Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing

History

In 1994, Anita Borg 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. More than a dozen 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 has been 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:

2010 featured tracks on Open Source and Human-Computer Interaction. The Technical Theme Track for 2011 focused 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 Jackson, Carol Bartz, Duy-Loan Le, Maria Klawe, Frances E. Allen, Mary Lou Jepsen, Barbara Liskov, Susan Landau, Jennifer Mankoff, Susan L. Graham, and Fernanda Viegas. 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 ACM 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 Bajcsy, BlogHer, Elaine Weyuker and Unoma Okorafor.

CRA-W Career Mentoring Workshops

The Computing Research Association’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 Microsoft, Google, 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

Grace Hopper Open Source Day was held for the first time in 2011. One-day registration is open to the public and included for all conference attendees. The event includes a codeathon, skill-building workshop, and exhibition space featuring open source projects.

Participating organizations have included Google Crisis Response, Mozilla, Sahana Software Foundation, The Women’s Peer-to-Peer Network, Open Data Kit, Microsoft Disaster Response, OpenHatch, Wikimedia Foundation, E-Democracy, Systers, WordPress and OpenStack.

Career Fair

The Grace Hopper Celebration features a career fair with over 70 high-tech companies, government labs, and universities.

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: