SheCodes Talk

More of my story from Shecodes, as well as a call-to-action about what we need to spend more time talking about.

1. I’m @lizTheDeveloper Director of Operations Instructor / Developer @Hackbright Academy Chapter Leader Teacher Girl Develop It @GDISF Friday, August 9, 13
2. My Story Friday, August 9, 13
3. I learned to code when I was young Friday, August 9, 13
4. I learned to code when I was young To combat learning disabilities Friday, August 9, 13
5. I learned to code when I was young To combat learning disabilities And to connect with my dad Friday, August 9, 13
6. I learned to code when I was young To combat learning disabilities And to connect with my dad I dealt better with formal logic than with people Friday, August 9, 13
7. My dad wrote permission slips in pseudo-code Friday, August 9, 13
8. My dad wrote permission slips in pseudo-code Our worst fights were about Visual Basic Friday, August 9, 13
9. My dad wrote permission slips in pseudo-code Our worst fights were about Visual Basic Because Visual Basic is terrible Friday, August 9, 13
10. My dad wrote permission slips in pseudo-code Our worst fights were about Visual Basic Because Visual Basic is terrible But also because we were a family of engineers Friday, August 9, 13
11. My dad wrote permission slips in pseudo-code Our worst fights were about Visual Basic Because Visual Basic is terrible But also because we were a family of engineers I learned it was important to care about what you do Friday, August 9, 13
12. School was terrible for me Friday, August 9, 13
13. School was terrible for me I have learning disabilities - teachers don’t like dealing with that. Friday, August 9, 13
14. School was terrible for me I have learning disabilities - teachers don’t like dealing with that. My dad went to school for Psychology Friday, August 9, 13
15. School was terrible for me I have learning disabilities - teachers don’t like dealing with that. My dad went to school for Psychology He created other opportunities for me to learn Friday, August 9, 13
16. My heroes were mostly men Friday, August 9, 13
17. My heroes were mostly men Geordi LaForge was the biggest influencer in my life (other than my dad) Friday, August 9, 13
18. My heroes were mostly men Geordi LaForge was the biggest influencer in my life (other than my dad) Friday, August 9, 13
19. My heroes were mostly men Geordi LaForge was the biggest influencer in my life (other than my dad) I learned that it was more important to be kindred spirits than look alike. Friday, August 9, 13
20. I never knew I was different Friday, August 9, 13
21. Adults focus on differences Friday, August 9, 13
22. Adults focus on differences Children focus on interests Friday, August 9, 13
23. Adults focus on differences Children focus on interests Learning is inherently fun Friday, August 9, 13
24. Adults focus on differences Children focus on interests Learning is inherently fun All children want to learn Friday, August 9, 13
25. (what they want to learn isn’t always what you want to teach them) Friday, August 9, 13
26. (what they want to learn isn’t always what you want to teach them) Friday, August 9, 13
27. Because I didn’t know how I was supposed to be Friday, August 9, 13
28. Because I didn’t know how I was supposed to be I just did what I wanted Friday, August 9, 13
29. Because I didn’t know how I was supposed to be I just did what I wanted And now I’m a software engineer Friday, August 9, 13
30. Being a software engineer means you’re surrounded by men Friday, August 9, 13
31. Being a software engineer means you’re surrounded by men I lost my female identity Friday, August 9, 13
32. Being a software engineer means you’re surrounded by men I lost my female identity I was a developer not a “female developer” Friday, August 9, 13
33. It took awhile to notice I wasn’t the same Friday, August 9, 13
34. It took awhile to notice I wasn’t the same First taste was being referred to as “one of the good ones” Friday, August 9, 13
35. It took awhile to notice I wasn’t the same First taste was being referred to as “one of the good ones” Which meant a woman who didn’t identify strongly as a woman. Friday, August 9, 13
36. When I moved to San Francisco I didn’t know how to interview Friday, August 9, 13
37. When I moved to San Francisco I didn’t know how to interview I thought I wasn’t a “real” developer Friday, August 9, 13
38. When I moved to San Francisco I didn’t know how to interview I thought I wasn’t a “real” developer I questioned everything I knew about myself Friday, August 9, 13
39. The Square interview Friday, August 9, 13
40. The ThoughtWorks Interview Friday, August 9, 13
41. I couldn’t stand being viewed as Non-Technical Friday, August 9, 13
42. I started teaching basic classes with Girl Develop It Friday, August 9, 13
43. I started teaching basic classes with Girl Develop It Seeing other people struggle with identity Friday, August 9, 13
44. I started teaching basic classes with Girl Develop It Seeing other people struggle with identity Made me realize I wasn’t alone Friday, August 9, 13
45. I wrote the Fraud Prevention system for 8 of the top 10 banks in the country Friday, August 9, 13
46. I wrote the Fraud Prevention system for 8 of the top 10 banks in the country (Sorry if your debit card gets canceled when you travel, my bad) Friday, August 9, 13
47. k-means clustering algorithms considering 25 degrees of dimensionality is hard Friday, August 9, 13
48. k-means clustering algorithms considering 25 degrees of dimensionality is hard I am a real developer Friday, August 9, 13
49. We, as women, need to talk about tech in public Friday, August 9, 13
50. We can’t be a novelty anymore Friday, August 9, 13
51. We can’t be a novelty anymore It’s time to step up to the plate Friday, August 9, 13
52. We can’t be a novelty anymore It’s time to step up to the plate Let’s all prove we know what we’re talking about Friday, August 9, 13
53. Speak Friday, August 9, 13
54. Speak Teach Friday, August 9, 13
55. Speak Teach Argue Friday, August 9, 13
56. Talk about technical things Friday, August 9, 13
57. Talk about technical things like k-means clustering like busting CAP theorem at scale like machine learning algorithms like natural language processing like language design like how to build an OS Friday, August 9, 13
58. Those things are what our students to in 10 weeks @Hackbright Friday, August 9, 13
59. Argue with the community Friday, August 9, 13
60. Argue with the community about JS MVC being slow about Functional vs OOP about why scripting languages suck / are great about the merits of putting programmer efficacy first / last about your area of expertise about syntactic sugar in Ruby about architecture patterns and antipatterns Friday, August 9, 13
61. Be childlike Friday, August 9, 13
62. Because this place is wonderful Friday, August 9, 13
63. Because this place is wonderful There are too many interesting, wonderful things to explore Friday, August 9, 13
64. Because this place is wonderful There are too many interesting, wonderful things to explore To worry about what makes you different Friday, August 9, 13
65. Because this place is wonderful There are too many interesting, wonderful things to explore To worry about what makes you different Just make things Friday, August 9, 13
66. -@lizTheDeveloper Friday, August 9, 13