FRANKFURT, Germany, July 16 — At a showcase hosted by the Women in High Performance Computing (WHPC) to celebrate female leaders in advanced research computing, Compute Canada signed a memorandum of understanding with the goal to increase the representation of women in advanced research computing in Canada. Compute Canada is honoured to be the first international partner to join WHPC. The showcase was part of the annual ISC High Performance Conference.

“The WHPC network aims to build a community of female high performance computing. Together, scientists, technicians, researchers, users and academics collaborate, share knowledge, mentor, to address the poor representation of women in the subject and achieve equal representation for all in HPC,” says Dr. Toni Collis, Founder WHPC. “This new partnership with our first international partner, Compute Canada, will lay the foundation for a truly global effort.”

Gender inequality is a key problem across all scientific disciplines, both in academia and industry. Research indicates that women educated at a university/college level are more likely to have a technical or professional job than men with a similar level of education. Despite this, women are less likely to be scientists or engineers than men, and are less likely to use a science-based PhD in a research career than men.

“Achieving gender balance in advanced research computing is an important goal for Compute Canada. This is not just an important equality and balance issue. We know achieving gender balance, and diversity in general, improves innovation and research outputs,” says Mark Dietrich, President and Chief Executive Officer Compute Canada. “In order to meet the growing demand for HPC skillsets to address the increasing requirements of key industrial and academic sectors we must support and grow our skill base in this area.”

Compute Canada’s first action will be to work with WHPC to understand why women are underrepresented and create activities in training and outreach specific to this issue.

“Dr. Collis’ work in this area both in research and outreach has been exceptional. We look forward to adopting these key learnings in Canada,” says Mark Dietrich.

About Women in High Performance Computing

The Women in High Performance Computing (WHPC) network supports collaboration and networking by bringing together female HPC scientists, researchers, developers, users and technicians from across the UK. We encourage women in HPC to engage in outreach activities and improve the visibility of inspirational role models. Our activities are complemented by research into the influence of UK equality initiatives on the HPC community.

About Compute Canada

Compute Canada, in partnership with regional organizations ACENET, Calcul Québec, Compute Ontario and WestGrid, leads the acceleration of research innovation by deploying state-of-the-art advanced research computing (ARC) systems, storage and software solutions. Together we provide essential digital research services and infrastructure for Canadian researchers and their collaborators in all academic and industrial sectors. Our world-class team of more than 200 experts employed by 35 partner universities and research institutions across the country provide direct support to research teams and industrial partners.

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Source: Compute Canada