Personal history

I’ve been interested in cyber security since my friend took me along to a dressCode lunch time club at my high school at 13. I then went on to be a dressCode mentor and part of Turing Testers – creating competitions and resources for girls in high school interested in computing. I then chose to study Cyber Security at Edinburgh Napier for the next four years, where I was involved in the university’s computing society, and co-founded a society for women and gender minorities in tech. Outside of computing, I have done Taekwondo for 18 years and love to hike on weekends especially in summer!

Who has been a big/biggest inspiration in your life –

I’m so lucky to have so many people who I could write about in this question. However, I would have to say my old high-school teacher Toni Scullion. She made the computing department a safe space for so many kids at my school, she made time for any student and was always available for a chat. It made me want to be a kinder person. Her work on improving the gender gap in computing science from secondary school level inspired me to do everything I could to help. Small actions have big impacts. Toni’s dedication to getting more girls interested and staying in computing is persistent and constantly inspires me to continue making efforts where I can.

What would you tell your teenage self?

You don’t have to be friends with everyone. I think coming into university, knowing I was going to a degree filled with men, and hearing about the drop-out rate of non-men in computing, I was anxious about finding people to connect with and chat with about courseworks and modules. This meant that I bent over backwards in my first year to remain friends with people I met in freshers who didn’t celebrate my achievements with me and didn’t make me feel wanted.

What was your first career aspiration as a child?

I actually had a million choices for what career I wanted to go into as a child. My very first career aspiration was a window cleaner. As I went through primary school, I was going to be an architect, an interpreter, a paramedic, a teacher, an outdoor education leader, a lawyer etc.

I was really unsure for a while even once I realised I loved computing.