BCSWomen Recognised for Supporting Women in Tech

15 Dec 2017 12:42 PM

BCSWomen part of BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT has won Tech Network of The Year Award. Organised by ‘We Are The City’ - the award will be presented to Sarah Burnett, Chair of BCSWomen - at a ceremony in London in the new year.

The BCS Specialist Group provides networking opportunities for all BCS professional women working in IT around the world. The Group's main objective is to provide support for female IT professionals, as well as mentoring and encouraging girls / women to enter IT as a career. BCSWomen runs a variety of events that are designed to improve womens’ technology and personal skills, and to provide networking opportunities.

Since its inception, by Dr Sue Black OBE in 2001, it is estimated that BCSWomen has helped over 10,000 women by providing them with hands-on coding, technology awareness and personal skill seminars, workshops and mentoring.

Sarah Burnett said: “It is fantastic to have this recognition for the hard work that the committee have put in to organising events and training for women in tech. We strive to hold events that add to their skills and help them with their careers. This award shows that our work is not going unnoticed. It has already motivated us to do more and will help us build more momentum for our initiatives, including our new Artificial Intelligence (AI) Accelerator program that aims to get more women into AI.”

Currently, only 17 per cent of employees in the UK technology sector are women; only one in six school leavers starting a degree in computer science in 2016 was female and the total number of girls taking either ICT or computer science at GCSE fell by 12 per cent in 2017.

Kayleigh Bateman, Head of WeAreTechWomen, added: “We are delighted to celebrate the achievements of BCSWomen; a remarkable group who are not only role models for the industry, but who are our future leaders of tomorrow. The award recognises the impact of this important network that is leading the way for the future generations of tech talent.

Over the course of my career, I have seen some truly talented and inspirational women who have been recognised by a multitude of awards. However, there is not one awards series that focuses on the next generation of female talent as a whole, or those who support these individuals. Our hope is that by recognising those that champion women in tech, we can encourage more organisations to follow their lead.”