The Canadian Celebration of Women in Computing was held in Ottawa this past weekend. The conference, originally the Ontario Celebration of Women in Computing, began at Queen’s in 2010, and went national this year. Wendy Powley of the Queen’s School of Computing reported the following:
“Close to 80 undergraduate and graduate students from the School of Computing attended the Canadian Celebration of Women in Computing (CAN-CWiC) 2016 conference in Ottawa this past weekend. This conference represents an amalgamation of three past ACM-W Regional Celebration events; the Ontario Celebration of Women in Computing (started by the Queen’s School of Computing in 2010, held by different universities each of the following 4 years), the Atlantic Celebration of Women in Computing (held in 2012 organized by Dr. Laurie Ricker, a School of Computing grad) and the Pacific Northwest Celebration of Women in Computing (held in 2014 by UBC).
CAN-CWiC was attended by more than 500 delegates from nine Canadian provinces. In addition to the 80 QSC students that traveled together from Kingston the CAN-CWiC buses, there were numerous QSC alumni present representing the various companies and universities where they now work. The Queen’s presence was clearly visible (and audible!!).
Dr. Amber Simpson, a QSC graduate (now at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in NYC) gave an interesting talk on Medical Computing. Alumnus Dr. Kelly Lyons (now a professor at U of T) inspired attendees young and not-as-young as a panelist on the concluding panel entitled “A Day in the Life of Women in Computing”. Wendy Powley, the conference founder, was a key organizer along with the Conference Chair, Dr. Catherine Mavriplis from the University of Ottawa. Debby Robertson was on hand to speak with potential graduate students at the career fair. Suchita Ganesan presented her research work in the Graduate Forum and tied for second prize. Congratulations, Suchita!
A great blog by Caleigh Minshall provides a student’s insight into the conference activities.
A huge thank you to all of our enthusiastic participants and to the QSC for sponsoring the conference in order to make it possible for so many of us to attend!”
~Wendy Powley