She was the first Black woman to earn a Doctor of Philosophy in Computer Science from North Carolina State University in 2005.
[2] Washington said that at 12, she was told by her teacher that she "gave blacks a bad rep." She has also highlighted racist student reviews of her collegiate teaching referring to her as "rude" or "disrespectful".
[3] Washington attended undergraduate school at Johnson C. Smith University, obtaining a Bachelor of Science in mathematics[4] in 2000.
[1][9] Washington, along with Dr. Shaundra Daily and PhD candidate Cecilé Sadler, created the Cultural Competence in Computing (3C) Fellows Program.
[6] In 2021, Washington and Daily were awarded a $10 million grant from the National Science Foundation to establish Duke University's Alliance for Identity-Inclusive Computing Education (AIICE).