Impactful Women in Tech
There are so many inspiring, influential, and impactful women in technology so we wanted to highlight a few from Hackernoon's 2021 list of 200 Black Women in Tech to Follow on Twitter.
Yelista Jean-Charles
Twitter @TheYelitsa
Yelista is the founder of Healthy Roots Dolls and was also listed on Forbes 30 under 30.
From her bio "Yelitsa never had a doll that looked like her growing up. The one time her parents gave her a black doll, she burst into tears because it wasn’t the “pretty one”. Since then, Yelitsa has made it her goal to make sure that no other children feel the way she did about her own appearance growing up.
While in her Junior year studying Illustration at the Rhode Island School of Design, Yelitsa redesigned the fairy tale Character Rapunzel as a brown girl with beautiful kinky hair. After speaking with classmates and friends, she saw the opportunity to address the demonstrated need for more diverse toys and representation in children’s publishing."
Qiana Patterson
Twitter @Q_i_a_n_a
“The most notable fact that culture imprints on women is the sense of our limits. The most important thing that one woman can do for another is to illuminate and expand her sense of actual possibilities.”
From her bio: "Qiana is a tech business executive leading operations, strategy, and strategic expansion in hypergrowth markets. Her interests lie in building better ways to use technology to make our world better especially socially impactful within mission-driven companies. Her current focus is on leading multi-state expansion and strategic initiatives and policy in the rideshare industry."
Qiana is currently the VP of Strategic Development at HopSkipDrive a youth transportation solution.
Lisa Mae Brunson
Twitter @MIssLisaMae
The founder of Wonder Women Tech, a non-profit that produces programming and events highlighting and celebrating women underrepresented in STEAM industries as well as innovators and entrepreneurs. This organizations seeks to create a shift in diversity and inclusion throughout these industries using impactful discussions and by producing revolutionary content.
From her bio: "Lisa Mae Brunson is a Creative Visionary, Speaker, Author & Social Innovator committed to impacting humanity on a global scale... She launched Junior Innovation Camp and Wonder Girls Camp teaching underprivileged kids STEAM curriculum, two hackathons--Hacks 4 Humanity, a hackathon for Social Good, (featured at ASU) and Wonder Women Hacks, a hackathon addressing challenges facing women and girls.
Lisa Mae organizes socially innovative projects like the global “I Am Equality” photographic campaign, which launched in 17 cities and 5 countries. She has hugged over 8,000 people with her Love, Hugs and Inspiration Campaign. She volunteers with the Long Beach Code for America Brigade, and other projects geared towards civic engagement and community building. She helped organize a global #Fishackathon with the U.S. State Department and has worked with government and educational organizations."
Joy Buolamwini
Twitter @jovialjoy
The founder of the Algorithmic Justice League, 'an organization that combines art and research to illuminate the social implications and harms of artificial intelligence.'
"We want the world to remember the who codes matters, how we code matters, and that we can code a better future"
From her bio: "Joy Buolamwini is the poet of code. She founded the Algorithmic Justice League to create a world with more ethical and inclusive technology. Her TED Featured Talk on algorithmic bias has over 1 million views. Her MIT thesis methodology uncovered large racial and gender bias in AI services from companies like Microsoft, IBM, and Amazon. Her research has been covered in over 40 countries, and as a renowned international speaker she has championed the need for algorithmic justice at the World Economic Forum and the United Nations.
She serves on the Global Tech Panel convened by the vice president of European Commission to advise world leaders and technology executives on ways to reduce the harms of A.I. In late 2018 in partnership with the Georgetown Law Center on Privacy and Technology, Joy launched the Safe Face Pledge, the first agreement of its kind that prohibits the lethal application of facial analysis and recognition technology."
These are just a few of the amazing and strong women that have been highlighted recently, which doesn't even begin to scrape the surface of the talented women that are out there. Make sure to keep your eyes open and you will find them.
Be sure to check out the full list here and also check out Analytics Insight's list of The 10 Most Impactful Women in Technology 2020 for even more inspiring women in tech.
