Congratulations to the winners of this year’s Palantir Scholarship for Women in Technology! This year, scholarship applicants wrote essays addressing why they were pursuing a technical degree, what can be done to increase the number of women in technical fields, and what ways technology can be used to promote opportunities for women worldwide. The finalists were flown to Palo Alto to visit Palantir’s HQ. Morning interviews and a product demo paved the way for a lunch with our Philanthropy Engineers, a tour of Palo Alto, and roundtable discussions with Directors Bob McGrew and Michael Lopp. To cap off the day, the women joined fellow girl geeks at a Bay Area Girl Geek Dinner, the second to be hosted by Palantir.
Winners ($10,000 Scholarship)
Carrie Cai – MIT, MS/PhD Candidate
Carrie is currently working on her MS and PhD in Computer Science at MIT, where she is focusing on user interface design and spoken language systems. After graduating from Stanford with a BA in Human Biology and a MA in Education, she returned to school to pursue Computer Science.
Excerpt from Carrie’s Essay Submission:
“In my view, computer science has a tremendous potential to improve the lives of those facing barriers to education and language acquisition. My dream is to create software that will enable others to more easily communicate and comprehend, through developing language assistive technologies and digital interfaces for learning.”
Anna Kornfeld Simpson – Princeton, 2014
Anna is pursuing a B.S.E in Computer Science at Princeton. She is interested in information security, operating systems, networks, robotics, and getting more women excited about engineering and computer science. Anna co-founded Princeton’s Women in Science Colloquium in 2010 to connect female students and faculty in math, science and engineering.
Excerpt from Anna’s Essay Submission:
“…when I think about the strength of the truly diverse communities I have been in, I know that those with closed minds are the minority. If I am the only woman in the room, then my friend who joins next year will not be. By reaching out to other women interested in computer science, engineering, and robotics, we can build a community that supports and inspires everyone.”
Runners Up ($7,000 Scholarship)
- Nicola Dell – University of Washington, PhD Candidate
- Aakanksha Sarda – MIT, 2014
Finalists ($2,000 Scholarship)
- Elena Frey – Stanford, 2015
- Kathryne Hawthorne – University of North Carolina, 2013
- Katie Kuksenok — University of Washington, PhD Candidate
- Omosola Odetunde – Stanford, 2013
- Pratiksha Thaker – MIT, 2014
Semi-Finalists
- Willa Chen — Princeton, 2013
- Elaine Chen — Stanford, 2013
- Bonnie Eisenman — Princeton, 2014
- Darya Filippova — Carnegie Mellon, PhD candidate
- Kirsten Koa — University of California, San Diego, 2014
- Casatrina Lee — Stanford, 2014
- Jennifer Sleeman — University of Maryland, PhD Candidate
- Kyle Rector — University of Washington, PhD candidate
- Caitlyn Seim — Georgia Tech, 2013
- Amy Tai — Harvard, 2013
For information about next year’s scholarship, check out www.palantir.com/scholarship in the Summer of 2013!