Celebration of Women in Computing – Computer Science Canada/Informatique Canada

Annual Canadian Celebration of Women in Computing Conference (CAN-CWiC)

CAN-CWiC is the premiere Canadian computing conference for young women and non-binary people in technology. This annual event has been offered since 2011 and features networking, learning, sharing and mentoring. CAN-CWiC embodies the mission of encouraging curiosity and awareness for the digital innovations that change the community and world around us. Bringing together leaders in research, education and industry from across Canada. Get inspired by stories from women who have been there and done that and how they succeeded.

If you are a student interested in attending contact your department chair as they may coordinate the attendance of a number of students in your department. You can also register yourself via this website registration portal (opens in early spring).

The event will be held at the Delta Hotels by Marriott Toronto Airport and Conference Center in Toronto.

Students:

If your school is participating in CAN-CWiC, it will provide the opportunity to sponsored students to attend the event and will arrange and pay for your transportation (by bus or air) and accommodation (on the 20^th). If you are not a sponsored student, you can still register yourself via the Registration Form and if you are a student in the below noted areas, you will be able to get a seat on the bus. If you are not in one of these areas, then you will then be responsible for your own transportation.

CAN-CWiC is arranging for bus transportation for students from Quebec (leaving from Montreal) and Ontario (outside the GTA – leaving from Ottawa, Kingston, and schools in the Golden Horseshoe, Windsor/Kitchener/Waterloo areas) and the University of Toronto. The buses leave in the morning of the 20^th, drop you off at the hotel, and drive you back to your school on the 21^st. Your department chair will have information on the bus schedule. If you are from outside Quebec or Ontario, you need to arrange transportation either through your department or by yourself.

Hotel shuttle:

The hotel offers a complimentary 24-hour shuttle bus service.
• From the Hotel: Every 30 minutes at the top and bottom of the hour
• From the Airport: Every 30 minutes at 15 & 45 minutes after the hour
AIRPORT PICK UP LOCATIONS
TERMINAL 1: Ground Level S5
TERMINAL 3 : Ground Level Post 41

CAN-CWiC will arrange and confirm your accommodation at the hotel once you have registered for the conference. Your hotel room will be double occupancy and you will share the room with another female student, and, in most cases, you have an option to be matched up with a person of your choice.

All your food and beverage, including the Friday October 20^th CAN-CWIC Banquet, are included in your registration fee.

Not a Student?

A special $159 rate has been secured. Use this link to make your reservation. Deadline for reservations is Friday, October 6, 2023.

On Friday, October 20^th all registered students will have an opportunity to attend the amazing CAN-CWiC reception and banquet. There are fun photo booths and we have some amazing keynote speakers lined up and you will receive a beautiful four course meal. It’s a great opportunity to dress up, mingle, meet other students from across Canada and have fun.

Steering Committee

The steering committee provides direction and advice to the co-chairs about the program. Co-chairs are chosen annually and move around from west to east. Co-chairs are responsible for finding and managing local support to run elements of the conference organization.

CO-CHAIRS

OULDOOZ BAGHBAN KARIMI

Lecturer, School of Computing Science
Chair, Computing Science Diversity Committee
President, Academic Women
Simon Fraser University

Jeremy Bradbury

PhD Associate Professor Computer Science Faculty of Science, Ontario Tech University

Steering Committee Members

Joanne Atlee

Professor
Cheriton School of Computer Science
University of Waterloo

Sheila McIlraith

Professor
Department of Computer Science
University of Toronto
Vector Institute, Canada CIFAR AI Chair
Associate Director and Research Lead, Schwartz Reisman Institute

Kate Larson

Professor
Cheriton School of Computer Science
University of Waterloo

Program

All events will take place at the Delta Hotel. Information about keynote speakers and parallel sessions will become available over the summer.

Friday, October 20th

12:00 noon – 5:00 pm: CS-CAN|INFO-CAN Faculty Meeting
4:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m. - Registration
6:30 p.m. – Banquet - Keynote Speaker: To be confirmed

Saturday, October 21nd

7:30 a.m. - 8:30 a.m. - Breakfast
8:00 a.m. - 2 p.m. - Registration

8:45 a.m. - 9:50 a.m.
NCWIT Aspirations in Computing National Award - Keynote Speaker: to be confirmed

9:50 a.m. – 10:00 a.m. Break

10:00 a.m. - 11:50 a.m. - Parallel sessions
12:00 p.m. - 2:00 p.m. - Lunch and Career Fair
2:00 p.m. - 3:50 p.m. - Parallel sessions

3:50 p.m. – 4:10 p.m. Break

4:10 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.
Panel Session: Moderated by Joanne Atlee, Professor, University of Waterloo

5:30 p.m. End of the program

Canadian Celebration of Women in Computing Conference Program Schedule

See the full list of speaker profiles.

On a Bus?

Your bus is leaving at in the parking lot at 5:30 p.m. sharp!! Don’t be late!!!

On a Plane?

Check your flight time and make sure you can be on the hotel shuttle in time for your flight.

Hotel shuttle:

The hotel offers a complimentary 24-hour shuttle bus service.
• From the Hotel: Every 30 minutes at the top and bottom of the hour
• From the Airport: Every 30 minutes at 15 & 45 minutes after the hour

Time	Room	Activity	Info
3:00 pm. – 6:00 pm	International Ballroom Lobby of hotel	Pick up registration badge Pick up hotel key	On a Bus? Your badge will be delivered to you on the bus. Remain on the bus until your badges have been delivered. Then proceed to the hotel lobby if you have a hotel room for your room key. Not on a Bus? Go to registration first to pick up your badge and then go pick up your room key.
12:00 – 5:00 pm	New York	Faculty Meeting 12:00-1:00Lunch 1:00-1:30 Introductions 1:30-3:00 Statistics on the under representation of Women in Computing 3:00-3:30 Break 3:30-5:00 Encouraging and Supporting Marginalized Students	N/a
6:30 pm – 10:00 pm	International Ballroom	Dinner	There is no assigned seating. All food will be nut-free, some vegetarian, no pork.
6:30 pm – 7:00 pm	International Ballroom	Keynote Speaker Topic: We didn’t come this far to only come this far	Keynote Speaker: Tanjulia Akter \| Software engineer \| Electronic Arts

Saturday, October 21nd 7:30 am – 10:00 – Opening of the Conference

Time	Room	Activity	Speaker
7:30 am – 8:15 am	Plaza C (2^nd floor)	Light Breakfast	N/A
8:15 am – 8:30 am	International Ballroom	NCWIT Aspirations in Computing National Award Presentation	Wendy Powely
8:30 am – 9:00 am	International Ballroom	Keynote Speaker Topic: Breaking Gender Barriers in Tech	Victoria Granova \| Security Technical Program Manager \| Amazon Web Services
9:00 am – 9:15 am	International Ballroom	Keynote Speaker	Nailah Ogeer \| Senior IT Manager\| TD Bank \| My journey from rags to riches – an immigrant success story
9:15 am – 9:30 am	International Ballroom	Keynote Speaker Generative AI	Christina Fung \| Global Head of AI Enablement \| CGI
9:30 am – 9:45 am	International Ballroom	Keynote Speaker A woman in STEM: from trials to triumph	Pauline Keeton Curtis \| Managing Director Portfolio Technical Support \| BMO

Saturday, October 21nd 10:00 am – 10:50 – Parallel Sessions (choose one)

Room	Session Title	Speaker
International Ballroom A	Teaching Track Career Paths	Jacqueline Smith \| Professor \| University of Toronto Bethany Edmunds \| Professor \| Northeastern University
International Ballroom B	National Cyber Threat Assessment – 2023-24	Anne Marie Salter \| Data scientist and Machine learning researcher \| Canadian Center for Cyber Security – Communications Security Establishment Alicia Greeley \| Manager of Cryptographic Services & Operations \| Cyber Centre, Communications Security Establishment
New York	AI in the Rail Industry	Maryam Ahmadi \| Expert – Machine Learning \| CN Rail
Toronto	Bridging Worlds: The Proxy Product Owner role in orchestrating between Business Vision And IT Realities	Marwa El-Khatib \| Scrum Master \| Morgan Stanley
Montreal	Responding to Everyday Biases	Joanne Atlee \| Assistant Professor – Interaction Design \| York University \| Social and Technological Systems Lab
Ottawa	Enas Aitarawneh – York University Conversation Derailment Forecasting with Graph Convolutional Networks Hajer Mejri – University of Montreal Interpretable Northern Leaf Blight disease classification through Counterfactual Explanations Lorena Barreto Simedo Pacheco – Concordia University A Deep Dive into user-reported issues Mahzabeen Emu – Queen’s University Quantum Computing Era for Optimization	Moderated by: Stacey Scott , Algoma University

Saturday, October 21nd 11:00 am – 11:50 – Parallel Sessions (choose one)

Room	Session Title	Speaker
International Ballroom A	Unlocking the Gaming Industry : Your Non-Gaming Experience is the Key	Tanjulia Akter \| Software engineer \| Electronic Arts
International Ballroom B	Leveraging AI and Emerging Technologies for your Career Journey	Stefan Shetty \| Senior Partner Sales Manager \| AWS
New York	Tips and Tools to Land the Internship/Co-op You Want	Kate McRoberts \| Co-Op Coordinator \| University of Guelph Laura Gatto Anne-Marie Zawadzki
Toronto	I’ve been there!” Succeeding through your career stages”	Sharon O’Sullivan \| Head of Technology Research & Innovation Adela Nae \| Director – Technology Delivery and Transformation Raksha Kannan \| Senior Analyst – Credit Strategy Jennifer Chan \| Senior Manager – Strategic Initiatives (moderator) BMO
Montreal	Fireside chat: Advice to Ignite your Career	Wendy Powley \| Associate Professor \| Queen’s University Kelly Lyons, Professor, University of Toronto
Ottawa	Medha Muppala \| University of Windsor \| Designing for Accessibility Mélisande Teng \| MILA Species distribution modelling using remote sensing and citizen science data Meriem Ben Chaaben \| University of Montreal \| Using Few-Shot Prompt Learning for Automating Model Completion Mouna Dhaouadi \| University of Montreal Exploring Developers Rationale in the Linux Kernel Namrata Kundu \| University of British Columbia \| Closest Convex Function Approximation: Algorithms and Application	Moderated by: Zille Huma Kamal \| University of Waterloo

12:00 pm – 2:00 pm – Lunch and Career Fair – Plaza Ballroom (2nd Floor)

If the lineup for lunch is long, visit the career fair first! Lunch will be available until 1:30 pm

12:00 pm – 2:00 pm – Faculty Mentoring Circles – Plaza Ballroom (2nd Floor)

Faculty Members Only: Grab lunch and join us for an opportunity for faculty to connect for peer-to-peer mentorship. Planned topics are: Academic Leadership Roles; Planning for Promotion; Teaching Track Faculty. Other topics may be added depending on attendee interest.

Academic Leadership

If you are interested in taking the path to become a leader in an academic institute and want to be familiar with the problems, challenges, and solutions, learning from the experiences of our mentors can be the best choice. Come with your questions and hear advice and stories from women who have walked the same path.

Tenure and Promotion

Join our mentoring circle for pre-tenure faculty, a supportive space where early-career academics connect with experienced mentors. Navigate the path to tenure with insights, advice, and a collaborative community dedicated to your professional growth in academia.

Teaching Professor

Engage with experienced educators who are ready to share insights, strategies, and stories about navigating the challenges and triumphs in the academic world. Bring your questions, and benefit from the collective wisdom of mentors who have walked a similar path. Join our teaching circle, where collaboration and shared experiences can enhance your journey as an educator and leader in academia.

2:00 pm – 2:50 – Parallel Sessions (choose one)

Room	Session Title	Speaker
International Ballroom A	Computer Science Research: Areas, Methodologies, and Resources	Ouldooz Baghban Karimi \| Lecturer \| Simon Fraser University
International Ballroom B	Early Talent and Coop Opportunities	Olga Mpampanis \| Early Talent Acquisition Partner- Platforms & Technology \| TD Bank
New York	Changing the face of technology	Japnit Ahuja \| Founder \| Go Girl Organization
Toronto	Talking Sense Into AI: On The Role of Conversation in Human-AI Collaboration	Anastasia Kuzminykh \| Assistant Professor \| University of Toronto
Montreal	Resume & Interview prep Workshop	Mary Wittman \| Vice President \| Consulting Services Mariia Merkulova \| Campus Recruitment Consultant. Maria Khan \| National Campus Recruitment Manager \| CGI
Ottawa	Parnian Eslamloo – University of Saskatchewan Harmonizing Technical and User-Centric Elements: A Framework for Bug-Inducing Commit Prevention Pooja Joshi – D2L How different people rock climb and what I have learned from it Pragya Bhandari – The University of British Columbia BuggIn: Automatic Intrinsic Bugs Classification Model using NLP and ML Sandra Kumi – University of Saskatchewan SleepSynth: Evaluating the use of Synthetic Data in Health Digital Twins	Moderated by: Karen Reid, University of Toronto

3:00 pm – 3:50 pm – Parallel Sessions

Room	Session Title	Speaker
International Ballroom A	Inclusive Teaching	Jacqueline Smith \| Professor \| University of Toronto Sadia Sharmin \| Professor \| University of Toronto
International Ballroom B	Navigating the AI Era: Preparing for the Future	FeiFei Han \| AI Consultant \| Deloitte
Toronto	Learnings from the Center for Inclusive Computing and MS Pathways Consortium Projects	Jodi Tims \| Associate Dean of Global Network Programs \| Northeastern University
Montreal	Canceled	Shital Desai
Ottawa	Shri Harini Ramesh – Carleton University \| An Interactive Data Visualization System for Analyzing the Virtual Cardiac Rehabilitation (VCR) Journey of Older Adults: Prior, During, and Post VCR Program Somayeh Fatahi – University of Saskatchewan \| From Insights to Impact: My Adventures in Data Science Swati Goswami – The University of British Columbia \| FlowCache: Accelerating Network Functions using Programmable Switches Wejdene Haouari – York University \| Improving reliability efficiency through log mining and multi-objective optimizations Yan Yan – University of Guelph \| Machine Learning on High-Dimensional Biological Data Analysis	Moderated by: Mahreen Nasir

Women in Tech Leadership Panel Discussion

4:10 pm – 5:00 pm – International Ballroom

Panel Session:

Moderated by Joanne Atlee, Professor, University of Waterloo

Speakers:

Alicia Greeley, Manager of Cryptographic Services & Operations at Canadian Centre for Cyber Security (CCCS) at the Communications Security Establishment (CSE)
After attending Memorial University and College of the North Atlantic in St John’s, NL, Alicia accepted a job as a software developer with CSE. Alicia has held various technical and technical leadership roles at CSE over the last two decades and is currently working within CCCS. She is passionate in creating diverse and inclusive working environments within technical fields. In her spare time, she spends time with her family, two daughters and is known to love cats!

Sonia Kulwant Singh, Team Product owner, Scrum lead, DevOps Engineer at SAP
Sonia has 13+ years of Information technology experience with a techno-functional profile spanning across multiple roles of Product Owner, Scrum lead, Development, Devops, Research and Design, Quality, Maintenance, Customer Support and Consulting in products like IoT, S/4 Hana, Digital manufacturing cloud, Cloud for Analytics, Business ByDesign and more at SAP. She is also part of the AI Ambassador Network at SAP and had recently delivered a session about “Demystifying AI technology like ChatGPT” across SAP Canada.
Kelly Lyons, Professor in the Faculty of Information at the University of Toronto
Associate Director of the Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society
Prior to joining the University of Toronto, she was the Program Director of the IBM Toronto Lab Centre for Advanced Studies (CAS). Her research interests include service science, knowledge mobilization, data science, and software engineering. She has held a number of senior administrative roles at the University of Toronto, co‐authored several papers, received research funding from industry and government, served on program committees for conferences, given many keynote and invited presentations, and co‐chaired several workshops. She is currently on the Board of CS-Can/Info-Can. From 2020 to 2022, she served on the Board of the Informs Service Science Section. From 2008 to 2012, she was a Member‐at‐Large of the ACM Council and a member of the Executive Council of ACM‐W.

Leadership in Tech:
It can be difficult to think beyond the next internship, the first post-grad work placement, or the next promotion, but it is important to be more deliberate in one’s career choices. In this panel, we discuss different career trajectories in leadership in tech, with lots of time for questions from the audience.

Speaker List Profiles

Keynote Speakers

Parallel Session Speakers

Lightning Talk Speakers

Thank you for your interest in the 13th Celebration of Women in Computing Conference (CAN-CWiC)

CAN-CWiC provides an excellent opportunity to connect with hundreds of female computing students from across the country.

Sponsorship Benefits

Statistics from 2022

CAN-CWIC is funded by sponsorship by industry, government and universities/colleges. Becoming a sponsor of the CAN-CWIC affords your organization the opportunity to:

Influence and attract tomorrow’s computing professionals
Showcase your commitment to diversity
Provide opportunities for your technical women to develop leadership, mentor and network
Participate in the career fair
Promote your organization’s needs
Strengthen relationships with participating universities, scope out potential collaborations
Support a program that improves the climate for the sector at large
Academic Sponsorship – recruit Graduate Students

650 attendees
Over 35 organizations attended
30+ institution were represented from B.C., Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec and Nova Scotia
Over 30 sponsors
100% of sponsor funding went towards supporting students allowing them to attend the event.
25 amazing lightning talks
3 awards presented through our partnership with NCWIT Aspirations in Computing Award
30 booths at the job fair

CAN-CWiC is 75% funded through sponsorship by industry, government, universities and colleges.

All funds are used to support student participation. Sponsorship allows CAN-CWiC to offer highly-subsidized fees for students to attend all presentations, panels and workshops, participate by giving talks or presenting posters, network with other attendees and attend the career fair and banquet. Thanks to our sponsors, we are also able to provide overnight accommodation, and, in many cases, transportation for students.