The 2015 Richard Tapia Conference will be held on Feb. 18-21 in Boston. This year’s conference theme is Diversity at Scale. Dr. Dilma Da Silva, head of the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at Texas A&M University, and Dr. Jack Dongarra, research professor and TIAS Fellow, are among the many speakers at this year’s conference.
Da Silva will be speaking on "The Challenges in Mobile Cloud Computing" and Dongarra’s talk is titled “Algorithmic and Software Challenges when Moving Towards Exascale.” Other noteable speakers include Freeman A. Hrabowski, III, Odest Chadwicke Jenkins, Shaun Kane and Jacky Wright.
CSE is a sponsor of the event and will have a booth. Additionally, 16 students funded by the Dwight Look College of Engineering, three students on Google doctoral consortium and poster scholarships, two staff members and a members of the faculty will attend the event.
The Richard Tapia Conference is presented by the Center for Minorities and People with Disabilities in Information Technology (CMD-IT) and is organized by the Coalition to Diversify Computing (CDC). CMD-IT is directed by Dr. Valerie Taylor, senior associate dean for academic affairs and Royce E. Wisenbaker Professor. Unocal Professor Dr. Nancy M. Amato, Taylor and Da Silva are members of CDC.
The goal of the conference is to bring together those in computing from all backgrounds, ethnicities and ages for several key reasons. The conference aims to celebrate the diversity that exists in computing, to connect with others with common backgrounds, ethnicities, disabilities, and genders in order to create communities that extend beyond the conference, to obtain advice from and make contacts with computing leaders in academia and industry, and to inspire attendees with presentations and conversations with leaders who share common backgrounds.