Jacqueline Kory-Westlund

More advice!

I collected a lot of good advice from the women at the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing, which I recently attended. I shared what they had to say about undergrads looking ahead to grad school.

This is Part II: applicable to everyone! A lot of it comes from the Imposter Plenary Panel. Those women had good things to say!

1. One of the women on the Imposter Plenary Panel, Fran Berman, emphasized confidence. When you get the opportunity to sit at a table with the most important people in your company or in your field, is sitting there a right, or a privilege? "You'll do best in that room if you think you have a right to be there," said Fran. She said it's a tightrope between who you believe yourself to be and who you want to be in that situation.

2. Yolanda Rankin, another of the women on the Imposter Plenary Panel, said the crux of managing situations is managing relationships with people.

3. Diane Gonzelez, another of the imposter panelists, explained her "Don't ask, don't get" policy. You have to tell people what you want, she said. If you want a promotion, your manager may pass you up until s/he knows you're looking for a promotion. This doesn't just apply to the job market, either. Diane shared a quote from Althea Gibson: "No matter what accomplishments you make, somebody helped you."

4. Fran Berman agreed with Diane Gonzalez: "there is no recognition fairy" who'll come along and give you an award. You must advocate for yourself and your career.

5. From the "How do I become a Researcher?" session: You have more control in academia than you do in industry. In general, anyway, because in industry, divisions get outsourced, proposals and ideas get turned down, and companies get reorganized. Unless you're the one in charge, you don't get as much self-determination.

6. Diane Gonzelez said she has observed a tendency among women: There's a job with ten requirements. A man may look at it, see he has two of the requirements, and apply, claiming that he can do all ten. A woman may have eight, but think, oh gosh, I'm not qualified, I shouldn't apply! Her advice: Don't doubt yourself so much.

7. Fran Berman talked about mistakes. She said, when you make a mistake, "You have to learn from it and don't repeat it... right away."

A lot of advice

Words of wisdom were being traded as often as poken high-fours at the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing, which I recently attended. Academics and professors shared their knowledge of navigating grad school; current grad students explained how not to do what they're doing; women in industry and government labs elucidated how they got there and why they enjoy their jobs.

These are a few nuggets I found to be particularly applicable. This list focuses on advice for current undergrads or early grad students -- I'll be following up soon with a list of more general advice!

1. One of the women on the Imposter Plenary Panel, Fran Berman, said, "You were not born as an undergrad, and you were not born as an intern." The skills you used to get to be an undergrad or intern will help you get to the next step, too - whether that's grad school or your first full-time job.

2. During the "How do I enjoy and succeed in grad school?" session, it was suggested that when investigating grad schools, talk to the students. Ask the students about advisors. How often do you meet? What's it like working with them, writing with them, and writing for them?

3. From the "How do I become a Researcher?" session: If you apply to grad school without knowing exactly what your focus will be, when you write your application essay, pick one thing you're interested in and write about that.. Even if that's not the only thing that interests you. You can change your mind later. The admissions folks are looking passion, interest, and focus.

4. Both the "How do I become a Researcher?" session and the "How do I enjoy and succeed in grad school?" session mentioned the following: When contacting potential grad schools, be conscious of professors' time. Professors are very busy people. Schedule meetings well in advance when visiting their schools. Show you've done your research: read their papers and ask questions about their work. You're not just finding out if these professors want you in their labs - you're finding out if you want to be in their labs! Oh, and if you send your resume to a professor, send it plain text, not as an attachment.

5. Erika Shehan Poole, during the "How do I enjoy and succeed in grad school?" session, suggested that students keep a research journal. Any ideas you have, good or bad - write them down. Questions you have. Later on, when you're planning your thesis (or any other time you need ideas), you can look back. Maybe there's a theme. Maybe some of those idea - even if they sounded dumb at the time - are actually good. Maybe they'll spark new ideas.

6. Duy-Loan T. Le, Thursday's keynote speaker, told all the students in the audience, "If you want to be the top of your class, don't fall in love." This speaks, I think, to the notion that time is finite. You cannot put all your time and energy into your coursework if you also want to put some time and energy into your relationships with the people you care about. As I've oft been told, it's a matter of balance.

Last week, I attended the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing. It was fantastic. Here are my top ten highlights (in an arbitrary order):

1. Everyone's friendliness. We were all in "network!" mode. It was easy to strike up conversations anywhere and everywhere - in line for food, waiting for panels to start, sitting at the same table at breakfast - because we all already had something in common.

1. The schedule in the program. Color-coded, clear, concise. What more could I need? It made figuring out what panels to attend and what rooms to go to remarkably easy. The map helped, too. Better yet, the GHC '10 wiki has notes on many of the talks I had to miss!

2. An unplanned interview. I was chatting with a recruiter about my past research experience, expecting to be directed to the company's careers website if I was interested in applying for a post-graduation job. I was - as expected - but at the end of the conversation, the recruiter asked if I'd have time the next morning for an official interview! My interviewing skills are a little rusty, and as long as I don't change my mind again about taking time off before grad school, I'll definitely be applying for a job at the company. On that note, I should mention:

3. The tabling. Universities, tech companies - I'm their target soon-to-be-graduating-college market, and they were all recruiting. I handed out copies of my resume, signed up for mailing lists, and collected a veritable stack of brochures. I even got to watch one recruiter look over my resume, nod, smile, and say to a fellow recruiter, "No worries here!" (Ego-boosting moment, indeed.)

4. Thursday's keynote speaker. Duy-Loan T. Le, a Senior Fellow at Texas Instruments, spoke brilliantly about the difficulties she has faced (and overcome) as a woman in technology. She focused on camaraderie and cross-gender collaboration, weaving stories from her own life into her counsel. I'm pretty sure members of the audience cried - she was that good of a speaker.

5. The swag. 3 flash drives (4gb total), 5 t-shirts, 21+ writing utensils, tape measures, screwdrivers, lip balm, a pair of Google sunglasses, and some other stuff. How could I not mention all that as a hightlight?

6. Free wireless. It was particularly useful on Friday after the Sponsor Night festivities, when several of my classmates and I needed to ssh into our CS department accounts to work on homework for our AI class.

7. Georgia Tech's HCI and HCC research. I attended Elizabeth Mynatt's introduction to human-centered computing (HCC), in which she presented examples of how current research at the Graphics, Visualization, and Usability (GVU) Center at Georgia Tech enables creativity, wellness, learning, and more. I also showed up to the later panel on new HCI research, which was followed by a field trip to the GVU Center! A large group of us wove our way through Atlanta (the weather was beautiful) over to the research center, where we got to see demos of tons of cool projects. Haptic passive learning, computer programs you can control with your brain, multi-touch tables for manipulating searches and information - very cool stuff!

8. Sponsor Night's pasta. One of the many dishes served at the Sponsor Night buffet was this fantastically delicious squash-stuffed ravioli smothered in creamy alfredo. It was really good. I'd like to find the recipe.

9. Good advice. And lots of it! Being one of the younger women in the crowd, I was in the perfect place for everyone's words of wisdom. Advice on grad school, advice on early careers and job-seeking, advice on interviews, advice on life in general. Stay tuned - I'll relay some of the best nuggets in an upcoming post!

I used to write papers in a very linear fashion.

I remember a paper for my intro cog sci class freshmen year, struggling to compose a decent introductory paragraph. I despaired over my first sentence. Transitions between themes, arguments, and discussions of evidence caused me agony. Even if I had all my research lined up, I couldn't write a later part because I hadn't written the part before it yet! A paper was a series of logical steps: How could I possibly know how best to start a paragraph without knowledge of the sentence prior?

My style has changed dramatically. Now, I write bits and pieces. If I know I'll be including a paragraph summarizing the work of a particular researcher, great, I can write that and have it ready when I need it. I construct bare-bones outlines, filling in details where I think they'll fit, making notes to myself of what need fleshing out and which sections are ready to go. Text gets moved around. Cut-paste. If I don't know how I'm supporting a particular argument yet, I can move on to what I do know and come back to the troublesome bit later. What I write doesn't have to be perfect the first time through.

I don't think know whether my new method saves me time. But I certainly feel more productive: I'm typing, even if I revise previously written paragraphs more frequently. Not expecting my writing to be perfect at the outset means I get more written down, which gives me more material to work with in my later revisions. I'm not staring at the screen, hesitantly trying out possible phrases, becoming the best friend of my "delete" key.

The blinking cursor at the top of a blank page is no longer my perpetual nemesis.

So, the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing is in about a week.

I first attended the conference two years ago, the year the free bookbags were tan-brown canvas, bright poster graphic plastered over the front, black adjustable strap, not enough pockets.

The appearance of the bag is important.

You see, last year, I missed the conference because I was studying abroad in Australia. On a friend's recommendation, my GHC bookbag was the bag I'd taken with me down under for carting notes and texts across campus. My friend said, maybe it'll work as a conversation starter!

The scene: Day Two of international student orientation. The crowd of 18 to 24-year-olds, hailing from every country you can name and probably a few you can't, was in mass exodus from a lecture hall to a large space in the Wentworth building, intrigued by the notion of morning tea. As I was walking across the footbridge to Wentworth, a young woman came up to me.

"Were you in Colorado for the conference this past year?" She pointed to my bag. I couldn't help but grin, of course: there I was, halfway around the globe, and I had a pre-made connection to someone! It turned out we were in the same Number Theory & Cryptography course, too; it was thanks to our six-hour-a-day study marathons that I vanquished the final exam.

A conversation starter, indeed.

Needless to say, I'm looking forward to this year's conference!