 I'm a software engineer and an educator, and I care a lot about access to computer science education and about leveraging technology to create positive social change. And this is the story of how that happened and what I learned along the way. I'm originally from Paris, France. Bonjour. I moved to the US to go to college, and that's where I learned to code. I wanted to be an astronaut. So I joined the engineering program at my school, and one of the requirements was an intro to programming class. And I fell in love with code immediately. It was like nothing I'd ever experienced. I felt like I could be creative and analytical all at once. I felt like I'd finally found an art form with which I could express myself. So I started programming and decided to major in computer science, and that was a really easy decision. But staying in computer science wasn't so easy. And it wasn't because learning to code is hard, which it is. It's frustrating. It's a lot of dealing with your computer telling you that you failed over and over again, but that wasn't the hard part. The hard part was overcoming other people's perceptions and my own about my abilities as a programmer. At the time, I was one of maybe five women in my CS classes, and there were some classes where I was the only woman. Similarly, there were really few people in my classes who hadn't been programming since they were 10 and whose parents weren't software engineers. And so even though I did really well in all my classes, no one wanted to work with me or interact with me on an intellectual level. It was really lonely. And it felt like being hyper-visible and invisible at the same time. People didn't believe I was a programmer. They'd say, prove it. Do you even know what a terminal is? Which is a very ridiculous question. And it wasn't just students. One of my male friends told me that our computer science professor said this to him. And Stupp is Yiddish slang for fuck, by the way. So my peers didn't see me as a programmer, and my professors didn't either. But it wasn't just them. I didn't believe it myself. Like until senior year of college, when people asked me if I was a programmer, I would say, not really. I'm trying to become one, which is really silly because the act of programming is what makes you a programmer. But I'm really stubborn. So I decided I was going to be a good programmer in a way that was undeniable to the world. So I joined the programming team and became the leader of my school's computer club and took all the hardest CS classes and won a bunch of hackathons. And I finally became accepted by my peers. And it was ridiculous that for others, all they had to do was show up and look nerdy. And I had to do all of this work. But I made it, so it didn't seem to matter. And then I graduated from college with a computer science degree. And I got my first full-time job as a programmer at a startup in New York. And that was a really awesome job. I was a front-end engineer. I learned a ton. I made great friends, got to be a part of a really small team, and have a huge impact on the product, the engineering, and all aspects of the company. And it was awesome. But one thing that wasn't so awesome was whenever I stepped out of my great job bubble and entered the tech world and went to conferences or meetups or events. And as our company grew and we hired more people, the same stuff people said to me in college started happening all over again everywhere I went. And some of it was really small, like microaggressions, like people asking me over and over again if I was a programmer. And also some bigger, scarier, more serious incidents like what we've seen is happening at Uber. And it got so prevalent at some point that I became really discouraged. I felt like, why do I love programming if programming doesn't love me back? I was just trying to do my job and the environment wasn't allowing me to. And I seriously considered quitting programming and becoming one of the 50% of women in software who leave. But as I said, I'm really stubborn. So I decided, again, I'm gonna try and find a solution. So I sought out my friends for advice and actually realized I only had male programmer friends. So I decided to meet as many female engineers as possible and I got friends to introduce me to female engineers at their companies and just went on blind coffee dates with a bunch of ladies. And I was looking for advice and looking to create a support network. And so I would ask them, what do I do? How do I survive in this field? And I got a lot of different advice. This one woman who'd been a professional developer over 10 years told me when she cut her hair short, people stopped sexually harassing her at tech events. And so I kind of tossed that to the side. And I had a male friend who was really trying to help and he said, why don't you become a badass programmer? Like become known for your expertise and people will have to take you seriously. And so I figured, okay, I can try that. So I started giving talks at meetups about something I'm really passionate about which is accessibility on the web. And it went really well and after a while I even got invited to speak at a big programming conference where people were flying from around the country to attend and I shared the stage with people I really respect, people who build the tools that I use every day kind of like Garuko. And I was certainly the youngest person on stage and I was really excited. I felt super accomplished. I was badass. And I gave my talk and it went really well but then the first thing that I got asked afterwards was this guy asked me, how do I talk to women at bars? And I couldn't believe it because after all the work that I'd done to get there, even in the moment when my expertise was undeniable, like I was literally on stage at a conference that he paid money to attend teaching him things, still I wasn't seen as a programmer. And so I learned that being a badass didn't help. I still didn't get any respect. And at this point I was really angry. I was sick of being treated this way because of my gender and my appearance but I'm a hacker so I decided to hack my appearance. So I shaved my head. And this was before Stranger Things so it was not as cool then. But I shaved my head and the weirdest thing happened suddenly overnight I was a good programmer. I stopped getting hit on at conferences and people listened to me and respected me. I stopped being this mix of hyper sexualized and underskilled programmer. And I tried to think about this scientifically, like is there something in hair that makes you bad at programming? Like maybe my hair was weighing me down, like dragging my programming skills down. But that can't be right because this guy's a really good programmer. And this guy is a really good programmer too and so is this guy. Just kidding, that's cereal from the movie Hackers. So it had nothing to do with my hair but now all of a sudden I was seen as a good programmer. And so what had changed then if not my actual skills which certainly hadn't changed overnight? It was the way I was being perceived by my peers. I was no longer this hyper feminine lady who didn't belong and people even mistook me and my husband for a gay couple months. And so I didn't present as feminine anymore. Thusly it was acceptable for me to be a programmer and even a good one. And so this was a mind blowing discovery for me because even though I knew that I was a good programmer and I knew about sexism and tech, now I had proof on a really personal level. So I did a lot more thinking about this, about how my environment doesn't allow capable passionate people to succeed regardless of their skills. And I thought about the advice that people had given me which was all about changing myself. I cut your hair, become a badass, be more of a bitch, learn to ignore it. And I thought, no, it's not me who has to change. It's the culture that has to change. So I decided as long as I'm going to be in this field, I'm going to work to make it more diverse and more inclusive. And I decided to teach and mentor other people who don't fit the status quo so that at a certain point we might be able to change it. So I started teaching on the side as a volunteer. I taught lots of coding workshops for women and specifically women of color. And I really found a passion for education and eventually left my engineering job to join Coalition for Queens as their curriculum director. And Coalition for Queens is a free programming boot camp for adults from low income and underrepresented backgrounds. And I was hired to help launch our pilot program. And we had a really successful pilot. 50% of the class were women, 50% were immigrants, 50% had no college degree, 50% were black and Latinx. And the average income of the class when it started was about $20,000 a year. And graduates went on to work at companies like Spotify, Vice, Pinterest, Buzzfeed. And some of them make upwards of $120,000 a year now, which is life-changing. And since the pilot ended, I've decided to broaden my impact on education, which is why I joined Skillshare where I lead our web engineering team. So Skillshare is a continuing education platform that aims to help people learn new skills and grow their careers. And as a teacher, I'd hoped that it was possible to create diverse and inclusive workplaces in tech. And at Skillshare, I've actually seen it in practice. Before Skillshare, I'd always been the only woman on engineering teams. And when I joined, we were only two, but I'm really excited to say that we now have an engineering team that's 40% women and 60% folks of color, which is amazing. And thank you. And most recently, I founded my own educational program, the Code Cooperative, in which former inmates learned to code as a means to creating social change. All the students were recently released from prison and most of them had been in prison for a long time. And they've all been working on projects that highlight issues they've experienced within the US criminal justice system with the aim of solving them. And throughout this journey, I've learned the most important lesson about teaching and programming, which is that we need to stop thinking that there's only one type of person who can be an excellent programmer. Greatness in programming can come from anywhere and anyone can achieve excellence if they're given support, a safe space to learn, and if you trust that they can succeed. And you shouldn't have to shave your head or compromise any aspect of your identity to do what you love. Thank you.