October 4-6, IDEAS representatives accompanied The Graduate School (TGS) of Northwestern to the 2017 Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing.  The Grace Hopper Celebration is the world’s largest gathering of women technologists, and it was an honor and a thrill to be able to participate. The conference is produced by AnitaB.Org and presented in partnership with the Association for Computing Machinery.

Attending Grace Hopper allowed trainees Alice Lucas, Niharika Sravan, Vicky Yang, and Neda Rohani to network with professionals in the fields of data science, and many others, while also spreading word of IDEAS to undergraduates who are considering a future in data-driven work.

Michelle Paulsen, IDEAS’ program director accompanied the trainees alongside TGS representative, Michelle Williams, and monitored a Northwestern booth at the conference.  The group made many wonderful connections with experts in their fields, and with excited possible future IDEAS participants!