Mathbabe nailed a couple of key points on what people use to steer toward a career... knowledge the career exists, and belief they would be good at it. Most you

Mathbabe nailed a couple of key points on what people use to steer toward a career... knowledge the career exists, and belief they would be good at it. Most youth view their options in life based on what they see in their immediate social sphere. Having parents as mathemetician lets you know it's possible and probably also contributes to the belief that you could be good at it. If we want more women programmers/mathemeticians/etc, we need to show female examples earlier on to let girls know it is possible and weed out the fools in the education system who espouse girl brains don't work as analytically as boy brains. I bet a lot of girls don't go to mathcamp not because they think it's "uncool" but because they either don't know it exists or don't think they would be good enough.