Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

Mark Allen Weiss is a Professor and Associate Dean of Undergraduate Education at Florida International University. He is most well-known for his sole-authored Data Structures textbooks, which are among the most-widely used in computer science. Weiss received the ACM Karl V. Karlstrom Outstanding Educator Award for advancing the art and science of computer science (CS) education through his textbooks, research, and curriculum design. In his interview, he discusses what inspired him to begin writing textbooks, and his work with both the Advanced Placement (AP) CS Development Committee and the National Science Foundation.

Raluca Ada Popa is an Associate Professor at the University of California, Berkeley, where she is Co-Director of RISELab and SkyLab, two labs aiming to build secure intelligent systems for the cloud and for the sky of clouds, respectively. Her research interests include security, systems, and applied cryptography. Popa received the 2021 ACM Grace Murray Hopper Award for the design of secure distributed systems. In her interview, Popa discusses what inspired her to work in security and cryptography, the challenges and innovations in working with encrypted data, and the role of open-sourcing artifacts in her field.

Pieter Abbeel is a Professor at the University of California, Berkeley, where he is Director of the Berkeley Robot Learning Lab and Co-Director of the Berkeley Artificial Intelligence Research (BAIR) Lab. He is also Co-Founder, President, and Chief Scientist at Covariant, an AI robotics company. Abbeel is the recipient of the 2021 ACM Prize in Computing for contributions to robot learning. In his interview, he discusses some of his significant breakthroughs, AI learning in robots, and offers advice for aspiring AI researchers

ACM-W is the ACM Community of Support for Women in Computing. ACM-W supports, celebrates, and advocates internationally for the full engagement of women in all aspects of the computing field, providing a wide range of programs and services to ACM members and working in the larger community to advance the contributions of technical women.

Ruth Lennon, current chair of ACM-W Europe, has been appointed the next Global Chair of ACM-W. Ruth is the director of Craobh Technology Consulting, an organization that provides personalized solutions to industry problems. She is also a lecturer with 20 years of experience in the Department of Computing at Letterkenny Institute of Technology, Ireland, and has been a member of ACM for over 20 years.

Read more about Ruth Lennon's selection as Global Chair on the ACM-W website.

The open exchange of ideas is central to ACM’s mission. This requires an environment that embraces diversity and provides a safe, welcoming environment for all. ACM's Policy Against Harassment applies to all ACM activities, defines expected behavior and explains how to report unacceptable behavior.

ACM's Technology Policy Council and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Council sponsored a free screening and public discussion of the film "Coded Bias" and how those in computer science fields can address issues of algorithmic fairness. The discussion, held on March 29, 2021, has been archived, and "Coded Bias" is now viewable on both PBS and Netflix.

ACM SIGACCESS has developed a new free guide to help committees organizing and executing accessible virtual conferences inclusive for people with disabilities. The guidance is based on accessibility standards such as the W3C’s Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) and user experiences with virtual meetings, and provides a central resource for both best practices and links to other resources. Check out the guide at https://www.sigaccess.org/accessible-virtual-conferences/.

ACM Fellow Timothy Pinkston organized and moderated a panel on "Valuing Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Our Computing Community" held as a joint session of several co-located virtual conferences in March 2021. The panel included John Hennessey, David Patterson, Natalie Enright Jerger, Margaret Martonosi, Bill Dally and Kim Hazelwood. Watch a recording of the session and read a recap in CACM.