5 ms·

I Am the Girl That STEM Lost

6 points by Impossible 8y ago

flatfilefan 8y ago
“Math had always been hard for me.” How about an English major then?
- dang 8y ago
  Unless I'm reading it wrong, this is a personally nasty comment. Please don't post those to HN. That's the kind of community we're trying not to be. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- jrnichols 8y ago
  Clearly you didn't read the article because she did in fact pursue an English major instead. :)
justtopost 8y ago
Man, I feel left out of being an NBA star, but never learning to play, and then complaining about it, doesen't help, even if you are short. You get respect by trying and failing, not by failing basic prerequisites and wistfully blaming the tech community.
thanksDr 8y ago
Another victim of abusive math classes.
- rgacote 8y ago
  At least in the US, I think there continues to be a concept that programming is related to mathematics. I remember discovering in college that there were languages like Snobol and Lisp that had very little to do with numeric computation. Opened up a world of possibilities.
daly 8y ago
Bad at math? My college roommate went to the public school in my town. I went to the catholic school. He learned calc 1 and calc 2 before college. I had 2 weeks of trig. We were both math majors. He breezed through calc. I got a D in calc1, 2, and 3. I took the classes a second time. Am I bad at math? Absolutely. Did I give up? No. I have a math degree and a comp. sci. degree. I've been a programmer for nearly 50 years. I have to read a math paper 3 times before I "get it". I have to read and write programs in a new paradigm (e.g. haskell and functional programming) before I "get it". I have to watch videos. What seems to take other people minutes can cost me days of effort. I read tech books every day. Every day for 50 years amounts to a lot of work. STEM didn't lose you. You gave up. You're going to live another 50 years. You can be in STEM. Don't give up.
jrnichols 8y ago
This really came across as a story of a personal setback, but trying to shoehorn in sexism somehow and really goes nowhere except for the "we need more women in STEM" "Without resources and support, it’s no wonder that girls in college aren’t choosing STEM degrees." What does that have to do with the author not doing well in math? She then goes on to say we need to listen to girls, but at this point I think the story has gone off the rails. She didn't do well in math, took an English major instead, and isn't taking any of the free (probably women only) coding boot camps or resources already being offered to her. She's blaming sexism and "the system" for something that it sounds like she can easily overcome and perhaps excel at. As they always say.. you don't know until you try. for the record, college math is what's holding me back from completing my degree. I have also been bad (very bad) at math for many years. literal anxiety over it. This isn't just a woman in STEM thing. As harsh as it might sound, this is the real world. There aren't always hand holding gender specific resources. If you want to do something, you have to take the steps to do it.

6 points by Impossible 8y ago

flatfilefan 8y ago

“Math had always been hard for me.” How about an English major then?

dang 8y ago
Unless I'm reading it wrong, this is a personally nasty comment. Please don't post those to HN. That's the kind of community we're trying not to be. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
jrnichols 8y ago
Clearly you didn't read the article because she did in fact pursue an English major instead. :)

justtopost 8y ago

Man, I feel left out of being an NBA star, but never learning to play, and then complaining about it, doesen't help, even if you are short. You get respect by trying and failing, not by failing basic prerequisites and wistfully blaming the tech community.

thanksDr 8y ago

Another victim of abusive math classes.

rgacote 8y ago
At least in the US, I think there continues to be a concept that programming is related to mathematics. I remember discovering in college that there were languages like Snobol and Lisp that had very little to do with numeric computation. Opened up a world of possibilities.

daly 8y ago

Bad at math? My college roommate went to the public school in my town. I went to the catholic school. He learned calc 1 and calc 2 before college. I had 2 weeks of trig. We were both math majors. He breezed through calc. I got a D in calc1, 2, and 3. I took the classes a second time. Am I bad at math? Absolutely. Did I give up? No. I have a math degree and a comp. sci. degree. I've been a programmer for nearly 50 years. I have to read a math paper 3 times before I "get it". I have to read and write programs in a new paradigm (e.g. haskell and functional programming) before I "get it". I have to watch videos. What seems to take other people minutes can cost me days of effort. I read tech books every day. Every day for 50 years amounts to a lot of work. STEM didn't lose you. You gave up. You're going to live another 50 years. You can be in STEM. Don't give up.

jrnichols 8y ago

This really came across as a story of a personal setback, but trying to shoehorn in sexism somehow and really goes nowhere except for the "we need more women in STEM" "Without resources and support, it’s no wonder that girls in college aren’t choosing STEM degrees." What does that have to do with the author not doing well in math? She then goes on to say we need to listen to girls, but at this point I think the story has gone off the rails. She didn't do well in math, took an English major instead, and isn't taking any of the free (probably women only) coding boot camps or resources already being offered to her. She's blaming sexism and "the system" for something that it sounds like she can easily overcome and perhaps excel at. As they always say.. you don't know until you try. for the record, college math is what's holding me back from completing my degree. I have also been bad (very bad) at math for many years. literal anxiety over it. This isn't just a woman in STEM thing. As harsh as it might sound, this is the real world. There aren't always hand holding gender specific resources. If you want to do something, you have to take the steps to do it.