Dear Siebel Scholars Community,

Dear Siebel Scholars Community,

I hope you are all well.  I’m excited to join this community of technology leaders.  I am writing regarding the lack of female representation in the speaker list at the upcoming “Social Implications of AI” conference.  Upon hearing about the conference, I was very excited and immediately registered.  But upon closely looking at the speaker list, my friend and fellow Scholar, Claire Duvallet, noticed a lack of any women in AI as panelists. An all-male panel was also chosen for last year’s conference.  Her observation gained a strong following on Twitter. 

Since the theme of this conference is social implications, it is important to have as many social groups represented as possible.  Lack of female and minority representation in STEM panels is a common problem, and one easily rectified by awareness and a little action.  Claire found resources to assist (listed below).  She encouraged me to email the organizing committee in response to this issue.  I did so, and now I write to you all:

My hope with this message is to encourage other Siebel Scholars to engage and help make the conference organizing committee aware of this issue.   If you agree, please engage in this discussion either on this site or via contacting the Siebel organizers listed below.  I’m excited to feel represented and hopefully meet you all at this year’s conference.

Sincerely,

Neerja Aggarwal, MIT

Siebel Scholars Class of 2018

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Relevant email addresses:

siebelai@siebel.org (conference committee)

ssf@siebel.org (Siebel Foundation Directors)

tom@siebel.org (Tom Siebel, Founder)

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Articles highlighting influential women in AI

https://www.kdnuggets.com/2018/03/inspiring-women-ai-big-data-science.html
https://www.tieinflect.org/12-brilliant-women-ai-ethics-follow-2018/

Resources to identify speakers from groups underrepresented in STEM

https://blackinai.github.io/
http://womeninai.co