Data Chicks, We Need You! Call for Speakers

The call for speakers has gone out for 24 Hours of PASS, a virtual conference of the Professional Association for SQL Server.  But this isn’t an ordinary call for speakers.  PASS is going to do something extraordinary: in honour of Women’s History Month, only female speakers will be be presenting.

Normally I’m not a fan of any special accommodations or “help” for female workers: quotas, waiving of requirements, etc.  I sometimes think that those sorts of programs send the wrong message, too.  But in this case, I’m a huge fan of what PASS wants to do here. There are plenty of qualified women to speak on these topics, but usually the problem is that women tend not to submit to speak, for a variety of reasons.

24 Hours of PASS To Celebrate Women’s History Month

By Thomas LaRock
Mark your calendars! The next 24 Hours of PASS event is taking place March 15 and 16. We are sticking to the two day format with 12 sessions presented each day.

Since March is also Women’s History month we’ll be carrying that theme through to the online event. As a result we plan to feature 24 prominent female speakers during the course of the event with session content as always, focused on SQL Server.

If you have an abstract in mind or have suggestions for specific speakers or topics, send us an email at 24hours@sqlpass.org. Deadline for abstract submission (max 250 words with a 125 word bio) is January 14.

You can read Tom’s blog post about how and why he came up with the idea of a female-only event.

I welcome this special event for a few reasons:

1. PASS is doing something to recognize the vast amount of knowledge women in technology
2. Choosing to promote the wonderful female speakers out there during Women’s History Month (which also includes International Women’s Day and Ada Lovelace Day) is a great way to honour and recognize all the good work that millions of women do in IT around the world.
3. Encouraging female speakers is the best way to build a pool of qualified speakers for other events like SQL Saturdays, SQLRally, PASS Summit, Enterprise Data World, DAMA Chapters, etc.
4. I believe that this one event will do more to encourage more women to speak at events that all the encouraging e-mails and blog posts could ever accomplish.

While this is a PASS event, not every presentation will be just about SQL Server code.  I typically give my Database Design Contentious Issues presentation at in-person events and one of my database design-related presentations for virtual events.  They might include SQL Server content, but they aren’t just about the DBMSs.  If you have a presentation that you’ve given at a DAMA event, there’s a good chance you can present it at a PASS event.

So I need you to help:

1. If you are a female and work with data, please put together an abstract and submit it.  Now.  I’d love it if they had 300 abstracts to choose from.
2. If you aren’t female, please personally ask one of your female co-workers to submit an abstract.  Do it now…it will only take a couple of minutes.
3. Please retweet this post, post to Facebook and LinkedIn about this amazing opportunity to highlight female IT professionals.  Let’s show the world what #WIT has to offer.

I am excited about this event – I can’t wait to see it unfold. Please help us by getting the word out.  Let’s make something happen.

2 Comments

• Tweets that mention Data Chicks, We Need You! Call for Speakers #24HoP « InfoAdvisors' Blog -- Topsy.com 9 December 2010 at 4:14 PM

  [...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Karen Lopez, O'Reilly UG Program, Willie Favero , Daragh O Brien, Adobe Groups and others. Adobe Groups said: RT @datachick: Data Chicks, We Need You! Call for Speakers #24HoP http://goo.gl/fb/72nms [...]

  Reply
• Trolling the #24HoP | InfoAdvisors' Blog 10 December 2010 at 5:39 PM

  [...] knew it would happen.  As I blogged previously, SQLPASS is hosting a 24 Hours of PASS event in March and is using this event to honour Women in IT (WIT) by having 24 sessions given solely by female data [...]

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