Ana Rico (COM`24)

Born and raised in New York City, Shateva Long (CAS ‘23) has been inseparable from her computer since she can remember. After participating in a Girls Who Code program in high school, which revolved around video game design, she discovered her passion for coding, and decided to come to Boston University as a Computer Science major.

Upon arriving at BU, Shateva discovered that studying Computer Science was not, in fact, video game design. Rather than the coding experience she had initially expected, the curriculum had a more theoretical and math-based approach. Nonetheless, as someone who had always loved math, she enjoyed the problem-solving challenges.

“I always wanted to build something,” says Shateva. “but in my courses I couldn’t find a lot of project-based learning.” As a very hands-on person, she couldn’t shake the feeling that something was missing from her college experience.

That’s where BU Spark! came in, a BU initiative to support student-driven projects related to computer science and engineering. During her sophomore year, Shateva joined their Innovation Fellowship Program, and took the role of team lead, which gave her the opportunity to start her own project.

And, motivated by a conversation Shateva had with a BU student who was confused about the Black Lives Matter movement, Shateva came up with an innovative idea. After diving into articles about the movement, she realized that the majority of the authors’ own perceptions and biases would creep into their descriptions. She decided to create a tool to combat bias, as well as to help other students learn about bias and reflect about their own experiences.

Along with two other CAS developers, and a CFA UX designer, Shateva launched B (or Bias) Scanner, which allows users to copy and paste text found on the Internet into the app, where it is scanned to identify potential words or phrases that could exhibit racial bias. Shateva’s group received the first $2,000 Spark! Equity Innovation Fellowship, funded by a grant that supports students working on innovation projects that address issues related to diversity, equity, inclusion, and antiracism.

“Racial bias is found all throughout medical textbooks and it is negatively affecting the lives of women of color, especially Black women. Even outside of textbooks, I see this bias and it is impacting the way information is being digested,” Shateva said at the time. “My classmate was expressing their confusion with the Black Lives Matter movement and claimed that the sources they read had conflicting information. The first thing I thought was, how can I fix this?”

Shateva’s dedication to diversity and inclusion work didn’t stop there. Together with a friend, she created the Black Policy Initiative, a project supported by then-Dean of Students Kenneth Elmore, aimed at empowering black students, and involving them in the decision-making processes on campus.

Her dedication to DEI was further fueled by a personal experience involving two friends who, despite not looking anything alike, were able to unlock each other’s phones due to their similar skin tones. Curious by this, Shateva researched and discovered that this is something that mostly happens to people with darker skin.

This motivated her to combine her passion for DEI with her love for technology, and create the DEI Tech Collective. This student initiative tries to hold tech leaders accountable and make sure no one is pushing DEI down their priority list.

“We don’t see much change, because people don’t believe that change is needed,” says Shateva. “Progress can be achieved faster if we just include everyone. I’m not talking only about color, I’m talking about different abilities, backgrounds, and socio-economic status.”

Shateva’s journey has been marked by many occasions where she has stepped up as a leader, in both the technology world and as a first-generation college student — from serving as a computer science ambassador and a code instructor, to being a peer mentor for the FY101 First Generation Students section. “I’ve noticed that I always tend to take leadership roles, even when I try not to,” she said.

Together with some friends, Shateva also initiated the Age of Advocacy initiative, a program dedicated to supporting middle school women of color during their transition to high school, by engaging them in projects through a social justice lens.

After four years at BU, Shateva believes that the Computer Science curriculum really made her a “better thinker,” and Bu Spark! helped her discover her career path. She is now ready to start working in Redmond, Washington, as a project manager at Microsoft. Shateva is excited to experience life after college, while she keeps trying to make a difference regarding diversity, equity, and inclusion.

“Because of my great experience here, I feel ready to go,” she said.