A while ago I pledged to write a blog post for Ada Lovelace day. The whole point of the day is to celebrate the role of women in technology. I was quite surprised by the reaction of some of my colleagues to the idea. Some people seemed to think it was patronizing – but I really do think that this is a great idea as we do still need to take every opportunity to celebrate female role models, particularly in technology there is still a male bias. I was listening to the Guardian’s tech weekly podcast the other week, and Suw Charman-Anderson (organiser of the day) was talking about the what her motivations were for organising the day. I think she summed it all up by saying “women don’t pimp their sh*t ” in the same way as men. So I’m going to indulge in a bit of pimping now.

I am very fortunate as I get to work with some really talented, inspirational people (women and men) everyday. I do really believe that the small JISC world I inhabit is a great model for equality. However, there are still more male developers than female and I’d really love to see a few more proper geek girls. So today, instead of just choosing one person to write about I’d just like to take a few minutes to celebrate all the great women I work with, read about and admire in the field of educational technology – too many to mention but you all know who you are – the extended sisters of CETIS. To all of us who have been the only, or one of the few females in meetings (particularly at standard bodies meetings), let’s keep going and hope that more females come onboard. Of course I do have to make one exception and say a big thank you to Lorna Campbell for being a mentor, role model and all round great gal pal

Let’s celebrate today and hope that celebrating the lives and work of women like Ada Lovelace will help inspire us all (women and men) and the next generation too.