Women buck trend by taking charge of University's IT Crowd
UNIVERSITY computing departments are generally regarded as bastions of masculinity, but it still comes as a surprise to find IT academics are often mistaken for clerical staff simply because they are women.
It is true that almost every British university computing department is still run by men. However, one Scottish institution is attempting to break the mould.
Edinburgh Napier University's school of computing is unique in Scotland for having more than half of its top jobs occupied by women even though less than 10 per cent of its students are female.
Three women breaking down the gender barriers in this traditionally male sector at Napier are Dr Hazel Hall, Professor Emma Hart, and Sally Smith. Dr Hall is an expert on social networking sites, and was named the Information Professional of the Year at the Online Information Conference 2009 in London.
Mrs Smith, head of the school of computing, spent eight years working in industry before moving into teaching. She was recently made a Fellow of the British Computer Society, and fronted the official launch of the school's games laboratory in October.
Prof Hart rose rapidly to her current academic status after studying in Oxford and Edinburgh, and earning her PhD at Napier. She says she can see why, on the outside looking in, people may perceive computing and information technology to be a men-only profession.
"In the past I've been at conferences with more than 500 people attending, and certainly around 95 per cent of them are usually men," she says.
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