 1962, to a Vietnamese-Muslim family , she fled to the U.S...
, Maria Klawe
Maria Klawe
Maria M. Klawe is a computer scientist and the fifth president of Harvey Mudd College . Although born in Toronto in 1951, she became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 2009. She was previously Dean of the School of Engineering and Applied Science at Princeton University.-Biography:Klawe was born in...
, Frances E. Allen
Frances E. Allen
Frances Elizabeth "Fran" Allen is an American computer scientist and pioneer in the field of optimizing compilers. Her achievements include seminal work in compilers, code optimization, and parallelization...
, Mary Lou Jepsen
Mary Lou Jepsen
Mary Lou Jepsen is founder and CEO of Pixel Qi, a manufacturer of low-cost, low-power LCD screens for laptops. She was the first chief technology officer of One Laptop per Child .- Early life and education :...
, Barbara Jane Liskov, Susan Landau
Susan Landau
Susan Landau is an American mathematician and engineer, as of 2011, a Visiting Scholar at the Computer Science Department, Harvard University....
, Jennifer Mankoff
Jennifer Mankoff
Jennifer Mankoff is an associate professor in the Human-Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie Mellon University, where she joined the faculty in 2004.-Early life and education:She earned her B.A. at Oberlin College and her Ph.D...
, Susan L. Graham
Susan L. Graham
Susan L. Graham is a computer scientist. Graham is the Pehong Chen Distinguished Professor in the Computer Science Division of the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences at the University of California, Berkeley...
, and Fernanda Viegas
Fernanda Viégas
Fernanda Bertini Viégas is a Brazilian scientist and designer whose work focuses on the social, collaborative, and artistic aspects of information visualization. Viégas received a Ph.D. in Media Arts and Sciences from the MIT Media Lab in 2005. The same year she began work at the Cambridge location...
. Speaker presentations are available to watch online after the conference.
Poster Session and ACM Student Research Competition
The Grace Hopper Celebration features one of the largest technical poster sessions of any conference, with over 175 posters. Presenters can choose to have their posters considered for the ACMAssociation for Computing Machinery
The Association for Computing Machinery is a learned society for computing. It was founded in 1947 as the world's first scientific and educational computing society. Its membership is more than 92,000 as of 2009...
Student Research Competition (SRC) at the Grace Hopper Celebration, the largest SRC of any technical conference.
Awards
Several awards are presented at the Grace Hopper Celebration to recognize technical women and those who support them, including the Anita Borg Social Impact Award and Anita Borg Technical Leadership Award. The Denice Denton Emerging Leader Award recognizes a non-tenured faculty member for leadership, and the Anita Borg Change Agent Awards recognize technical women in developing countries. In 2011, the first A. Richard Newton Educator Award will recognize teaching practices that attract girls and women into STEM fields. Past awards winners have included Ruzena BajcsyRuzena Bajcsy
Ružena Bajcsy is an American computer scientist who specializes in robotics. She is Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the University of California, Berkeley,, where she is also Director Emerita of CITRIS .She was previously Professor of Computer Science and Engineering at...
, BlogHer
BlogHer
BlogHer refers to a group blog and online community, and to an annual blogging conference for women. Three of the 2005 conference organizers, , , and , began a company, Blogher LLC, which in 2006 also began a blog ad network...
, and Elaine Weyuker
Elaine Weyuker
Elaine J. Weyuker is an ACM Fellow, an IEEE Fellow , and an AT&T Fellow at Bell Labs for research in software metrics and testing as well as elected to the National Academy of Engineering. She is the author of over 130 papers in journals and refereed conference proceedings.Weyuker received a Ph.D....
.
CRA-W Career Mentoring Workshops
The Computing Research AssociationComputing Research Association
The Computing Research Association is an association of more than 220 North American academic departments of computer science, computer engineering, and related fields; laboratories and centers in industry, government, and academia engaging in basic computing research; and affiliated professional...
’s Committee on the Status of Women in Computing Research (CRA-W) sponsors a series of sessions at the Grace Hopper Celebration aimed at undergraduates, graduates, and early career researchers. Sessions cover topics such as applying to graduate school, publishing papers, networking, work-life balance, and more.
K-12 Computing Teachers Workshop
Hosted by the Computer Science Teachers Association and the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology, the K-12 Computing Teachers Workshop is a two-day event for K-12 teachers, covering challenges and ways to involve more girls in computer science. The workshop began in 2009, attracting more than 650 applications its first year.Technical Executive Forum
Begun in 2007, the Technical Executive Forum convenes high-level technology executives to discuss challenges and share solutions for recruiting, retaining, and advancing technical women. In 2010, 65 executives attended the event, from companies including MicrosoftMicrosoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
Google
Google Inc. is an American multinational public corporation invested in Internet search, cloud computing, and advertising technologies. Google hosts and develops a number of Internet-based services and products, and generates profit primarily from advertising through its AdWords program...
, and Symantec.
Senior Women’s Summit
The Senior Women’s Summit is a one-day event held at the Grace Hopper Celebration, that brings together senior-level women to discuss issues facing senior technical women and provide a learning and networking platform.Grace Hopper Open Source Day
In 2011, the Grace Hopper Celebration will hold its first Open Source Day. One-day registration is open to the public and included for all conference attendees. The event will include a codeathon, skill-building workshop, and exhibition space featuring open source projects.Career Fair
The Grace Hopper Celebration features a career fair with over 70 high-tech companies, government labs, and universities.Affinity Breakfasts, Lunches, and Receptions
A variety of lunches and receptions for specific affinity groups, with a focus on underrepresented groups, are held at the Grace Hopper Celebration. These include:- Black Women in Computing Breakfast
- Junior Faculty Lunch
- Latinas in Computing Lunch
- Latinas in Computing Reception
- LGBT Lunch
- ResearcHers Lunch
- Senior Faculty Lunch
- Scholarship Recipients Lunch
- Speaker Appreciation Breakfasts
- Systers lunch
- Women of Color Lunch
Scholarships
Students make up approximately half of the attendees at the Grace Hopper Celebration. The Anita Borg Institute offers scholarships to undergraduate and graduate students to attend the conference. In 2010, 321 scholarships were awarded.Childcare and Nursing Mothers Room
The Grace Hopper Celebration offers free childcare to all attendees, as well as an on-site Nursing Mothers Room.List of Grace Hopper Celebrations
Past and future Grace Hopper Celebrations include:| Year | Location | Theme | Date | Links |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2011 | Portland, Oregon Portland, Oregon Portland is a city located in the Pacific Northwest, near the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers in the U.S. state of Oregon. As of the 2010 Census, it had a population of 583,776, making it the 29th most populous city in the United States... |
“What If…?” | November 9 – 12 | Website |
| 2010 | Atlanta, Georgia Atlanta, Georgia Atlanta is the capital and most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia. According to the 2010 census, Atlanta's population is 420,003. Atlanta is the cultural and economic center of the Atlanta metropolitan area, which is home to 5,268,860 people and is the ninth largest metropolitan area in... |
“Collaborating Across Boundaries” | Sep. 28 – Oct. 2 | Website |
| 2009 | Tucson, Arizona Tucson, Arizona Tucson is a city in and the county seat of Pima County, Arizona, United States. The city is located 118 miles southeast of Phoenix and 60 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border. The 2010 United States Census puts the city's population at 520,116 with a metropolitan area population at 1,020,200... |
“Creating Technology for Social Good” | Sep. 30 – Oct. 3 | Website |
| 2008 | Keystone, Colorado Keystone, Colorado Keystone is a census-designated place in Summit County, Colorado, United States. The population was 825 at the 2000 census. The Dillon Post Office serves Keystone postal addresses.... |
“We Build a Better World” | Oct. 1 – 4 | Website |
| 2007 | Orlando, Florida Orlando, Florida Orlando is a city in the central region of the U.S. state of Florida. It is the county seat of Orange County, and the center of the Greater Orlando metropolitan area. According to the 2010 US Census, the city had a population of 238,300, making Orlando the 79th largest city in the United States... |
“I Invent the Future” | Oct. 17 – 20 | Website |
| 2006 | San Diego, California San Diego, California San Diego is the eighth-largest city in the United States and second-largest city in California. The city is located on the coast of the Pacific Ocean in Southern California, immediately adjacent to the Mexican border. The birthplace of California, San Diego is known for its mild year-round... |
“Making Waves” | Oct. 3 – 7 | Website |
| 2004 | Chicago, Illinois | “Making History” | Oct. 6 – 9 | Website |
| 2002 | Vancouver, Canada | “Ubiquity” | Oct. 9 – 12 | |
| 2000 | Hyannis, Massachusetts Hyannis, Massachusetts Hyannis is the largest of seven villages in Barnstable, Massachusetts. Also it is the commercial and transportation hub of Cape Cod and was designated an urban area as a result of the 1990 census. Because of this, many refer to Hyannis as the "Capital of the Cape"... |
“Interconnections” | Sep. 14 – 16 | |
| 1997 | San Jose, California San Jose, California San Jose is the third-largest city in California, the tenth-largest in the U.S., and the county seat of Santa Clara County which is located at the southern end of San Francisco Bay... |
Sep. 19 - 21 | ||
| 1994 | Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution.... |
June 9–11 | ||