Cherri M. Pancake facts for kids

Cherri M. Pancake is a brilliant scientist who studies both people and computers! She is an ethnographer, which means she studies different cultures and how people live. She is also a computer scientist, someone who works with computers and how they are used.

Dr. Pancake is a professor at Oregon State University. She is known for her important work in making computers easier to use, especially very powerful ones. These powerful computers are called high performance computing systems. In 2018, she was chosen to be the president of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM). This is a very big organization for computer professionals.

Cherri Pancake's Education Journey

Cherri Pancake's path to becoming a computer scientist was quite unique! She first earned a bachelor's degree from Cornell University. Her studies were in environmental design, which is about planning spaces and environments.

After that, she studied anthropology at Louisiana State University. Anthropology is the study of human societies and cultures. She then worked for the Peace Corps in Peru, helping people there.

Studying Cultures in Guatemala

Dr. Pancake spent ten years living in Guatemala. During this time, she studied the Maya peoples, who are an ancient group with a rich culture. For more than six years, she was the curator at the Ixchel Museum of Indigenous Textiles and Clothing. A curator helps take care of and display items in a museum.

In the early 1980s, there was political trouble in Guatemala. Because of this, she returned to the United States.

Becoming a Computer Engineer

Back in the US, Cherri Pancake decided to go back to school. She became a graduate student in engineering at Auburn University. She was the first woman to join this program! She worked very hard and earned her PhD in Computer Engineering in 1986.

Her Career and Research Work

For ten years, Dr. Pancake worked at two places at once. She was a professor, first at Auburn University and then at Oregon State University. She also worked as a visiting scientist at the Cornell Theory Center.

Making Computers Easier to Use

Dr. Pancake did the very first studies on how easy it was to use software for high performance computing. This is called usability testing. She found ways to make these tools much better. She used her knowledge of how people see colors, how quickly computers respond, and how our short-term memory works. This helped reduce programming errors and make the software more user-friendly.

Leadership in Computing

For over twenty years, Cherri Pancake has been very active with the ACM/IEEE Supercomputing Conference. This is a huge conference where computer experts share new ideas. She was the main leader for the SC99 conference in 1999.

In 1993, she started the Parallel Tools Consortium. This group worked on making software tools work well together. She also led efforts to create new software standards.

In 2011, she founded SIGHPC, which is a special interest group within the ACM for high performance computing. She was its leader until 2016. Then, she was elected vice-president of the Association for Computing Machinery. In 2018, she became the president of the ACM.

Working with leaders from Intel Corporation, she helped create special fellowships. These are called the ACM SIGHPC/Intel Computational & Data Science Fellowships. They help more people from different backgrounds get involved in the field of computing.

Awards and Special Recognitions

Cherri Pancake has received many important awards for her work.

• In 2001, she was named a Fellow of the Association for Computing Machinery. This was for her leadership in making high performance computing tools easier to use.
• In 2003, she became a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).
• In 2006, she was honored as one of the Oregon Women of Achievement. This award recognizes women who have made a big difference in Oregon.