“Women are both talented and innovative thinkers and tend to use computer science as a tool to solve larger problems.” — Kimberly Bryant, electrical engineer and founder of the Black Girls Code (a course that teaches basic programming concepts to black girls)

The Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar understands that girls and women holding the leadership positions and collaborating on teams in science and technology, in the present times, have an extraordinarily positive impact on the growth and development of a nation. Hence, the Institute is an active promoter of educating them in a manner that they can confidently take the initiative and step-up to conquer diverse domains of automation.

Working in this direction, IITGN will collaborate with the Association for Computing Machinery’s Council on Women in Computing (ACM-W) on 14th February 2020 to organize the ACM-W India Event on Women in Computer Science and Research. Co-located with IRISS (13th and 14th February 2020) and the ACM India Annual Event (15th February 2020), it will feature several engaging sessions highlighting the research opportunities for women in the field of Computer Science.

Recently, Apeksha Srivastava had an interaction with Heena Timani, Chairperson of ACM-W India, about this event.

Starting with the basics, what is the purpose of ACM-W?

The objective of ACM-W is to celebrate, support, and advocate for the effective engagement of women in computing internationally. It facilitates the academic and professional journey of girls and women in the branch of computing through mentoring. Together with the ACM community of computer scientists, teachers, employers, and policy-makers, it seeks to improve learning and working environments for females. 

With 36,000+ members and 25+ events annually, it strives to strengthen and enhance the contributions of technical women across the globe. The ACM-W team believes that the connection of professional women with ACM-W will be a great source of social and professional support for them as well as future generations.

ACM-W India aims to steer forward this task of the ACM and ACM-W communities with a particular focus on the empowerment of girls and women in the areas of computing in India. Its activities include facilitation of the technological growth of women by organizing invited seminars, lectures, workshops, and meetings, hence providing platforms for sharing information, ideas, resources, and experiences. It supports females in their career growth, helps them to face the hurdles of their work environment, and encourages them to participate in studies and research related to computing.

What is the goal of the upcoming ACM-W India event happening at IIT Gandhinagar?

The ACM-W India Event on ‘Women in Computer Science and Research’ at IIT Gandhinagar focuses on bringing unique opportunities for academia and industry through collective learning and interacting with experts and peers. This one-day event houses several intellectually enriching education and research possibilities for girls and women students and professionals in the ever-growing field of computer science.

Who is the target audience of this event?

This event is open to all the faculties, students, and industry people, but the primary target audience is the females.

What are you hoping to achieve from it?

Through this event, we intend to spread awareness about the current research fields and different schemes, especially for women, under the banner of ACM India.

An informative panel discussion, titled Opportunities in Higher Education and Research for Women, and a thought-provoking session highlighting the exciting career paths in three different categories, viz., research, academia, and industry will be the main attractions of this event.

 

Who will be some of the speakers during this event?

The event will host a keynote lecture from Dr. Cherri M Pancake, current President of ACM (Professor Emeritus Oregon State University and Director of Northwest Alliance for Computational Science and Engineering). We will also have invited talks from Dr. Lipika Dey (on Data Analytics), Principal Scientist in TCS Innovation, and Dr. Kalika Bali (on Building Technologies for Low Resource Language), Principal Researcher in Microsoft Research Lab, India. Apart from this, there will be sessions from Dr. Meenakshi D’Souza (Associate Professor, IIIT Bangalore), Dr. Joycee M Mekie (Assistant Professor, Electrical Engineering, IITGN), Dr. Arati M. Dixit (Senior Scientist at ARA, Raleigh and Teaching Associate Professor, ECE Department, NC State University, USA ), Dr. Nutan Limaye (Associate Professor, IIT Bombay) and Dr. Chitra Babu (Professor and HOD, SSN College, Chennai), to name a few.

“There are so many exciting things going on in the computer industry, that if you have an idea, a dream, something that you want to do, then just go for it.” — Stephanie Shirley, information technology pioneer, businesswoman, philanthropist, and founder of a software company in 1962 staffed entirely by women