This is a great story. Thanks for sharing. If you don't mind my asking, what materials did you use to develop your curriculum, and have you shared the curriculum anywhere? (Apologies if this is on the site. Didn't see it but might have missed.)
Back then at school, I held a presentation about a simple calculator I wrote. I explained them my code in the hope to make programming more interesting. They _were_ interested, but it turned out that, in the end, I was the only one to take an apprenticeship as a programmer.
Then in my apprenticeship, we had one single woman in our class. As far as I remember, she only took that apprenticeship because of her father, who was the boss of some IT company. She quit it after three (of four) years. And no, there wasn't even one single comment regarding her being female.
The other girls at that tech school looked at us in funny ways, sometimes saying things like "Oh look, these guys must be the strange programmer nerds! OMG!" - which was funny, because we usually acted more "normal" than they did.
I don't know what it's like today. It's been about six years since then. But at least back then, the women here simply weren't interested in programming. I got to know two female Swiss programmers until now, and I haven't heard from both of them for more than 5 years now.
It sounds like you're saying, "Programming was offered to them, but they didn't take it, so apparently they didn't want it."
But what was "programming"? Was it a skill/profession, or a lifestyle that was being offered to the women? I think it's often seen as a lifestyle - i.e. programmers only eat pizza and wear hackathon t-shirts and spend their free time playing video games. Of course this is wildly inaccurate. Good programmers need to only have knowledge and an interest and ability to learn more - what you eat, wear, and enjoy as a hobby shouldn't matter. But if you go to someone and ask if she wants to give up her own lifestyle and own interests to become a "programmer", she's going to say no.
I suspect that so many people enjoy the stereotypical activities that they're unable to separate out the programming lifestyle from the actual skills necessary.
> In a survey after the camp, I asked the girls if they may want to pursue computer science in the future: every single student responded with an enthusiastic YES!
Literally and honestly brought a tear to my eye. The world needs more people like Christina Li.
Inspiring. I was glad to see a coding camp for kids in my neighborhood. It conflicted with another summer camp we'd chosen, now I'm curious to know about the gender breakdown of the participants.
I find this ironic coming from an Asian women. Maybe she means a lack of white women in computer science. I recall my University lectures were dominated by Asian students, and of those, the gender balance was pretty even. Among non-Asian students, the vast majority were white men.
> "Maybe it’s because women like Margaret Hamilton [...] and Grace Hopper [...] aren’t as popularized and mythologized as men like Bill Gates and Steve Jobs."
Steve Jobs and Bill Gates are famous for being titans of industry. They are not known for their technical abilities. Steve Jobs never even wrote code.
>Maybe it’s because of the still prevalent mindset that women shouldn’t be in engineering at all.
Is this is an actual prevalent mindset? I've literally never encountered it in the last two decades, although I also never attended university. I do assume, as a white male, that I would be approached by other males who would confide such prejudices in me. I've certainly been approached by white people (in non-engineering contexts) who assumed I would be comfortable with racist behavior so I feel like I would be soaking in obvious, blatant examples of this claim, but it has literally never happened.
Is this just an underlying assumption people have, and it goes unchallenged because of the apparent prevailing belief that contradicting a woman about sexism claims is also sexism? Is it a mindset that one finds primarily on campus? Have I just been lucky in selecting employers?
This is true curiosity, although I'll certainly understand if some of you are too emotional about the topic to avoid downvoting me for asking the question. I've had enough tangles over this issue to know that it's fairly rare to find people willing to calmly discuss these things.
Just as an opposite anecdote, I find that I run into it all the time. Sometimes, its from people that are outside of the tech industry itself. Sometimes, it is from people that don't realize that they are saying such a thing. Sometimes, its from people of different cultural background (e.g. Chinese developers). I see this in SF, saw it in Chicago, Dallas, Atlanta and in the various countries I've worked in.
I also recognized that it has took me a lot of time and a lot of effort to get to a point where I recognize it. 10 years ago, many of the things that would set off the "Hey; that does seem right" alarm bell would be unconsciously ignored and taken at face value.
If I may presume, I'm going to suggest that your experience may be because you're more 'attuned' to racism than you are to sexism. For me, at least, it takes effort and willful learning to come to better grips with sexism, racism, ageism, etc. It's hard work!
As a white male, why would you expect to experience the mindset that is specific to women?
Perhaps you do encounter it, but just think it's so normal that you don't even recognize it.
The most obvious example I encounter is: a woman who may be of average or above average attraction, and the assumption is she is not an engineer, but instead:
a. Marketer
b. Sales
c. Social Media Manager
d. Community Manager
e. Office Assistant
Further examples--attractiveness means a woman got where she is because of something other than her technical ability.
Or even that attractiveness is even relevant at all.
> Is this just an underlying assumption people have, and it goes unchallenged because of the apparent prevailing belief that contradicting a woman about sexism claims is also sexism?
I think you are not familiar with what sexism is, and confuse it with misogyny. There is nothing about sexism to contradict, and beliefs, prevalent or otherwise, have nothing to do with it. Sexism is simply a state of affairs where women have less power than men in society. Sexism in tech is a fact, especially in software, as it is the only white-collar industry that has seen female participation consistently drop over the past couple of decades, unlike other industries (including science, medicine and other form of engineering) where women participation has been steadily on the rise. As tech is an industry that holds a lot of power, the decline in women participation is sexism.
Your claim that you personally have not witnessed overt misogyny has, therefore, little to do with the reality of sexism. Arguing with women or men about the reality of sexism is also unnecessary, as it is a proven fact.
So, given the ability to chose between a personal STEM-related project (mostly male) and teaching activity (the area absolutely dominated by female) on her spring break, Christina went for the later.
Is teaching in this subject also (sic) "absolutely dominated by female"? I doubt it. It's also an incredible amount of work to organize something like this. Kudos to anyone, regardless of gender, who takes this kind of thing on.
I have two little girls. When they're a bit older, I hope some motivated individual is around to put on an event like this for them. If not, maybe that person will be me. :)
Yes, I too prefer not hearing about isolated women doing STEM projects, who are afraid of publicizing their work as a female positive activity. Real coders do it alone, and don't share their work or talk about it, ever, and if they do, then that's very girly of them to do.
Do girls look at Christina Li and see someone who looks weird (admission: I'm old so I have no idea if her personal style choice is fashionable), and does that turn girls off from STEM?
Doctors and Lawyers look more professional, and perhaps that appeals more broadly to the women who would otherwise be qualified to go into tech?
At first, I was confused. The goal of most software projects is to cut costs and increase revenue for some line of business. How does bringing more women into programming help?
I asked my wife this question. Her answer.... It achieves the goal because women traditionally earn less money than men for the same job. I was stunned. Maybe she's right.
> It achieves the goal because women traditionally earn less money than men for the same job. I was stunned. Maybe she's right.
The Gender Pay Gap in the US is all but non-existant, and the largest discrepancy is due the fact that women are less likely to negotiate more than men.
> The goal of most software projects is to cut costs and increase revenue for some line of business. How does bringing more women into programming help?
There aren't enough good engineers to fill the open software positions. Increasing the pool of qualified applicants directly impacts the ability for teams to deliver software.
[+] [-] spiffyman|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] supercanuck|10 years ago|reply
http://tina98.github.io/HelloWorld/
[+] [-] andresmanz|10 years ago|reply
Then in my apprenticeship, we had one single woman in our class. As far as I remember, she only took that apprenticeship because of her father, who was the boss of some IT company. She quit it after three (of four) years. And no, there wasn't even one single comment regarding her being female.
The other girls at that tech school looked at us in funny ways, sometimes saying things like "Oh look, these guys must be the strange programmer nerds! OMG!" - which was funny, because we usually acted more "normal" than they did.
I don't know what it's like today. It's been about six years since then. But at least back then, the women here simply weren't interested in programming. I got to know two female Swiss programmers until now, and I haven't heard from both of them for more than 5 years now.
[+] [-] katelynsills|10 years ago|reply
But what was "programming"? Was it a skill/profession, or a lifestyle that was being offered to the women? I think it's often seen as a lifestyle - i.e. programmers only eat pizza and wear hackathon t-shirts and spend their free time playing video games. Of course this is wildly inaccurate. Good programmers need to only have knowledge and an interest and ability to learn more - what you eat, wear, and enjoy as a hobby shouldn't matter. But if you go to someone and ask if she wants to give up her own lifestyle and own interests to become a "programmer", she's going to say no.
I suspect that so many people enjoy the stereotypical activities that they're unable to separate out the programming lifestyle from the actual skills necessary.
[+] [-] jperras|10 years ago|reply
Literally and honestly brought a tear to my eye. The world needs more people like Christina Li.
[+] [-] alan57|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] smegel|10 years ago|reply
I find this ironic coming from an Asian women. Maybe she means a lack of white women in computer science. I recall my University lectures were dominated by Asian students, and of those, the gender balance was pretty even. Among non-Asian students, the vast majority were white men.
[+] [-] balls187|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 009900giant|10 years ago|reply
Steve Jobs and Bill Gates are famous for being titans of industry. They are not known for their technical abilities. Steve Jobs never even wrote code.
[+] [-] cheepin|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] oldmanjay|10 years ago|reply
>Maybe it’s because of the still prevalent mindset that women shouldn’t be in engineering at all.
Is this is an actual prevalent mindset? I've literally never encountered it in the last two decades, although I also never attended university. I do assume, as a white male, that I would be approached by other males who would confide such prejudices in me. I've certainly been approached by white people (in non-engineering contexts) who assumed I would be comfortable with racist behavior so I feel like I would be soaking in obvious, blatant examples of this claim, but it has literally never happened.
Is this just an underlying assumption people have, and it goes unchallenged because of the apparent prevailing belief that contradicting a woman about sexism claims is also sexism? Is it a mindset that one finds primarily on campus? Have I just been lucky in selecting employers?
This is true curiosity, although I'll certainly understand if some of you are too emotional about the topic to avoid downvoting me for asking the question. I've had enough tangles over this issue to know that it's fairly rare to find people willing to calmly discuss these things.
[+] [-] hammerdr|10 years ago|reply
I also recognized that it has took me a lot of time and a lot of effort to get to a point where I recognize it. 10 years ago, many of the things that would set off the "Hey; that does seem right" alarm bell would be unconsciously ignored and taken at face value.
If I may presume, I'm going to suggest that your experience may be because you're more 'attuned' to racism than you are to sexism. For me, at least, it takes effort and willful learning to come to better grips with sexism, racism, ageism, etc. It's hard work!
[+] [-] balls187|10 years ago|reply
Perhaps you do encounter it, but just think it's so normal that you don't even recognize it.
The most obvious example I encounter is: a woman who may be of average or above average attraction, and the assumption is she is not an engineer, but instead:
a. Marketer
b. Sales
c. Social Media Manager
d. Community Manager
e. Office Assistant
Further examples--attractiveness means a woman got where she is because of something other than her technical ability.
Or even that attractiveness is even relevant at all.
[+] [-] cbhl|10 years ago|reply
I'd also recommend an anecdote by Michael Kimmel, see the section "MAKING PRIVILEGE VISIBLE" at http://www.fjaz.com/kimmel.html.
[+] [-] pron|10 years ago|reply
I think you are not familiar with what sexism is, and confuse it with misogyny. There is nothing about sexism to contradict, and beliefs, prevalent or otherwise, have nothing to do with it. Sexism is simply a state of affairs where women have less power than men in society. Sexism in tech is a fact, especially in software, as it is the only white-collar industry that has seen female participation consistently drop over the past couple of decades, unlike other industries (including science, medicine and other form of engineering) where women participation has been steadily on the rise. As tech is an industry that holds a lot of power, the decline in women participation is sexism.
Your claim that you personally have not witnessed overt misogyny has, therefore, little to do with the reality of sexism. Arguing with women or men about the reality of sexism is also unnecessary, as it is a proven fact.
[+] [-] srgvd|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] oalders|10 years ago|reply
Is teaching in this subject also (sic) "absolutely dominated by female"? I doubt it. It's also an incredible amount of work to organize something like this. Kudos to anyone, regardless of gender, who takes this kind of thing on.
I have two little girls. When they're a bit older, I hope some motivated individual is around to put on an event like this for them. If not, maybe that person will be me. :)
[+] [-] amibeingserious|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] balls187|10 years ago|reply
Doctors and Lawyers look more professional, and perhaps that appeals more broadly to the women who would otherwise be qualified to go into tech?
[+] [-] maxerickson|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pcote|10 years ago|reply
I asked my wife this question. Her answer.... It achieves the goal because women traditionally earn less money than men for the same job. I was stunned. Maybe she's right.
[+] [-] balls187|10 years ago|reply
The Gender Pay Gap in the US is all but non-existant, and the largest discrepancy is due the fact that women are less likely to negotiate more than men.
> The goal of most software projects is to cut costs and increase revenue for some line of business. How does bringing more women into programming help?
There aren't enough good engineers to fill the open software positions. Increasing the pool of qualified applicants directly impacts the ability for teams to deliver software.