Do you remember those 4 brave, little, black kindergarten girls who were the first to attend a desegregated school? This is one of those girls, Leona Tate. She went to kindergarten accompanied by US Marshalls. She said the first year and a half wasn’t bad. Her family never let her feel like they were afraid, […]
Meeting someone who made history as part of desegregation Read More »
I’ve spent a lot of time over the past few weeks talking about why we have so few women in open source and web development and how to encourage more women to join. (I even got to spend an awesome afternoon with a bunch of girls. I was supposed to be mentoring them but they
The secret to my success in a field of men? All my friends. My guy friends. Read More »
In 2003 I gave a talk in Malaysia. What I noticed immediately is that my audience was well over half women. This was really noticeable because they were all wearing brightly colored hijabs. Usually I scan the room and count how many women I can find – usually on my fingers even in a room
How does Malaysia encourage so many women in software? Read More »
The GNOME community is extremely diverse when it comes to nationality. But we don’t have many women working on GNOME. We want to make sure that women interested in working on GNOME know they are welcome, so we have announced the GNOME Outreach Program for Women! The goal is to encourage women to participate in
More Women in GNOME Now! Read More »
Chris pointed me at this cartoon as a comment to my It’s not about not offending post and I keep finding myself looking at it. I almost always feel like I’m representing a group – if not more than one group. When we lived in Alaska, I represented Caucasians. When we lived in Spain, I
Who do you represent? Read More »
When talking about women in free software or political correctness in general, we seem to focus on saying things that “don’t offend” the minority group. But that’s not what it’s about. It’s about saying things that encourage people to join your group, that send the right message and represent our values. While not saying things
It’s not about not offending Read More »
One of the most common questions I get asked, right after “What do you do?”, is “What does the GNOME Foundation do?” I wrote an article explaining what the GNOME Foundation does in the current issue of OSBR, Women in Open Source, guest edited by Rikki Kite. (And there are some really good articles by
The GNOME Foundation Is All About People Read More »
I didn’t see Danese Cooper‘s talk "Why Whinging Doesn’t Work" but the title has really been bothering me. I almost titled this post "stop telling me to stop whining!" I should start by saying I have never complained about my career in technology. (And I’m sure Danese wasn’t thinking about me personally when she wrote
Imagine twice as many developers Read More »
One of the things I’m passionate about is encouraging women in technology. With that in mind, I’m going to talk about something that’s never discussed in mixed company: crying at work. Or rather, trying desperately not to cry at work. I’ll tell you how I try not to cry at work and I’ll tell you
Learning not to cry in today’s work place Read More »