For me it comes down to two factors... 1) In this specific case, I wonder if the geographic location (she moved to Mid-West) had a lot to do with it... ie work

For me it comes down to two factors... 1) In this specific case, I wonder if the geographic location (she moved to Mid-West) had a lot to do with it... ie workers not accepting of a strong woman in the workplace. In other words nothing particularly to do with IT specifically. 2) In general, women just don't particularly gravitate to IT related fields, perhaps because behaviorally logic-brained people are statistically more likely to be men than women, and those are the type of people who get ahead and successful in IT-related classes and careers. Here in SF, I do think we could do a lot more to be accepting and encouraging of women but I think things are a lot better than other places and the main issue is lack of interest by women rather than them being pushed/kept out.