The pipeline for tech oriented careers opens up around the 6th grade, and starts to become harder to enter around the 11th. I know from personal experience tha

The pipeline for tech oriented careers opens up around the 6th grade, and starts to become harder to enter around the 11th. I know from personal experience that kids at those ages rarely have any idea about what career they'll actually be in at age 30. So the parents that have high expectations--and push their kids to achieve academically--fill up that pipeline early. My own high school had roughly equal numbers of black and white students (40% white, 40% black, 20% others). But all my classes were overwhelmingly whites, Jews, Chinese, and Indians, and their parents were mostly doctors, lawyers, tenured professors (or even university presidents), and business owners. Most of the boys were all in the same scout troop (50). Few played a sport; if they did, it was tennis or cross-country running. Most played a musical instrument. I don't even know where all the black people went after elementary school. They were still there at school, they just weren't in most of my classes (except for the 2 that were in all of them--they had high-expectations parents). Then, once I went off to college, most of the ladies vanished, too. They were in my chem and psych classes. They were in the band. They were certainly there. But they didn't take the CompSci classes. And in the workplace, well, they show up from time to time at different jobs, but most places look just like all the boys from my 6th grade accelerated math class, 30 years later. I don't think you can entirely blame the hiring companies for this one.