Katy Dickinson

Sun @ Grace Hopper Conference 2009 (GHC09)

Sun is again a Platinum Sponsor of the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing (GHC09). "Hopper" is an annual conference designed to bring the research and career interests of women in computing to the forefront. The conference is presented by the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology (ABI) and the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM). This year's conference is almost sold out even though it does not start until 30 September, 2009 in Tucson, Arizona. Sun is honored to have fifteen invited speakers, presenters, panelists, posters, and birds-of-a-feature session leaders this year!

Thanks to Sun's CTO Greg Papadopoulos for his long-term support of the Hopper Conference and the Anita Borg Institute! (Greg is an ABI Trustee-Emeritus.) Thanks also to the Women-West@Sun (particularly Susan Miller) for funding Sun's 2009 GHC Platinum Sponsorship!

Why go to Hopper?

1. Professional education, celebration, and excitement
2. Networking (with Sun and non-Sun attendees) and Visibility
3. Recruiting (University and Professional)

Sun's Giveaways and Images for Hopper 2009

• Sun GHC 2009 Advertisement/Program and Poster Image
  
  Thanks to Margaret Nguyen for her work on this! There will be a poster version of this image at Sun's exhibit hall table.
• Sun Women in Engineering Tshirt, cloth is espresso (dark brown)

Sun's shirt front, with correct colors

Sun's shirt back, colors will be blue and green

• Sun Women in Engineering Water Bottle (in every conference attendee's bag)


• Distributing 100 copies of Greg's new book Citizen Engineer: A Handbok for Socially Responsible Engineering, (fifty copies at a book signing after his 1 October talk, fifty at the Sun exhibit hall table)
  
• We have borrowed a black Sun logo table cloth from University Relations. They are also generously sending some tshirts and pens.
• Distributing copies of two Sun Labs Technical Reports:
  "Sun Mentoring: 1996-2009" (2009, by Katy Dickinson, Tanya Jankot, and Helen Gracon)
  "Technology and Courage" (1996, Ivan Sutherland)
• OpenSolaris standing banner for Sun's exhibit hall table.

Sun's Schedule at Hopper 2009

• Wednesday, 30 September
  7 pm - Ania Pavilion, Poster Session, during the Opening Reception (featuring 4 Sun posters)
  - "3D Collaborative Environments for Social Good" poster by Gilda Garreton and Nicole Yankelovich
  - "Designing for the 100+ Year Archive" poster by Cathleen Wharton
  - "Formal verification on leading edge microprocessor design" poster by Catherine Ahlschlager
  - Video blogging poster by Deirdre Straughan


• Thursday, 1 October
  10 am - Tucson A - "Citizen Engineer - Become One" talk by Greg Papadopoulos with Sophie Vanderbroek (Xerox CTO) - book signing after the talk
  10 am - PW4 - Tucson E, "Developing sustainable technologies for an improved future" (Sudesna Dash, panelist)
  11:15 am - PW6 - San Pedro 1-2, "The Value of Awards and How to Get Them" (Katy Dickinson, panelist)
  11:15 am - PW9 - Tucson F, "Women and the Flat Connected World" (Meenakshi Kaul-Basu and Sumitha Prashant, panelists)
  3:15 pm - PW13 - Tucson E, "Open Source Community Development" (Valerie Fenwick and Teresa Giacomini, panelists)


• Friday, 2 October
  10 am - PW18 - San Pedro 1-2, "From Spec. to Silicon: Performance Benchmarking through the Lifecycle of Chip Development" (Manisha Hardikar presenter)
  10 am - PW17 - Starr Circle Pavilion, "Technical Mentorship and Sponsorship: Why You Need It and How to Find It" (Cathleen Wharton, panelist)
  11:15 am - 12:15 pm Starr Circle Pavilion "The Software Soul: Maximizing Profitability by Unleashing the Spirit of Software Teams" (Meenakshi Kaul-Basu, panelist)
  1:45 pm - IT6 - San Luis 1-2, Susan Landau invited talk "Bits and Bites: Explaining Communications Security (and Insecurity) in Washington and Brussels"
  1:45 pm - PW26 - Tucson E, "Solving the Two Body Problem: Creating Technology While Maintaining Your Social Life" (Katy Dickinson, panelist)
  5:30 pm - BOF9 - San Pedro 1-2, "Speed Mentoring for Latinas in Computing" (with Gilda Garreton)

Images Copyright 2006-2009 by Katy Dickinson and Sun Microsystems

Posted at 03:51PM Sep 17, 2009 by katysblog in Hopper - Anita Borg Institute  |  Comments[2]

New Willow Glen Lion's Club

My husband, John Plocher, and I recently joined the new San Jose - Willow Glen Lions Club. With 45,000 clubs and 1.3 million members, Lions is the world's largest service club organization. Our new club started officially on 17 August and our charter night and party will be on 24 October. We have over thirty members already. I was elected Club Secretary. John and I are enjoying meeting and working with members of our local community.

Club Leaders

Willow Glen Lions Club Meeting

Recycling Eyeglasses

Images Copyright 2009 by Katy Dickinson

Posted at 01:55PM Sep 17, 2009 by katysblog in News & Reviews  | 

Last Back to School Night

My son Paul is a Senior at Paly (Palo Alto High School) this year. I went to our final "Back to School" parents' night last week. Starting at 6:45 pm on 10 September, I followed Paul's daily schedule, managed to find all of his classrooms (crisscrossing the big campus as it grew dark), and talked with all of his teachers.

Paul is happy to be taking Geology, Advanced Sculpture, and Algebra-2 all year. He was surprised at how much he is also enjoying his semester-long Living Skills and Economics classes. Next semester, Economics is replaced by Sociology/History, and Living Skills is replaced by World Literature. Paul also has a Study Skills period so that he gets regular support for his learning disabilities. Paul is enjoying being the big guy in most of his classes this year, both as a Senior and because he stands almost six feet tall.

During the last three-plus years, we have found Paly to be either a good college preparatory school or a good school to support teens with physical and learning disabilities. Paly seems to do much less well teaching and supporting average kids. My family's struggles with Paly have often been because Paul is in two groups which have no provision for overlap: he is intelligent and college-bound, and he has disabilities. Paly has good classes and services for one group or the other. Paly teachers are often excellent but we have also run into some who have minimal abilities (or desire) to support disabled students, despite our Individualized Education Program (IEP).

I observe that Palo Alto Unified School District (PAUSD) teachers and administrators are under growing stress from overcrowded aging facilities plus social problems such as the increasing number of High School suicides in Palo Alto. We will leave Paly in June with mixed feelings.

Images Copyright 2009 by Katy Dickinson

Posted at 12:29PM Sep 17, 2009 by katysblog in Home & Family  |