Ms. Jana Makar1, Ms. Aditi Subramanya2, Ms. Emily Barker3
1New Zealand eScience Infrastructure (NeSI), Auckland, New Zealand, 2Pawsey Supercomputing Research Centre, Perth, Australia, 3University of Western Australia, Perth, Australia
Biography:
Aditi Subramanya, Pawsey Supercomputing Research Centre. Based at the Pawsey Supercomputing Centre, Aditi is a communicator in the digital world. Aditi loves tech and is passionate about creating diverse, inclusive mindsets and cultures. Aditi’s goal is to break global barriers to create fair opportunities for all.
Emily Barker, University of Western Australia. Emily has been passionate about creating diversity in STEM fields since her undergraduate studies in science almost 15 years ago. Recently moving into the HPC team at the University of Western Australia, she discovered WHPC and is excited about finding new avenues to promote the field to underrepresented groups and create a comfortable space for people from all backgrounds.
Jana Makar, New Zealand eScience Infrastructure (NeSI). Based at the University of Auckland, Jana is the Communications Manager at New Zealand eScience Infrastructure (NeSI). Prior to that, she worked with HPC consortia and other digital research infrastructure providers in Canada. It was there she first learned about and joined the global WHPC community.
Abstract:
Situation: As a Chapter of Women in High Performance Computing (WHPC+ AusNZ) we recognise the role we play in raising the visibility and celebrating the successes of our community members, the roles they hold, and the career paths they’ve followed to get there (or are still pursuing!).
When our Chapter ran a community survey in 2023, we received feedback that community members would like to see the Chapter take more action to share positive career and research highlights, and strive for wider representation of all roles in the field, from technical staff through to comms staff and users.
In this session, we will host a panel that showcases the diversity of our community and creates a forum for learning from others’ experiences and perspectives.
Task:
This session will:
– challenge biases around gender and binaries in our sector and in the workplace
– shine a spotlight on the major challenges and triumphs of community members
– open a forum for sharing perspectives, experiences, and advice
Action: To drive our discussion, a panel of 3-4 invited speakers who represent the breadth of the community – diverse in role, domain, and career stage. We’ll begin the session with lightning talk presentations, then move into a moderated discussion. We’ll then open the floor for general questions and discussion.
Result: We hope this ‘community showcase’ session will raise the visibility of the challenges and triumphs of our community members, share perspectives not regularly heard, and support others who might be struggling with similar challenges.