The Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology (ABI) has announced sessions to be held at the Grace Hopper Celebration focusing on the specific issues and challenges faced by African-American, Latina, Asian, lesbian and bisexual women, and women in developing countries. The sixth Grace Hopper Celebration will be held October 4-7, 2006 at the Town and Country resort in San Diego, CA.

The Grace Hopper Celebration has always been a place of inclusion and community. This year builds on that tradition by exploring the breadth and depth of women's experiences in new detail. Focusing on the diverse experiences of women gives us a better opportunity to develop solutions for problems facing women in computing. Shaping the conversation is a series of presentations and gatherings:

"Anatomy of a Nationwide, Three-year, Multidisciplinary Study of Diversity on the Computing Disciplines" The objectives of this panel are twofold: (1) Provide information regarding a scientific research study on gender-based differences and ethnic and cultural models in the computing disciplines that is presently underway in the United States, and (2) encourage others to undertake such studies so that results might be replicated and generalized across studies.

"Embrace Your Duality as an Asian Woman to Lead" This Birds of a Feather presentation will discuss the unique issues that Asian women face and explore various skills and resources we can use to address them. We will brainstorm how to leverage our gender strength to excel and to embrace our cultural advantage to lead.

"Latinas in Engineering" This Birds of Feather Session for the 2006 Grace Hopper conference is intended to facilitate informal discussion among Latina women in the computer science and engineering fields.

Both women and Latinos are in the minority in technical fields in the United States, and it is rarer still to encounter a Latina in computer science or engineering.

"SpelBots: Women Making Waves in Robotics Research and Education" This talk will describe a cohesive, integrated approach to increase the participation and education of women and African Americans using innovative robotics and computer curriculum and competitions. We also discuss the joint Spelman and Carnegie Mellon University NSF-sponsored project, C.A.R.E. that is seeking to broaden the participation of young girls, women and students at historically black colleges and universities in the field of robotics and AI.

"Ripple Effects: Increasing the Diversity of Creators and Consumers of Computing Technology" This panel will focus on our newest "wave" of efforts to increase diversity, beyond gender, in the creators and consumers of computing technology so that computing technology becomes relevant and accessible to developing communities.

"Typing Lavender: LGBT Women in Computer Science" The goal of this session is to bring together LGBT computer scientists and allies to provide an opportunity to meet and discuss issues of particular relevance to the LGBT community.

"Closing the Achievement Gap: Tools for 21st Century Learning" This session introduce the work of the Technology Access Foundation (TFA) and discuss what some call an achievement gap for economically challenged students of color- but which is really an "opportunity gap".

In addition to these formal presentations, informal affinity groups are being encouraged throughout the conference. To encourage connections, networking and motivation the Women of Color luncheon will be held on Thursday sponsored by The National Center for Women and IT.

The Grace Hopper Celebration is proud to give all women the opportunity to work together to increase the impact of women on technology and to increase the positive impact of technology on the world's women. We invite all people to register and get involved.

Registration for the conference is currently underway. For more information, visit http://www.anitaborg.org/programs/ghc/.