With the aim of recognizing and making visible the work of Chilean women who have had a relevant trajectory for society in the areas of engineering, technology and other scientific fields, for the first time the Ada Byron Award for Women Technologist Chile 2022 will be delivered in the country, whose applications are already open, with a deadline until November 30.
The recognition is inspired by those women who have contributed to different scientific disciplines, such as the British Ada Byron, who in the nineteenth century was the first person in history to perform programming in the field of computer science. The award was established in 2014 at the University of Deusto, Spain, and as part of its internationalization process, from this year it arrives in Chile, by the hand of the Andrés Bello University.
Each candidate can present herself or be presented by another person or entity, for which she must meet the following requirements: be a woman, of legal age, resident in Chile, with Chilean nationality, and have a degree or professional career in technological, engineering and other scientific fields closely related to technology.
All the data about the process can be found in the application bases published in the https://premioadabyron.unab.cl/. The official call for the prize was made on September 9, and three months later, on January 9, 2023, the name of the winner will be known, who will receive three thousand euros as part of the prize.
Evaluation Criteria
Among the criteria that will be considered to evaluate the applications, the relevance of the innovations contributed by the candidates in their scientific or professional career, as well as their postgraduate degrees, stands out.
In addition, the applicants’ abilities to connect different activities through collaboration with other people and entities will be considered; socialize knowledge and achievements through public dissemination; overcome difficulties, including, where appropriate, those derived from their condition as a woman and those generated by the needs of reconciling personal, family and work and / or professional life.
An important criterion is also related to supporting the presence of other women in the scientific field and to promote changes in this field towards greater equality.
These criteria will be evaluated by a Scientific Committee, composed of personalities related to the scientific-technological world and gender equity. This committee is chaired by the dean of the Faculty of Engineering of the UNAB, Dr. Alejandro Caroca.
Along with him, the following people make up the entity: Consuelo Fertilio, director of Women Engineers of Chile; Gabriela Castillo, Executive Director of Ingeniosas; Dr. Carla Taramasco, research professor at the Faculty of Engineering UNAB; Dr. Pamela Álvarez, director of the Department of Engineering Sciences and representative of the Gender Equality Committee of the Faculty of Engineering UNAB; Dr. María Francisca Blanco, general director of Research UNAB; Ignacio Guerrero, general director of Graduates, Employability and UNAB Networks; Dr. Nicolás Bronfman, Academic Vice-Chancellor of the Andrés Bello University.
The Scientific Committee will define among the candidates three shortlisted, from among which the winner will be chosen, by an independent jury, headed by the rector of the UNAB, Julio Castro. He will be accompanied in this task: Dr. Silvia Díaz, Minister of Science, Technology, Knowledge and Innovation; Gloria Hutt, former Minister of Transport and Telecommunications; Silvana Droppelmann Igor, from Huawei Chile; Alex Pessó, Legal Director and Corporate Affairs Manager of Microsoft Chile; Dr. Silvana Cominetti, president of the Institute of Engineers of Chile; Margarita Ducci, executive director of the United Nations Chile Global Compact Network; Hernán Orellana, director of Banco BCI, director of Companies, advisor in Digitalization in Innovation; Dr. Alex Rayón Jerez, Vice-Rector for International Relations and Digital Transformation at the University of Deusto.
Boosting women’s participation
Andrés Bello University has been characterized by promoting the participation of women in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) careers, through various national and international initiatives. For this reason, the institution positioned itself as the right one to host the Ada Byro Award in Chile.n. To mention just a few of these initiatives, at the institutional level, UNAB has the Committee for Gender Equity and Female Leadership, and the Faculty of Engineering created a Gender Equality Committee last year to promote justice, equal opportunities and gender equity.
The director of the School of Engineering of UNAB and president of the Gender Equality Committee of the Faculty, Lilian San Martín, said: “We believe that we are responsible for contributing to the search for equality, and we are in continuous work to contribute to the development of girls and women in STEM”.
In addition to academic support from UNAB, the Ada Byron Chile Award 2022 is sponsored by Microsoft Chile and Huawei, as well as the collaboration of HubTec.
The Communications Manager of Huawei Chile and member of the jury, Silvana Droppelmann, explained that “the development of countries is closely linked to research in all areas and, of course, to the adoption of cutting-edge technologies in all areas. That’s why Huawei not only supports female inclusion in ICTs, but in the 170 countries where it operates, it works with different alliances to increase the number of women in science and the tech world.”
Alex Pessó, legal director and manager of Corporate Affairs at Microsoft and member of the jury, commented that “we are excited and honored to participate in the call for the first edition of the Ada Byron award in Chile for women who empower themselves and dare to change the world with science, engineering, mathematics and technology. This is an issue that is intimately linked to our mission.”
“For HUBTEC it is very important to support this type of initiative because gender equality has been incorporated since the beginning of our operations, it is in our DNA, and we consider it extremely relevant to recognize, value and incorporate into the R+D ecosystem the talents and knowledge that many Chilean women have in science and technology”, commented the executive director of HUBTEC, Ignacio Merino.
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