Written by shr 
Ada Lovelace Day at Bogazici University
On the 7th of November, Women Techmakers (WTM) Istanbul organized an event called as “Yes, we can do it! Ada Lovelace Day” at Bogazici University. Before giving the summary of this amazing event, we would like to give brief information about Ada Lovelace. She was a British mathematician and writer. The turning point of her life started after getting known Charles Babbage and his early mechanical general purpose computer, “the Analytical Engine”. In the history of computers, she was known as the first computer programmer because her notes on the “Analytical Engine” contain first algorithm intended to be carried out by a machine. (For detailed information about Ada Lovelace, you can read our Turkish article on HBR: http://www.hbrturkiye.com/blog/cesitlilik/kim-demis%CC%A7-kadinlar-yazilimdan-anlamaz-diye). It was a big coincidence that as sHR. we also intended to remind IT professionals about the strength of the women in Computer Science by introducing our pioneer woman computer programmer; Ada Lovelace in the above article.
Let’s continue with “the distinguished guest speakers and women role models” in this organization:
Dr. Suzan Üsküdarlı; an academician in the Computer Engineering Department of Boğaziçi University, explained what Linked Data is and how people can make contribution to Linked Data Community. Although we are from different disciplines, we, as sHR, were quite inspired by her thrilling speech. Dr. Nazlı Güney, Business Development Manager at Netaş, mentioned about the career opportunities after getting Ph.D. Binnur Görer, a Ph.D. student at Boğaziçi University, talked about “the Anita Borg Scholarship” and her research projects on robotics. Büşra Deniz and Sevnur Malik explained the aim of WTM Istanbul groups and its upcoming events. At the end of the event, two presents/gifts (card board) were given to the lucky participants by drawing lots; we were one of them 🙂 (see photos)
Women have a tendency to underestimate their potential because of the patriarchal systems, society norms, gender stereotypes (e.g. attitudes about girl’s mathematic ability), and barriers put by themselves etc. Therefore, as women we should look at our role models in the history to get the inspiration & motivation that we need; and then we can take an action to challenge these beliefs and systems by doing & showing our best.
