Women Underrepresented In Computer Science Summary

Women have always been viewed as the weaker sex, and society will continue to view them that way unless they do something about it. In the essay “When Bright Girls Decide that Math is a Waste of time”, the author Susan Jacoby discusses the problems women steering clear of math and science subjects because of the traditional view of a woman. She focused on what causes high school girls to focus on arts courses instead of STEM courses and what are the effects of it on themselves. The underlying discrimination amongst boys and girls, stereotypical thinking of parents and teachers that girls are not good at math eventually decreases the self-confidence among girls to solve science and math problems.

The force of societal stereotypes is a large part of this gap. Instead of joining STEM careers, the most common careers among women are secretaries, nurses, and elementary and middle school teachers (Mandell). This truly illustrates that when well-rounded, talented women have the choice, they are inclined to delve into the field in which society expects them to belong. In this way, the stereotype of women not being involved in STEM is forcing less women to be involved in these fields. The deficiency of women in technical fields, despite their well-roundedness and ability, can be directly related to unyielding cultural stereotypes that stigmatize women in supposedly masculine fields.

This program is an after school program that runs three days a week, inviting young girls to come to the science center to learn about STEM in a fun, educational, interactive and empowering way. Girls will be divided into age groups that focus on age appropriate activities where they are mentored by female professionals in the STEM field that will offer inspiration. Some of the issues addressed would touch on female empowerment, building confidence in STEM areas, fighting negative stereotypes about women in the STEM field, different career options including coding, date creation, cyber security, ethical hacking, engineering, math, science, biology and chemistry. Girls will take part in each branch of the STEM field and be exposed to the many things it offers. The science center is seeking to make the program available for girls aged six to eighteen as we believe the earlier the exposure the more confident the girls will be come and the longer the exposure the more invested they will be. The science center has paired with other nonprofits that are working to collect data for studies and reports regarding women in the STEM field. The science center and these organizations will use this program to collect data to

The college level is, in a certain sense, too late.” The young ladies are nowadays deciding what they're would like to major much earlier than what than young men would like to major in. If they decide they're not interested in computer science at the end of 8th grade, there's nothing that can change them to do at the college level to change their paradigm. The sad news here is that the number of computer sience teachers is very less and so much so that theirs is only one out of 10 teachers that is competent enough to teach computer science. Hence, the problem of the lack of good computer science in the secondary schools in the country is also a very big major problem. Therefore, it wouldn’t be wrong if we say that the problem of the shortage of jobs takes place in the United States from the very rudimentary level. Therefore, we need to dig deep to completely clear this problem of not having enough computer science majors else it won’t long enough that there would be a technological crisis in the United States just because there aren’t people to handle the multiple databases and control cryptology on which the world currently

Being a woman programmer “put [her] at one remove from the general society of programmers” (728).  Ullman expresses that there is a good ratio when having four women in 24-person company. According to a new study, in the U.S, the average percentage of technology jobs held by women has actually fallen over the past few years. It is plain to see that sexism today is much as same as Ullman describes, or even worse. Ullman mentions that despite of many rule of laws and social activism, women are still inferior to men. Moreover, she gives some advice for women who are facing with sexism at work by either fighting back or looking for another job. No matter how the choices these women make, they can not eliminate the fact that “the prejudice [always] follows [them]” (729). Ullman strongly recommends women to “[tack] into the love of the word” and keep in mind why they pursued that job in the first place. By doing that will “create a suspension of time, opens a spacious room of [their] own in which [they] can walk around and consider [their] response”

Traditionally, men take on the manufacturing, engineering, science occupations in society. Since the 1970’s women’s representation in science, engineering, mathematics, and technology, a group of subjects known as STEM, occupations has increased; but younger girls, under 40, remain underrepresented in these occupations (Census). Furthermore, within the group of few but strong females a part of STEM lies a huge discrepancy between employment of whites and Asians, compared to Africans, Hispanics, and native Americans. Although it is hard to identify the reason for the limited amount of girls in these subject areas, some specialist speculate lack of girls is due to stereotyping threat, stigmas of females lacking the intelligence to comprehend

Men are the people who have the most rank in technical skills. There has not been any growth in jobs in STEM since 2000 for women. It has been said that the pattern may begin in early education. Females may not be encouraged to study math and science as much as males are encouraged to do so. Very few of females who earn bachelor’s degree do so in the area of STEM. However, slightly over half of bachelor’s degrees are earned by women. Many people believe that females lack the intelligence to be successful in STEM. Others believe women do better in skills such as education, and humanitarian roles such as doctor’s an lawyers. Sometimes women themselves believe that men have what it takes to be successful in STEM. Sometimes females have “self-esteem”

Although computer industries have grown exponentially, there still remains a shortage of quality computer science graduates to support this growth. This is more pronounced amongst female graduates who are less attracted to this field. The challenges in computer science are well documented, with studies suggesting that female’s attitudes about computer science are set early on, where they find computer science to be boring and characterised as geeky and uninteresting (Cheryan et al., 2015). The declining interest means that fewer students are being drawn into undergraduate computer science courses. Despite, a wide range of initiatives to encourage females in computer science, this still continues to be a challenge (Computer Science Online,

Andresse St. Rose, Christianne Corbett, and Catherine Hill, are actively involved in the field of female studies in education and researchers for The American Association of University Women. In their 2010 book titled Why so Few? Women in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics, the first chapter is the book’s namesake and contains a wide depth of information, from statistics regarding a smaller female presence in STEM careers, differences across gender in students pursuing STEM related AP courses, and a comparison of the gender divide in earlier years with the present time.

Stereotype threat was first defined by Steele and Arson as the “social-psychological threat that occurs when one is in a situation or doing something for which a negative stereotype about one’s group applies. This predicament threatens one with being negatively stereotyped, with being judged or threatened stereotypically, or with the prospect of conforming to the stereotype” (Steele, 1997, p.614). The biggest stereotype when we talk about STEM fields is “Why so Few [women]?” Then comes the cultural stereotype that boys are innately better than girls at math and sciences, which is inescapable in the U.S. and apparently at the fault. Recent trends in achievements by girls and women compare to their counterparts, as well as years of scientific research, demonstrate that this notion is simply incorrect. Although the number of women still lags behind the number of men in many STEM fields, the reasons for this gap are cultural biases and institutional barriers that hinder the advancement of women.

The U.S. Department of Education recently reported that even though relatively more female high school graduates took advanced STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) courses than male counterparts, their interests in STEM subjects were significantly low regardless of race/ethnicity (U.S. Department of Education, 2015). Furthermore, there are significantly less women who completed STEM degrees compared to men (Lee, Alston, & Kahn, 2015). This gender discrepancy has been the key goal for the researchers for the last decades, and many studies have examined how to promote gender parity in STEM fields.

The Technovation Challenge that required you to code a mobile application to solve a community problem sparked my interest in computer science. I built up my skills in CS through the preparation for this competition, which led me to continue learning new programming languages like Java and HTML. The key message behind this competition was that even if you are a woman, you could accomplish anything in a STEM field. Only after this was I exposed to the inequality present in STEM fields. I wanted to give the same opportunities to girls all over to inspire and prepare them to pursue STEM fields. After being selected by the Made With Code Advisory Committee, I was further educated on the inequality and how much girls would be benefited if they had

Century-old traditions of girls growing up with pink ribbons and dolls rather than toy airplanes or building kits places young girls in a bubble of who they are and what they are meant to be. While girls grow to become industry professionals, the Silicon Valley’s culture developed by Cannon and Perry drives women away because “men tend to prefer working with things while women prefer working with people”. However, the technology industry is arguably one of the most interpersonal careers because communication and teamwork are necessary to develop successful products. Furthemore, confident females who stand up for themselves are generally labeled as “bossy” rather than proactive by their peers. The day-to-day alienation women faced causes them to lose their confidence and believe they would fail in a technical career.

areas of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics employers are not getting enough women (Pozniak). High school girls only represent 17 percent of computer science Advance Placement (AP) test takers (O'Shea). The most significant group of minorities who are behind in earning computer technology degrees and working in science and mathematical professions are women. “Historically, women’s low representation in science and engineering was said to be due in large part of their lack of ability, interest, or both” (Horning 30). However, this is no longer a true fact according to Ward. Some suggestions to increasing the amount of women in sciences include introducing already present women faculty as mentors. Over the last three decades,

Parents also have a vital role in influencing the career path their children choose. Children look to their parents as role models and for approval, and parents attitudes and actions will influence their children. They also take into account what job their mother has as compared to their father. In many cases, children start to associate gender with particular jobs when they are very young due to their family life(Stitt, 1988). Stereotypes, like those, are brought forth to girls everyday, ranging from the traditional female jobs to males being more intelligent than females. One example is the fact that there aren’t as many women as men in jobs such as scientists and doctors. Girls often don’t question this idea because it is reinforced by so many people. These stereotypes sometimes get adopted by girls because of this constant reinforcement. Parents have the opportunity either to invalidate these stereotypes or confirm them by their actions and words. They must reassure their children that girls can participate in anything they want, including math and science activities or courses.