By Paul Miller MA ’21
For as long as Professor Jennifer Goodall can remember, empowering women has been a central theme in her life. In the 1960s, her mother was inspired by the women’s rights movement. Following her mother’s lead, Goodall studied the role of women in ancient Roman and Greek societies while in college.
Today, as the vice dean in the College of Emergency Preparedness, Homeland Security and Cybersecurity (CEHC), she teaches informatics and leads efforts to increase gender diversity through initiatives such as the state-wide New York Celebration of Women in Computing and the State of Grace conference hosted by CEHC. Goodall has also served as a consultant for the National Center for Women & Information Technology (NCWIT), a non-profit that brings together more than 1,200 universities, companies, government entities and others nationwide to increase the meaningful participation of girls and women in computing.
“I think it’s much more mainstream to acknowledge that this is a problem and that we, collectively, need to do something about it,” says Goodall, who recalls a time when there was only one woman in the web development class she taught. “I said, ‘This is not OK anymore’ … it still is a personal passion of mine.”
Goodall’s work with NCWIT, over the years, has helped raise awareness of the problem with attention-grabbing efforts such as their Sit With Me awareness campaign which features a distinctive red chair that symbolically supports women in computing and technology.
“People would take the chair with them to different places,” Goodall says. “And we use them at events to get people to talk about gender equality and technology.”
It’s the type of effort that Goodall hopes will help permanently turn the tide and usher more women and girls into STEM and the tech field. The campaign’s tagline seems to perfectly match Goodall’s lifetime of advocacy for women: “Sometimes you have to sit down to take a stand.”
By Paul Miller MA ’21
For as long as Professor Jennifer Goodall can remember, empowering women has been a central theme in her life. In the 1960s, her mother was inspired by the women’s rights movement. Following her mother’s lead, Goodall studied the role of women in ancient Roman and Greek societies while in college.
Today, as the vice dean in the College of Emergency Preparedness, Homeland Security and Cybersecurity (CEHC), she teaches informatics and leads efforts to increase gender diversity through initiatives such as the state-wide New York Celebration of Women in Computing and the State of Grace conference hosted by CEHC. Goodall has also served as a consultant for the National Center for Women & Information Technology (NCWIT), a non-profit that brings together more than 1,200 universities, companies, government entities and others nationwide to increase the meaningful participation of girls and women in computing.
“I think it’s much more mainstream to acknowledge that this is a problem and that we, collectively, need to do something about it,” says Goodall, who recalls a time when there was only one woman in the web development class she taught. “I said, ‘This is not OK anymore’ … it still is a personal passion of mine.”
Goodall’s work with NCWIT, over the years, has helped raise awareness of the problem with attention-grabbing efforts such as their Sit With Me awareness campaign which features a distinctive red chair that symbolically supports women in computing and technology.
“People would take the chair with them to different places,” Goodall says. “And we use them at events to get people to talk about gender equality and technology.”
It’s the type of effort that Goodall hopes will help permanently turn the tide and usher more women and girls into STEM and the tech field. The campaign’s tagline seems to perfectly match Goodall’s lifetime of advocacy for women: “Sometimes you have to sit down to take a stand.”
