Alicia Nicki Washington

Last updated
Alicia Nicki Washington
Education Johnson C. Smith University (BS)
North Carolina State University (MS, PhD)
Scientific career
Fields Computer Science
Institutions Duke University
Doctoral advisor Harry Perros

Alicia Nicki Washington is an American computer scientist, author, and professor at Duke University. She is the author of the book Unapologetically Dope. She was the first Black woman to earn a Doctor of Philosophy in Computer Science from North Carolina State University in 2005. [1]

Contents

Early life and education

Washington learned how to code from her mother, who was a programmer at IBM, while growing up in Durham, North Carolina. [2]

Growing up Washington experienced the most diversity within her girl scout troop; and Washington said that it encouraged community between everyone outside of school, despite her growing up in a mostly black community and others in white communities. [3]

Washington said that at 12, she was told by her teacher that she "gave blacks a bad rep." She has also highlighted racist student reviews of her collegiate teaching referring to her as "rude" or "disrespectful". [4]

Washington attended undergraduate school at Johnson C. Smith University, obtaining a Bachelor of Science in mathematics [5] in 2000. She earned her Master of Science in 2002 and her Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in 2005 in Computer Science (CS) from North Carolina State University (NC State). [1] [6] [7] Of the students who have graduated from this university, Washington was also the first Black woman to receive a computer science Ph.D. [8]

Career

2006-2020

In 2006, Washington became an assistant professor of CS at Howard University, where she was the first Black woman CS faculty. [1] [2] [9] At Howard, Washington helped develop Google's "Google In Residence" program. [10] Washington joined Winthrop University in 2015 as an associate professor of CS. [1]

Duke University (2020-present)

Washington joined Duke University's faculty as a professor of CS in June 2020. [1] [11]

Washington founded the course "Race, Gender, Class, and Computing" during her first year of being a professor at Duke University in 2020. [12]

Washington, along with Dr. Shaundra Daily and PhD candidate Cecilé Sadler, created the Cultural Competence in Computing (3C) Fellows Program. [7]

In 2021, Washington and Daily were awarded a $10 million grant from the National Science Foundation to establish Duke University's Alliance for Identity-Inclusive Computing Education (AIICE). [7] [13]

Selected publications

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 "Meet Duke's new faculty of 2020". Duke Stories. 2020-10-13. Archived from the original on 2022-02-04. Retrieved 2022-02-04.
  2. 1 2 Vara, Vauhini (22 August 2014). "Pandora and the White Male". The New Yorker . Archived from the original on 2018-04-10. Retrieved 2022-02-04.
  3. ↑ "Girl Scout Alum Promotes Anti-Racism and Anti-Bias in Tech". Girl Scouts of the USA. Retrieved 2025-10-05.
  4. ↑ Chen, Te-Ping (3 June 2020). "For Black Professionals, Unrest Lays Bare a Balancing Act at Work". Wall Street Journal . ISSN   0099-9660. Archived from the original on 2022-02-04. Retrieved 2022-02-04.
  5. ↑ "People of ACM: Nicki Washington". www.acm.org. Archived from the original on 2022-02-06. Retrieved 2022-02-06.
  6. ↑ "Nicki Washington". SXSW EDU 2022 Schedule. Archived from the original on 2022-02-04. Retrieved 2022-02-04.
  7. 1 2 3 Mahoney, Ashley (27 August 2021). "JCSU graduate widens opportunities in computer science field". The Charlotte Post . Archived from the original on 2022-02-04. Retrieved 2022-02-04.
  8. ↑ Education, Alliance for Interdisciplinary Innovation in Computing. "Nicki Washington, Ph.D. | Alliance for Interdisciplinary Innovation in Computing Education". aiiceinnovates.org. Retrieved 2025-10-11.
  9. ↑ Jackson, Charreah; Gallagher, Demetria; Wilson, Kimberly (March 2019). "15 Black Women Disrupting the Tech Industry". Essence . p. 85.
  10. ↑ Elias, Jennifer (21 February 2021). "Google's program for Black college students suffered disorganization and culture clashes, former participants say". CNBC . Archived from the original on 2022-02-04. Retrieved 2022-02-04.
  11. ↑ Newsome, Melba (27 October 2021). "How tackling tech's diversity challenges can spur innovation". MIT Technology Review . Archived from the original on 2022-02-04. Retrieved 2022-02-04.
  12. ↑ "Nicki Washington". awards.acm.org. Retrieved 2025-10-12.
  13. ↑ "NSF Award Search: Award # 2118453 - NSF INCLUDES Alliance: The Alliance for Identity-Inclusive Computing Education (AIICE): A Collective Impact Approach to Broadening Participation in Computing". National Science Foundation . Archived from the original on 2022-02-04. Retrieved 2022-02-04.

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