5 ms·

Why is shifting people from one major into another on face desirable? We should be glad there are less, eg, female biology majors and future doctors?

raldi 11y ago
If a young woman has equal potential as a future doctor or computer scientist, then sure, it's zero-sum whether she picks one versus the other. The problem is, there are undoubtedly a large number of young women out there who have the potential to become great programmers and love their careers, but for whatever reason, they're ending up becoming average doctors instead and feeling just so-so about their career choice. In the latter case, it's better for both the women in question, and society in general, to support their becoming computer scientists.
- _dark_matter_ 11y ago
  Or, more likely, they might finish their degree but not do well enough to go to Med School anyways, resulting in a different career path altogether.
- saulrh 11y ago
  My SO is one of the women who are better off because they got through a CS degree instead of an alternate. She could have been a good molecular biologist or teacher, but she's a spectacular software engineer, especially for those high-level business-use/architectural tasks that a lot of devs can't handle. She'd be a lot less happy right now if her dad had managed to succeed in convincing her that girls can't program.
tbabb 11y ago
The overwhelming skew in the CS population suggests that women either believe CS is not accessible to them (which isn't-- or should not be-- true), or that the community is unwelcoming to them (which is a problem in of itself and should be corrected, and means that motivated women are turning away from a field that would otherwise excite them). The skew is indicative of a problem. We should fix it.
- Lawtonfogle 11y ago
  Isn't it possible for the skew to also represent that it just isn't appealing (for example it may not be appealing due to socially conditioned gender roles)?
  - tbabb 11y ago
    We won't know if that's the case until we fix the glaring, skew-causing problems that are already there.
- sheepmullet 11y ago
  > The overwhelming skew in the CS population suggests that women either believe CS is not accessible to them It isn't for many of them. Not really. Not as a great career. I'm on ~$160k total comp as a senior software dev working full time. I want to move to a part time 20-25 hours and yet nobody wants to hire me for $80k/year part time.
daveguy 11y ago
You should read the article. What they did wasn't about shifting people from different majors on gender. It was about making CS more accessible in general. It probably increased their CS enrollment (and retainment) significantly. Some things they did: 1) separate experienced from inexperienced programmers in intro classes minimizing intimidation effects where it feels like you are behind from the start. 2) early research programs. Get students involved in applications of CS rather than just theory and fundamental programming for 2 years. 3) "share what works" and "demystify success" are communication with other colleges and moocs about what works in teaching cs along with giving more clear guidelines of what successful performance looks like. So. These have the added benefit of improving the gender gap, but really these are items that will help EVERY CS student. I don't think they corrected for impact of girls who code movements and increased encouragement in HS (eg increase if they had done nothing), but then it isn't a scientific study just a case study.
cortesoft 11y ago
Well, this article is written from the perspective of the CS field. The CS field wants more diversity, for many reasons (better pool of candidates, more diverse field, etc). Any field that has a very skewed demographic would probably have similar outreach initiatives to draw in the under-represented group.

raldi 11y ago

If a young woman has equal potential as a future doctor or computer scientist, then sure, it's zero-sum whether she picks one versus the other. The problem is, there are undoubtedly a large number of young women out there who have the potential to become great programmers and love their careers, but for whatever reason, they're ending up becoming average doctors instead and feeling just so-so about their career choice. In the latter case, it's better for both the women in question, and society in general, to support their becoming computer scientists.

_dark_matter_ 11y ago
Or, more likely, they might finish their degree but not do well enough to go to Med School anyways, resulting in a different career path altogether.
saulrh 11y ago
My SO is one of the women who are better off because they got through a CS degree instead of an alternate. She could have been a good molecular biologist or teacher, but she's a spectacular software engineer, especially for those high-level business-use/architectural tasks that a lot of devs can't handle. She'd be a lot less happy right now if her dad had managed to succeed in convincing her that girls can't program.

tbabb 11y ago

The overwhelming skew in the CS population suggests that women either believe CS is not accessible to them (which isn't-- or should not be-- true), or that the community is unwelcoming to them (which is a problem in of itself and should be corrected, and means that motivated women are turning away from a field that would otherwise excite them). The skew is indicative of a problem. We should fix it.

Lawtonfogle 11y ago
Isn't it possible for the skew to also represent that it just isn't appealing (for example it may not be appealing due to socially conditioned gender roles)?
- tbabb 11y ago
  We won't know if that's the case until we fix the glaring, skew-causing problems that are already there.
sheepmullet 11y ago
> The overwhelming skew in the CS population suggests that women either believe CS is not accessible to them It isn't for many of them. Not really. Not as a great career. I'm on ~$160k total comp as a senior software dev working full time. I want to move to a part time 20-25 hours and yet nobody wants to hire me for $80k/year part time.

daveguy 11y ago

You should read the article. What they did wasn't about shifting people from different majors on gender. It was about making CS more accessible in general. It probably increased their CS enrollment (and retainment) significantly. Some things they did: 1) separate experienced from inexperienced programmers in intro classes minimizing intimidation effects where it feels like you are behind from the start. 2) early research programs. Get students involved in applications of CS rather than just theory and fundamental programming for 2 years. 3) "share what works" and "demystify success" are communication with other colleges and moocs about what works in teaching cs along with giving more clear guidelines of what successful performance looks like. So. These have the added benefit of improving the gender gap, but really these are items that will help EVERY CS student. I don't think they corrected for impact of girls who code movements and increased encouragement in HS (eg increase if they had done nothing), but then it isn't a scientific study just a case study.

cortesoft 11y ago

Well, this article is written from the perspective of the CS field. The CS field wants more diversity, for many reasons (better pool of candidates, more diverse field, etc). Any field that has a very skewed demographic would probably have similar outreach initiatives to draw in the under-represented group.