Reporting from the CWC in New Zealand
February 11th, 2008 by
gloriajw
It’s an inconvenient time for me to be traveling. I have a new employer patiently waiting for me to start, but who understood the impossibility of my backing out of a trip to New Zealand to speak at a women’s tech conference. I have other contract work piling up, and several contiguous weeks of heads-down work awaiting me when I return. But it is well worth it.
The Computing Women’s Congress is held every other year, and takes place on the beautifully hilly, tropically lush campus of the University of Waikato, in Hamilton. This shoe-optional campus feels laid back and relaxed, but also hosts an outstanding graduate IT program, and Ph.D students and professors from around the world.
The women I’ve met at the CWC are just as impressive. All either have a Ph.D or are studying for one, and they’re sharp, to say the least. I was at first intimidated, being more of a “layman”, with only a BS and much field experience. But the environment is welcoming, and the women running and attending this event are simply great. The academic theory definitely compliments the practice, and I am enjoying it immensely.
In one course, I learned basic C# development in a .Net environment in one day. It’s not something I’d normally want to learn, but the instructors were great, and the presentation was outstanding.
The course I’m teaching is a three day web framework intensive, using Python, CherryPy, CherryTemplate, SqlAlchemy, connecting to both MySql and Postgresql databases. It’s an intensive without the intense part, and the attendees seem to be enjoying themselves. These brilliant women whipped through it faster than I expected, and finished day one 30 minutes early. Last night I hid for several hours in a campus office and wrote more exercises for the course, to keep up with them. They’re really making me work for this, and that is great fun.
This event was mentioned in Computerworld yesterday.
I’ll be posting the code from my course, since it does some unique things most web framework code doesn’t do, and you may find it useful.
February 11th, 2008 at 12:26 pm
“Last night I hid for several hours in a campus office and wrote more exercises for the course, to keep up with them.”
On those rare occasions I’ve had to teach, I can say without a doubt that that kind of thing is an absolutely wonderful problem to have. It’s both a compliment and a reassurance that you’ve got the interest of the people learning from you.
February 17th, 2008 at 2:51 am
i missed this, due to conflict with linux.conf.au — hope to make the next one — with is was every year. It’s a great event for sure. What’s you think of Hamiltron?
May 6th, 2008 at 4:56 pm
Hi Gloria - have you posted the code?