Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland 20771

ENGINEERING COLLOQUIUM

Monday, September 26, 2005 / 3:30 PM, Building 3 Auditorium

Postponed due to conflict with Administrator Griffin's talk. We will announce a new date as soon as we have one.

Dr. Maria Klawe

"Attracting and Retaining Women in Engineering "

ABSTRACT -- After steadily increasing for two decades, the percentage of women receiving bachelors degrees in engineering has remained at about 20% for several years. In some fields such as chemical engineering and bioengineering the percentage is at or above 50%. In others, such as mechanical, computer and electrical engineering the percentage is under 15%. What accounts for these differences? Does it matter? What can we do to change things?

SPEAKER -- Dr. Maria Klawe is currently Dean of Engineering and a professor of Computer Science at Princeton University. She moved to Princeton in January 2003 from the University of British Columbia where she served as Dean of Science from 1998 to 2002, Vice-President of Student and Academic Services from 1995 to 1998, and Head of the Department of Computer Science from 1988 to 1995. Prior to UBC, Maria spent eight years with IBM Research in California, and two years at the University of Toronto. She received her Ph.D. (1977) and B.Sc. (1973) in Mathematics from the University of Alberta.

Dr. Klawe is Past President of the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM) in New York, Chair of the Board of Trustees of the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology in Palo Alto, and a Trustee of the Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics in Los Angeles and the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute in Berkeley. She was one of the founders and is currently Chair of the Board of Silicon Chalk, a Vancouver-based company producing software to support interactive learning and collaboration in classes where each student has a wirelessly communicating laptop computer (see www.siliconchalk.com).

In the past Dr. Klawe has held leadership positions in the American Mathematical Society, the Computing Research Association, the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, and the Canadian Mathematical Society. Maria was elected as a Fellow of the Association of Computing Machinery in 1995. Other awards include Vancouver YWCA Women of Distinction Award in Science and Technology (1997), Wired Woman Pioneer (2001), Canadian New Media Educator of the Year (2001), BC Science Council Champion of the Year (2001), University of Alberta Distinguished Alumna (2003), Nico Habermann Award (2004), and honorary doctorates from Dalhousie University (2004), Queen's University (2004), the University of Waterloo (2003), and Ryerson University (2001).