As the nation celebrates National Hispanic Heritage Month, the Center for Minorities and People with Disabilities in Information Technology (CMD-IT) honors the strides made by the Hispanics/Latinx pioneers and changemakers in the tech industry.

Innovative solutions are busting workplace barriers

Hispanic/Latinx employees in tech organizations face overwhelming barriers to career success. It can be hard to find role models and mentors with similar backgrounds, and it’s challenging to navigate the complexities of unconscious bias in a workforce that lacks diversity. Hispanic/Latinx employees hold just 8% of jobs in high tech, despite making up at least 18% of the overall population. 

CMD-IT strives to create opportunities for communities to network, strengthen relationships and participate in leadership programs. At the 2022 Tapia Conference, industry and academic leaders shared strategies and practices to increase the representation of Hispanic/Latinx’s in computing.

A panel of female Latina Ph.D. recipients shared their personal stories of navigating the dissertation process into careers at Google, IBM Research, the University of Notre Dame and Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. 

Marymount University, a Hispanic/Latinx-serving educational institution, presented effective programs for retaining and preparing Latinx students for the job market. Hispanic/Latinx academic panelists discussed best practices for effective events, networking, and building a sense of belonging — all necessary for increasing  Hispanic/Latinx community in academia.

Strong networks foster opportunities for growth

It is well recognized the importance of strong networks in fostering growth and progression in industry and academia. CMD-IT’s 2022 Tapia Conference hosted the annual meeting for Hispanics in Computing to meet face to face, network and share effective strategies to thrive. The community of computing professionals, faculty and students are focused on mentoring, promoting and advancing the careers of Hispanic/Latinx’s in computing. The Hispanics in Computing community was founded a few months before Tapia 2009 and has been meeting at the annual conference since that time. Several members of the community started attending this Birds of a Feather session as graduate students and are now in tenure track positions or employed in research organizations and paying it forward to serve as mentors for other students.  

Together, CMD-IT and Hispanics in Computing are breaking down barriers and helping communities find their voice in computing. The potential for innovation has never been brighter. To learn more about CMD-IT programs that help our target communities fully engage in computing and promote innovation click here