Today is Ada Lovelace Day, a day that encourages all of us to celebrate the achievements of women in technology and science. I’ve been very lucky in the last few weeks to interview all three of our Anita Borg Institute Women of Vision Award Winners. All three have incredible technical achievements that everyone is celebrating. Our three winners are Kristina M. Johnson, Under Secretary for Energy; Lila Ibrahim, General Manager, Emerging Markets Platform Group, Intel Corporation; and Kathleen R. McKeown, Henry and Gertrude Rothschild Professor of Computer Science, Columbia University
What I discovered interviewing them is that, while their areas are very divergent, all three share a passion for innovation and a willingness to take risk and break new ground in their work. In addition, all three have worked actively to increase the number of women in technology. While not everyone can create groundbreaking innovation, all of us can work together to reach out to girls and women in technology to encourage them and support their pursuit of a technical career.
Here are their bios:
Kristina M. Johnson Under Secretary for Energy, Department of Energy
Kristina M. Johnson is the Women of Vision Award winner in the Leadership category. Kristina Johnson is recognized for her work as both Under Secretary of Energy and as an academic. Kristina Johnson was the first woman to receive the Fritz Medal, considered the highest award in the engineering profession. As Under Secretary of Energy, Kristina Johnson is responsible for developing and coordinating a strategic portfolio approach across energy technologies to reduce green house gas emissions, and grow the clean energy economy.. Before serving as Provost of Johns Hopkins University, Kristina Johnson was Dean of Duke University’s Pratt School of Engineering where she significantly expanded the School including overseeing the planning, funding and construction of the 322,000-square-foot Fitzpatrick Center for Interdisciplinary Engineering, Medicine and Applied Sciences. Kristina Johnson’s research has resulted in 129 US and International Patents and 140 refereed papers.
Kathleen R. McKeown, Henry and Gertrude Rothschild Professor of Computer Science, Columbia University
Kathleen R. McKeown is the Women of Vision Award winner in the Innovation category. Kathleen McKeown has made seminal contributions to the natural language processing (NLP) area, also called Computational Linguistics (CL), within the general areas of artificial intelligence, information extraction, and human machine interaction. More specifically, McKeown has made pioneering contributions to natural language generation; this field of research focuses on enabling computers to effectively utilize natural language.
Lila Ibrahim, General Manager, Emerging Markets Platform Group, Intel Corporation
Lila Ibrahim is the Women of Vision Award winner in the Social Impact category. Ibrahim is responsible for leading the research, definition, development, and marketing of technologies that are specifically designed for education worldwide. The Emerging Markets Platform Group operates as a social enterprise responsible for pioneering new markets and business models while having a positive impact on sustainable economic development. Previously, she served as Chief of Staff to Intel Chairman Craig Barrett where she led the Digital Village Initiative to deliver technology projects which advanced Education, Health, and e-Governance from the Amazon to Africa. Lila Ibrahim also established two computer facilities at the Druze Orphanage in Abey, Lebanon.
I encourage everyone to come hear their stories in person at the Anita Borg Institute’s Women of Vision Awards on May 12, 2010.