Seattle Girls’ School (2706 S. Jackson St.) will present its 2015 Grace Hopper Awards to Martha Choe and Dr. Maxine Hayes.
Choe will receive the Grace Hopper Award for Exemplary Leadership. Choe, who current serves as director of Seattle branch at the Federal Reserve System, served as the chief administrative officer of Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation from 2008 to 2014. Prior to the foundation, she served as the director of the Washington State Department of Community, Trade and Economic Development. She is former chair of the White House Commission on Asian American and Pacific Islanders.
She previously was elected to two four-year terms on the Seattle City Council and chaired the transportation and economic development and finance committees. She served as vice president at the Bank of California Credit Administration, Commercial and Private Banking. She also taught high school in Eugene, Ore.
Hayes will receive the Grace Hopper Award for Outstanding Achievement. She is the retired state health officer of the Washington State Department of Health, serving the department from 1988 to 2013. Prior to her appointment as state health officer, she was the assistant secretary of community and family in the Department of Health.
She is clinical professor of pediatrics at the University of Washington School of Medicine and clinical professor of health services at the University of Washington School of Public Health in Seattle.
The awards are named for Grace Murray Hopper (1906–1992), who was a mathematician, computer scientist, systems designer and programmer. Her groundbreaking work as a mathematician and computer scientist led to the development of the computer language COBOL. She is more famously known as the “mother of the computer” and was the first female admiral in the Navy.
The 2015 honorees will be recognized during the 13th-annual awards luncheon on May 14. Reservations to attend the annual awards luncheon must be made by April 22 at www.seattlegirlsschool.org/luncheon.