Black Girls Code Founder Presented with Toyota Standing O-Vation Award by Oprah

Kimberly Bryant's Black Girls CODE is on a mission to change the face of technology.

For her remarkable work, she was presented with Toyota's Standing O-vation Award by Oprah at the San Jose stop of the Life You Want Tour.

Bryant, an engineer by training, attended Vanderbilt and learned quickly of the alienation that accompanies being the "only one."

"One of the first experiences I had with being a double minority was being introduced to the rest of the staff and my team by my manager by him saying, ‘Well, for Kimberly coming on we got a twofer; she's a woman and she's a person of color,'” Bryant recalled in Toyota's Standing O-Vation video.

She decided to make a change four years ago after her daughter, Kai, expressed interest in pursuing a similar career path.

“When she was 11 she attended a summer camp in technology and game design. As I looked around, it just kind of hit me that oh my God there's not too many girls in here, and that she was the only student of color,” said Bryant. “ Afterward she kind of opened up to me and said, ‘Yeah mom, sometimes the instructions wouldn't pay as much attention to the girls as they did the boys.'”

Bryant's organization often provides Black and brown girls their first introduction to the world of STEM.

Photo Credit: Facebook/Kimberly Bryant

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Kimberly Foster is the founder and editor of For Harriet. Email or Follow @KimberlyNFoster

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