As a past winner of The Elizabeth Parkin Award for Inspirational Women of Sheffield, Partner Michelle Cooper is supportive of International Women's Day which celebrates women's achievements, promotes equality and raises awareness about discrimination both nationally and internationally.
The theme this year is #EmbraceEquity which is a chance to act on and improve opportunities for women in the workplace, which is a subject Michelle has always championed since she completed her law degree and LLP (Solicitors’ Finals Course) at Sheffield University whilst juggling a young family, going on to head a successful family department in a prominent Sheffield Law Firm in what was very much a 'mans world' becoming one of the most sought after and revered family law solicitors and setting up her own firm in Sheffield City Centre.
From tech to business, it’s time to celebrate the impressive progress women at all levels of the career ladder have made.
To celebrate women's acheivements here are a some examples of how females shaped our high tech world today.
The First Women of Tech
Ada Lovelace - This English mathematician, writer, and Lord Byron's only legitimate child is recognised today for her work in science, technology, engineering, and maths (STEM). She worked alongside Charles Babbage's proposed general-purpose computer. She was the first and, in her time, the only person to see the full potential of Babbage's Analytical Engine to run code. Babbage thought it would be capable of solving equations and doing maths, but she saw that it could perform more complex tasks.
She’s credited for writing the world's first computer algorithm in 1842. Thanks to Ada, the number of developers in the UK private sector has risen by 74,000 in the past three years, according to ONS data in 2021.
Cracking the Enigma Code is one of the nation’s biggest tech success stories. What many don’t know is that 75% of World War Two’s code-breaking operators were women. Estimates show that Bletchley Park was home to 8,000 women. Whilst few females from that era were recognised as cryptanalysts, Bletchley Park’s story still gains momentum, thanks to today’s tech heroines such as software engineer Sue Black.
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