I have a pet theory that the features driving men out of higher education entirely are the same driving women in higher education out of CS/phys/eng: - mistrea

I have a pet theory that the features driving men out of higher education entirely are the same driving women in higher education out of CS/phys/eng: - mistreatment from/conflict with one or two administrators/teachers/profs - feeling out of place or different from peers - missing a small bit of foundation knowledge, feeling incompetent but no clear path to follow to catch up - having obligations outside of education/training (ie family, working to survive) - being more interested in other aspects of life, but having no way to do both simultaneously A boy who's a little slow reading hates grade 11 english but likes shop and drops out of high school. He'll quickly realize he can ignore the teachers he hates, never do homework, and still make good money working construction. This isn't so different from a girl who didn't program in high school, fought her way out of a poor neighborhood into university but is sick of feeling different and constantly explaining her interest in strong emotions and slam poetry to upper/middle-class nerds in first year engineering who think that programming Raspberry Pis is a fun way to relax after finishing circuits homework. As soon as she meets some students in the geography department she feels way more included and "normal" and transfers asap. She still thinks computers, software, and circuits are cool and uses them in GIS classes, but electrical eng classes never talked about the social implications of their work. These examples are simplifications of friends of mine from high school, but I still think they're useful. It would be benefit a lot of people if it were more normal to: a) take 1-2 years more than normal to finish high school b) have time between high school and university to work (not just menial jobs) c) go to a technical/trades school, (work) and then go to university d) take more then 4 years to complete a bachelors e) have at least one class/year that forces good group cooperation in a non-technical task