March is Women’s History Month and ITS has celebrated by highlighting women and nonbinary Tar Heels in technology. All month long, we have shared profiles, Q&As and stories to share the breadth and diversity of the Carolina-women-in-IT experience.
To read the kickoff article, with some historical perspective about women in tech at UNC-Chapel Hill, visit Celebrating Women’s History Month: Carolina women in IT.
- Kelly Brown, Deputy Chief Information Officer, School of Medicine IT
- Manisha Mittal, instructional designer, School of Nursing
- Stephanie Williams, digital projects programmer, University Libraries
- Kathy Anderson, Associate Dean for IT and Project Planning, Gillings School of Global Public Health
- Emily Brassell, Associate Head of Software Development, University Libraries
- Porschia Holmes, IT technician, Eshelman School of Pharmacy
- Jenny Williams, systems analyst, ITS Research Computing
“It’s still not easy, but the more of us there are, the more things will change for the better.”
Get — and stay — involved
Fostering women in the IT workforce doesn’t just happen during Women’s History Month. Consider joining a group to keep the momentum going year-round.
If you’re a woman or gender minority who is interested in starting a career in IT — or advancing your existing one — there are spaces for you. And if you’re an advocate for diversity and inclusion in tech, there are spaces for you, too.
“The field of IT offers many opportunities for growth and fulfillment, and it’s never too late to get started.”
Specifically, consider joining the EDUCAUSE Women in IT Community Group. Community groups are informal gathering spaces for people interested in a specific topic. The group is a place to build your professional network, ask questions, share resources and participate in events and conferences.
Or join a new group closer to home — UNC CAUSE recently started a women in technology special interest group (SIG) called WIT+. WIT+ “welcomes everyone who considers themselves an ally for promoting women in technology.” UNC CAUSE formed in 1973 as a more local answer to EDUCAUSE. While EDUCAUSE is open to higher education technology professionals nationwide, UNC CAUSE focuses on IT staff in UNC System schools. SIGs are free to join.
Power of mentorship
Many of the women we profiled this month mentioned the power of mentorship — both mentoring others and being mentored. Ask yourself how you might benefit from being a mentor or having a mentor. Reach out to your colleagues and community to look for opportunities — sometimes all you need to do is ask.
“Become a mentor or speaker to promote women in technology and counteract the stereotype.
Help build a workplace culture of diversity and inclusion to provide a work environment that is inviting and provides career growth.”
EDUCAUSE also has a mentoring program, with opportunities to become either a mentor or a mentee. The program is open to all EDUCAUSE members, so everyone in the UNC community is eligible to participate.
“EDUCAUSE has brought me many wonderful connections,” said Kate Hash, Assistant Vice Chancellor for Customer Experience & Engagement at ITS. Hash has been involved with EDUCAUSE in many ways — most recently as a mentor in the EDUCAUSE Student Leadership Pipeline program. For her, meeting and engaging with her mentee was one of the highlights of the most recent EDUCAUSE national conference. Calling the entire experience “energizing,” she added that this type of mentoring “was something that I hadn’t done before, but I’m so glad I took part.”
Just for students
While it’s worthwhile to join EDUCAUSE or UNC CAUSE groups, there are other exclusive opportunities for students.
A common theme when talking to ITS staff about their career trajectories is how they, often inadvertently, started their IT careers as a student worker.
And most weren’t IT majors. Recent IT career profiles, written by student employee Lila Davidson with ITS Communications, bear that out.
Consider Alexandra Corbett, who was studying philosophy and psychology and now does data governance. Or Jessica Walker, a journalism major who is a student worker in change management.
“One of the great things about IT is the way it draws people from all kinds of educational backgrounds and alternate career paths.”
Davidson herself isn’t an IT major. She studies, as she puts it, “some of the furthest things from information technology” — English, creative writing and media and journalism. For her, the benefits of working in IT are twofold. Not only does it give her a deeper understanding of the technology she uses every day, she said it also allows her to “connect with people I wouldn’t normally get to learn from and see the inner workings of the campus I’m a part of.”
On the job, she’s also “learned about the opportunities IT holds for people like me, whose niches are outside of technology — communicators, project managers, digital accessibility experts and more.” And like others who stumbled into IT, Davidson has learned a lot about valuing her own skills. “My job has taught me that the journalism and communications fields extend further than I ever knew and allowed me to think creatively and excitedly about my future,” she said. “It’s been such an eye-opening experience working in IT — something I never saw as a possibility for me — and I’m absolutely loving it.”
Most ITS student employment positions are available on JobX. You can also learn about jobs in different ITS divisions. While you’re there, read short testimonials from students about how they gained real-world experience, new skills and grew their professional network by working for ITS.
Also consider joining a student group on campus centered around women in IT, including: