Elena Martinez, who entered school as a “limited English speaker,” discovered an early affinity for math and went on to graduate from college with a degree in math and computer science. She now encourages high school girls to pursue STEM through the WiDS Next Gen Program. Elena has served on the WiDS Next Gen Committee and is a first-year graduate student in Stanford Institute for Computational and Mathematical Engineering (ICME).

Women in Data Science (WiDS) Next Gen is pleased to release four data science lessons for secondary school students. These lessons can be used by secondary school teachers, student clubs, or WiDS ambassadors to engage students in discussion and activities to explore data science. WiDS Next Gen aims to inspire secondary school students to consider careers involving data science, artificial intelligence (AI) and related fields by introducing them to data science role models and their work. To receive the latest WiDS Next Gen materials, including these lessons, sign up here.

Women are significantly underrepresented in the booming fields of Data Science and AI in the United States, as well as in the graduate school programs that prepare students for careers in this field. Women in Data Science (WiDS), with support from Pivotal Ventures, conducted an in-depth research study to understand the barriers women face and identify potential approaches to increase the participation of women in this vital field.

​Priya Donti, Executive Director of Climate Change AI, explains multiple ways that machine learning and AI can be used to mitigate climate change. Her work at the intersection of climate change, computer science, and data science led her to co-found Climate Change AI, our partner for the WiDS Datathon 2023 challenge to improve long-term weather forecasting. Listen to her interview on the WiDS Podcast.

Two women on different sides of world who had never participated in a Kaggle competition came together as a team to compete in the WiDS Datathon 2022—leading to new skills, confidence, and a lasting friendship. The datathon goal was to analyze the energy efficiency of buildings. Participants analyzed regional differences in building energy efficiency, creating models to predict building energy consumption, an important first step in understanding how to maximize energy efficiency.
 
We asked Pravallika Myneni and Anissa Amziani to tell us more about themselves and the experience of working together during the datathon competition.

Machine learning impacts so many parts of our daily lives, whether it’s doing a Google search, using your smart watch, or getting movie recommendations. Healthcare providers and businesses are using it to gain insights to guide decision making. And it’s also being applied to solve some of the world’s toughest problems like climate change and food security. Several recent WiDS talks, workshops, and podcasts describe the exciting applications of machine learning today and offer skills development workshops for new and experienced data scientists.

​After watching the WiDS conference via livestream from Wisconsin, Sarah Dahl felt inspired and empowered to pivot her career to data science.

Tickets are selling quickly for the upcoming Women in Data Science (WiDS) Stanford conference, happening in-person at Stanford University and on livestream on March 8, 2023. We’re excited to announce some of our distinguished speakers addressing topics ranging from climate change to bioinformatics to authoritarian politics, and more. They include:

​With the massive amounts of data that are generated and collected today, data visualization is an invaluable tool to help people explore and understand what it all means. Data visualizations can be exploratory to help analyze the data and explanatory to present insights to a broader audience. Both art and science, data visualization turns information into images and helps people see patterns, trends, and outliers in large data sets. Here is a sampling of recent WiDS talks and workshops that delve into different aspects of data visualization.

The 6th Annual Women in Data Science (WiDS) Datathon launches in January 2023, in the lead up to the WiDS conferences in March 2023. In this year’s datathon challenges participants will use data science to improve longer-range weather forecasts to help people prepare and adapt to extreme weather events caused by climate change.

The 8th Annual Women in Data Science (WiDS) Stanford conference will be held in-person at Stanford University and on livestream on March 8, 2023. WiDS Stanford is a technical conference featuring amazing women doing outstanding work in data science and related fields. This year’s conference will feature keynote addresses, technical talks, panel discussions, and time for networking. ​

​Julia Olivieri, assistant professor of computer science at the University of the Pacific, has been instrumental to the development of the WiDS Workshops while launching her own teaching career. The WiDS Global team has been grateful to have Julia serve on the WiDS Workshop committee for the past year.

Lesly Zerna, investigadora, docente, mentora, creadora de contenido y desarrolladora de software boliviana, comparte su pasión por aprender y enseñar ciencia de datos e inteligencia artificial. Ella dice que el aprendizaje funciona mejor cuando conoces tu estilo de aprendizaje personal y lo aplicas a los temas prácticos que te interesan. 

Register now for the Women in Data Science (WiDS) Stanford conference 2023, a technical conference featuring outstanding women discussing their exceptional work in data science and related fields, in a wide variety of research domains. Everyone is welcome and encouraged to attend. The conference will take place in-person, at Stanford University. Don’t wait to get your tickets for the in-person event, as they will sell out quickly! ​

​AI and machine learning are increasingly being used across industry and government to make decisions impacting many parts of our lives. These technologies could determine who gets a job interview, what products are advertised to different audiences, or what government resources are allocated to different populations. Bias can become embedded in the development of AI systems either through the data and/or the development and evaluation of algorithms. This can result in inaccurate predictions that can significantly impact people’s lives. Several WiDS talks describe how bias in machine learning can impact everything from online ads to search recommendations to bus routes.

​Leda Braga is founder and CEO of Systematica Investments, a hedge fund known for using data science-driven models to support its investment strategies. On the WiDS Podcast she explains how systematic investment management is data science applied to investment and how she believes it is the future of the financial industry.

While there have been amazing achievements with machine learning in recent years, reproducing results for state-of-the-art deep learning methods is seldom straightforward. Three leading data scientists share their views at recent WIDS conferences on the importance of establishing structures, standards and best practices to guide us towards consistently producing high quality science and reliable findings.

Would you like to have a positive impact on the women in your community? When you become a WiDS Ambassador, you provide inspiration, education, community, and support by hosting a WiDS conference or datathon workshop. Your WiDS event can help normalize the presence of women in data science by featuring outstanding local women doing outstanding work in the field! 

Millicent Ochieng is a Data and Applied Scientist at Microsoft Africa Research Institute MARI, a WiDS Kenya Ambassador & WiDS Africa Co-Ambassador.

Jessica Bohórquez, investigadora de la Universidad de Adelaide en Australia y consultora de la industria, está utilizando IA y transitorios de presión para inspeccionar y monitorear tuberías de agua para detectar fugas. Ella habla sobre su doctorado, su trabajo en la industria y sus consejos para seguir una carrera en ciencia de datos.

​Data science, machine learning and AI have the potential to have a major impact on the healthcare industry. In several WiDS Worldwide conference panels and technical talks, experts describe the challenges and opportunities for applying data science, machine learning and AI to healthcare research and patient care.

Íngrid Munné-Collado, a Data Scientist with the Danish weather and energy forecasting company ConWX, describes how she overcame a fear of coding to successfully build a career applying data science to renewable energy.