4 ms·

hey this hackerschool looks pretty cool. I see that their is a checkbox for "I am a woman" though. I am a high school-er that goes to vocational school for soft

by mel9 14y ago

hey this hackerschool looks pretty cool. I see that their is a checkbox for "I am a woman" though. I am a high school-er that goes to vocational school for software engineering. I also happen to be a girl. I'm not so sure about putting a checkbox of "I'm a woman". It might turn that group away and I don't even like the idea of it too much. I'd rather have people see me more than just a gender.

jacalata 14y ago
Would it make you more comfortable to have it just be a radio button for M|F?* Did you read through the FAQ or play with the checkbox enough to realise that they ask this because they have scholarships that are only available to women? Or are you uncomfortable with the concept of affirmative action in general? (Possible fix: have a checkbox 'I am eligible for a scholarship and would like to apply for one'. Automatically reject from the school anyone who turns out to have checked this without being eligible.) *ignoring any possible issues with presenting gender as binary there
graue 14y ago
Pretty sure that's only asked because they offer need-based scholarships to women. If you don't need the scholarship, you could probably leave that unchecked if it makes you feel more comfortable. The blog post announcing the scholarships states explicitly that there's no other special treatment: "We're not going to lower the bar for female applicants. ... Women will be judged on the exact same scale as men. We think to do otherwise would be insulting and counterproductive. We care a lot about getting more women into Hacker School, but we won't do it at the expense of the quality of the batch." - from https://www.hackerschool.com/blog/1-summer-2012-applications-open https://www.hackerschool.com/blog/1-summer-2012-applications... I'm in the current Hacker School batch (which is awesome), and can vouch that the above seems 100% true. On the whole, as a group, the women are every bit as smart, as experienced, and doing as cool things as the guys are. As a result, no one has to think much about gender - we just hack. I hope your concerns don't hold you back from applying.

by mel9 14y ago

jacalata 14y ago

Would it make you more comfortable to have it just be a radio button for M|F?* Did you read through the FAQ or play with the checkbox enough to realise that they ask this because they have scholarships that are only available to women? Or are you uncomfortable with the concept of affirmative action in general? (Possible fix: have a checkbox 'I am eligible for a scholarship and would like to apply for one'. Automatically reject from the school anyone who turns out to have checked this without being eligible.) *ignoring any possible issues with presenting gender as binary there

graue 14y ago

Pretty sure that's only asked because they offer need-based scholarships to women. If you don't need the scholarship, you could probably leave that unchecked if it makes you feel more comfortable. The blog post announcing the scholarships states explicitly that there's no other special treatment: "We're not going to lower the bar for female applicants. ... Women will be judged on the exact same scale as men. We think to do otherwise would be insulting and counterproductive. We care a lot about getting more women into Hacker School, but we won't do it at the expense of the quality of the batch." - from https://www.hackerschool.com/blog/1-summer-2012-applications-open https://www.hackerschool.com/blog/1-summer-2012-applications... I'm in the current Hacker School batch (which is awesome), and can vouch that the above seems 100% true. On the whole, as a group, the women are every bit as smart, as experienced, and doing as cool things as the guys are. As a result, no one has to think much about gender - we just hack. I hope your concerns don't hold you back from applying.