Current Events Blog Archive
Posted March 30, 2009 at 7:07 AM in Computing, Current Events, Links | Comments Off
Some of these stories are a few weeks old — sorry, that’s what happens when you go to SXSW!
- ACM Names Barbara Liskov Recipient of the 2008 ACM A.M. Turing Award You had to know I’d be excited about this one! Barbara Liskov is the second female recipient of the award (Fran Allen was the first, in 2006). Dr. Liskov was the first woman to receive a Ph.D. in Computer Science in the United States, and she is given the award “for contributions to practical and theoretical foundations of programming language and system design, especially related to data abstraction, fault tolerance, and distributed computing.” Congratulations, Barbara!
- Computer Science Majors Increase at Most Significant Rate Since Dot Com Boom Good news for the field of computing, however, if you look at the data, the percentage of women has remained the same.
- Psychology of nerding and the joy of reckless tech The topic of taking stuff apart without regard for whether or not it will work when put back together has come up in my life a lot, recently. For example, Mat Schaffer and I gave career day talks to young women last week, and we spoke about doing just this, to see if they have a knack for technology. My recommendation: spend $5 on an old VCR at Goodwill and pull the thing to pieces.
- Code cracker remade Bletchley Park scientists and makers have rebuilt The Bombe — the code cracking machines used to break the Enigma cipher in WWII! Plus, Bletchley Park is in need of saving, so please contribute, if you can.
- Students tie £56 camera to balloon and send it to edge of space to capture stunning images of Earth Now these are the types of projects that high schoolers ought to be doing! (The full set of photos are here.)
- Is Genius Born or Can It Be Learned No answers, but some interesting facts are mentioned.
Posted May 6, 2007 at 1:48 PM in Current Events, Places I Love, Politics, Women! | Comments Off
Despite the fact that all recent evidence pointed to this outcome, I’m still sad to see that Ségolène Royal was not elected as the new French president. I was glad to hear that about 85% of the French people voted, though — that’s huge!
I didn’t follow the election all that closely — though I probably paid more attention than the average American. My French isn’t all that great anymore, but from what I was reading about Mme. Royal’s position and what I thought I understood, I thought she had some great ideas in her 100-point plan.
I wonder what will happen to France as a country with Nicolas Sarkozy at its helm. His plans for changing France have been called “American” and “racist” by some — and for France, that really scares me. I don’t mind him fighting for things like over 35-hour work weeks (because I never could quite understand how anything ever got done in France when there were so few work hours), but it seems to me that he does come across in much the same way that Dubya does — hard-headed and unwilling to change his views in the face of opposition. He’s known for his bad temper. I think he’s kinda scary.
I also can’t help but wonder how this may affect Hillary Clinton as she contends for the Democratic presidential nomination. I’m not yet sure who I’m for in that run-off, but I certainly have a keen eye watching what goes on with her, just to see how she’s treated by the media and how she handles herself. I heard that, in the last French presidential debate, Royal was on the offensive — which Sarkozy called out as being un-presidential. A thinly veiled sexist attack that we’re to see more of in the U.S.? We’ll see soon enough…
Posted February 11, 2007 at 5:09 PM in Bryn Mawr, Current Events, People I Admire, Women! | Comments Off
It’s official! Earlier today, Drew Gilpin Faust (Bryn Mawr ’68) was unanimously confirmed as President of Harvard!
You probably need no reminder, if you’ve heard the news, but she is the first woman to hold this office (as well as “the best candidate”, according to the senior fellow of the Harvard Corporation). As Drew herself said, “I’m not the woman president of Harvard. I’m the president of Harvard.”
CNN has the AP story, and the Harvard newspaper, The Crimson, live-blogged the announcement.
Also, don’t miss Bryn Mawr’s write-up and Drew’s 2001 Commencement speech.
Posted September 18, 2006 at 9:03 AM in Current Events, Women! | Comments Off
Anousheh Ansari, the first female space “tourist” (after 6 months of training, I think one’s a little more than a tourist), is now in orbit. Hooray! She’ll be blogging from space, so you can follow her adventures and imagine yourself in space.
Posted July 10, 2006 at 11:27 PM in Current Events, Just Sayin, Pro-Choice, Women! | Comments Off
Rebekah E. Gee, M.D. and M.P.H., has written a piece for the New England Journal of Medicine, Plan B, Reproductive Rights, and Physician Activism. It’s well worth a read! Here’s my favorite bit:
Our government has been burying its head in the sand, pretending that sex does not happen. This agenda sets women back decades, threatening their right to achieve equally in society by robbing them of options for planning their childbearing.
Hi, my name is Kimberly Blessing. I'm a computer scientist, Web developer, standards evangelist, feminist, and geek. This is where I write about life, the Web, technology, women's issues, and whatever else comes to mind.
