Four Extraordinary Women

From The Right Perspective:

Barack Obama has chosen Amanda Simpson as a Senior Technical Advisor to the Department of Commerce...
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Simpson has more than 30 years of experience in the aerospace and defense industry, most recently serving as Deputy Director in Advanced Technology Development at Raytheon Missile Systems in Tucson, Arizona.
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Simpson also holds degrees in physics, engineering and business administration along with an extensive flight background. She is a certified flight instructor and test pilot with 20 years of experience.
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Simpson will be working in the Bureau of Industry and Security.

In 2004, the YWCA recognized her as one of their “Women on the Move,” and in the same year, she won the Democratic nomination to the Arizona House of Representatives. In 2005, she was given the Arizona Human Rights Foundation Individual Award.

From Get Surrey:

Kate Craig-Wood...was named one of the main winners at the NatWest Everywoman Awards.
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Last week’s award capped off a hugely successful year for Ms Craig-Wood and Memset, which is the country’s first carbon-neutral internet service provider.

A fortnight ago, her enterprise was also recognised when she was chosen as the Young Director of the Year by the Institute of Directors.

She's made Management Today's 35 most successful women under 35 list, won the IBM-sponsored Demeter award at the 2008 NatWest Everywoman National Awards, was recognised as the IoD's South East Young Director of the Year, and recently became the youngest person and third woman to join the board of Intellect UK, an IT, telecom and electronics trade association.

She also recently participated in the world's first skydive over Mount Everest to raise money for Computer Clubs 4 Girls, which aims to attract more girls to the sector by improving their technology skills.

From the ACLU:

Schroer, 49, retired from the Army as a Colonel in 2004 after 25 years of distinguished service. As an Airborne Ranger qualified Special Forces officer, Schroer completed over 450 parachute jumps, received numerous decorations including the Defense Superior Service Medal, and was hand-picked to head up a classified national security operation.
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When she interviewed for a job as a terrorism research analyst at the Library of Congress, she thought she'd found the perfect fit, given her background and 16,000-volume home library collection on military history, the art of war, international relations and political philosophy. Schroer accepted the position...

From Lynn Conway's site:

Lynn Conway is a famed pioneer of microelectronics chip design. Her innovations during the 1970's at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) have impacted chip design worldwide. Many high-tech companies and computing methods have foundations in her work.

Lynn received her B.S. and M.S.E.E. degrees from Columbia University in 1962 and 1963. She began her career at IBM Research at Yorktown Heights, NY, in 1964, moving on later to work at Memorex Corporation, at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), and at the Defense Advanced Research Project's Agency (DARPA). Concurrent with her work at Xerox PARC, she served as Visiting Associate Professor of EECS at M.I.T. in 1978-79. She joined the University of Michigan in 1985 as Professor of EECS and Associate Dean of the College of Engineering.

Thousands of chip designers learned their craft from Lynn's book, Introduction to VLSI Systems, which she co-authored with Professor Carver Mead of Caltech. Thousands more did their first VLSI design projects using the government's MOSIS prototyping system, which is based directly on Lynn's work at PARC. Much of the modern silicon chip design revolution is based on her work.

By successfully simplifying and demystifying the previously extremely complex process of silicon chip design, the work of the Mead-Conway team was largely responsible for the rapid progress in VLSI chip design and design tools in the 80's. Taken together, Lynn's many diverse contributions to computer architecture, VLSI design and internet-based chip-prototyping have greatly enhanced later progress in microelectronics, computing and information technology.

Lynn went on to win many awards and high honors, including election as a Member of the National Academy of Engineering, the highest professional recognition an engineer can receive.

What no one knew until recently is that Lynn also did earlier pioneering research at IBM in the 60's.
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Professor Conway has received many major awards for her research contributions, including the Wetherill Medal of the Franklin Institute, the Pender Award of the Moore School at the University of Pennsylvania, the Secretary of Defense Meritorious Achievement Award, the Electronics Award for Achievement, Xerox Corporation's recognition as a Xerox Research Fellow, the National Achievement Award of the Society of Women Engineers (SWE), the GLBT Engineer of the Year Award from the National Organization of Gay and Lesbian Scientists and Technical Professionals (NOGLSTP), an honorary doctorate from Trinity College, election as a Fellow of the IEEE (Lynn was the 12th woman to be so elected), election to the National Academy of Engineering, and election to the Electronic Design Hall of Fame.

Lynn has also served on many significant committees and boards, including the Editorial board of IEEE Spectrum magazine, numerous committees of the National Science Foundation and the National Academy of Engineering, and the U.S Air Force Scientific Advisory Board. She has served on the Board of Visitors of the U.S. Air Force Academy (a Presidential appointment), as a Member of the Corporation of the Draper Lab, as a member of NASA's Office of Space Science Task Force on Technology Readiness, and as a Member of the Council of the Government-University-Industry Research Roundtable (GUIRR) and also of the Air Force Science and Technology Board of the National Academies.

All of these women are transsexual though, so the following reaction at the Right Wing site Free Republic to Ms Simpson's appointment is typical:

I’d hit it:

148 gr at 200 yards sounds about right to me.

'Nuff said.