Women in WordPress: Rachel Cherry ![rw-book-cover](https://img.youtube.com/vi/B776s1sbquI/maxresdefault.jpg) ## Metadata - Author: [[YouTube]] - Full Title: Women in WordPress: Rachel Cherry - Category: #articles - Document Tags: [[video-notes]] [[youtube]] - Summary: Women in WordPress: Rachel Cherry - URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B776s1sbquI Next up in our women in WordPress series is Rachel Cherry. Hi Rachel. How are you today? >> Good. How are you? >> Good, thank you. I just realized my microphone was way behind me. Maybe I sound a little different. That's why. Anyway, tell us where you're located and what you do with WordPress. >> So, I am located in Rochester, New York. You're one of the few people I can drive to see. And we have actually. >> We have hung out a few times, had dinner. Um, and I've lived up here for a few years now and I love it. And I work for the University of Rochester as the university's digital accessibility developer. >> I love that. >> And yeah, so I I do work kind of indirectly with WordPress at the university. They do use a lot of WordPress there. And so it's not really my job to maintain the WordPress, but because we use so much of it, I do get to dabble. I do get to create things. I do get to maintain I'm It's kind of funny now. I'm like a website manager and not a developer. Like we have an accessibility website and it's on WordPress and I'm the content editor, not the developer. >> So that's a very interesting, right? It's very different. I'm not I I don't hate it. Um and so but um you may also know me as the founder of WP Campus. It's a community and organization that's for people that use WordPress in higher education. >> And so I still do a lot of work with that group. I'm on the board of directors. >> And I'm planning this year's conference which is going to be actually in Rochester. >> Yay. >> Uh which is very exciting. July 23rd through the 25th. And actually today I'm finishing all of the information so that we can kind of blast that out to people. So awesome. So yeah, a lot of great work with that group. Yeah, >> I can't wait to buy my ticket and be part of it this year because it's >> I love it. I'm so excited that you're doing that. And I do remember when you raised money through WP campus to do accessibility audits on WordPress core. Was that like three, four years ago? Maybe longer. I lose track. >> That was like 2019. So, it's been time is time is weird. That was like a precoid time, which feels like a lifetime ago. Uh, but yeah, that was 2019. We raised over $30,000 to do an audit of uh Gutenberg or the block editor. >> Yeah. >> And share those results out. And a lot of a lot of good work was done on the editor as a result of that audit and report. And that was a that was a great project. >> Yeah, that was fantastic. And it's one of those times when, you know, there we have drama in WordPress a lot of course because people disagree on things, but it was one of those times when it's like instead of just complaining about something, you literally raised the money to put your money where your mouth is kind of thing and made a difference instead of people just having thoughts and ideas and putting them out on social media. You really went for it and and made a difference and I appreciate the work that you do for sure. >> Thank you. Yeah. >> So, why is WordPress important then? So, you've raised $30,000 to make it better. So if anybody thinks it's kind of worth the investment, it would be you. Why is it important to you? >> Well, the I the investment was so important in the sense that it's so heavily used. There's so much of it out there and open-source is powerful tools especially for uh higher education environments and um these enterprise ecosystems where you have very decentralized groups. you know, we're we're constantly working on these ways to share code and share solutions and open source allows us to do that, which is really powerful versus closed or proprietary systems. And so, you know, WordPress is so valuable in our ecosystem because of how it enables us to not only create good work, but create work together. and and when the Gutenberg stuff was happening and there was so much unknown about its accessibility and you know one of the driving forces behind our project was giving people that information. >> You know we weren't making decisions for people on whether or not they should use it but a lot of people in our ecosystems have policies like we have accessibility policies. we can't use tools unless it's accessible and we didn't know like there wasn't good information out there and so we were really glad to do that work so that we could give our community that power to make decisions um that's in the best interest of their organization and and years later you know that great work was done fixes were made and I know a lot of universities are using the block editor now some are still kind of waiting around things move kind of slow in higher ed if you're >> they sure Uh but having this open ecosystem uh full of wonderful people that are really trying to do good work in higher ed and use the software to kind of further the mission of higher education. It's really it's a really great group to be a part of and be support and share ideas and solutions. And and you know, I'm really excited for the conference cuz just kind of getting to hang out with these people in the summer every year and learning from them and just kind of makes you a better and smarter person. Makes me feel smarter. Makes me >> uh and just having that connection. But yeah. >> Yeah. I love that. And I I think about the WordPress community a lot. Um and I I often think of that phrase where they say um look around the room. If you're the smartest person in the room, you're in the wrong room. And I love that WordPress makes me smarter because there are so many people in the room who know so much more about different things than I do and how we can all contribute to each other. So I think that's pretty cool. >> Yeah, totally. >> So when you think of women who are coming into WordPress, coming into tech, maybe thinking about a journey or just starting their journey, what's some advice that you would offer to them? I would say to to just um let's see what's a good way to phrase this. But I think about in my past and in and even in some of my friends, fellow female friends, you know, a lot of uh I feel like what a lot of what holds us back is is confidence and and the the reality is that like a lot of people don't know what they're doing. You know, I don't know what I'm doing all the time. Um, and the best advice that I can give is to kind of break down what you want to do into small chunks and just start moving forward like and to get your ideas out there to write them down and to share them. And that can be the biggest way to kind of move forward. Um, and if you're trying to say like learn a new skill, just, you know, break it down into small chunks and just start learning and coming up with ways to implement it. you know, I'm thinking a lot about I'm a developer, so I'm thinking a lot about development, but even in writing, like I struggle with my confidence in writing and so, you know, I try to break it down >> and the real and just kind of understanding that like, you know, at the end of the day, if you don't actually do anything, you know, you're not going to like do anything. You're not going to move forward. And so, it's kind of a it is a mental block a lot of times. And >> and especially for women, we're it's kind of ingrained in us from from when we're young. And so that's why it's really hard to kind of get over that hurdle. And so yeah, so recognizing that most of it is uh um in your head and and the more that you implement, the more that you, you know, just take baby steps forward, um the more that you share out loud, uh the kind of it's it's kind of the way to get your foot in the door of really anything. uh being active, being being like being purposely active to, you know, to try whatever the whatever the task is or whatever the feat is or Yeah. Just doing something is better than nothing. >> And understanding that like >> most people, >> you know, don't know what they're doing like and so don't Yeah. You know, like it doesn't have to be perfect. It just has to exist and then you can iterate, right? Like that's how that's how you get better. That's how you learn things. >> Absolutely. Baby steps still move you further than not doing anything at all. Absolutely. >> Yes. >> Absolutely. Well, thank you Rachel for taking some time today to share your story of course and the upcoming event this summer. I'm excited about and uh you know your thoughts and and thank you for your contributions to to WordPress and and all that it goes into. So I appreciate your time today and uh look forward to seeing you soon. Yeah. >> Thank you and to you. >> Thank you. [Music], Women in WordPress: Rachel Cherry, YouTube, 01k9gbfbyh8ds1h4pka0ncjwa3.