But why were those things not stopping women from majoring in computer science between 1970-1985? Of course, many colleges did not have computer science departments until the mid-80s.
And exclusion doesn’t have to be intentional or active. It can just happen. But I’m just spitballing here.
I have heard it explained that in the early computer boom of the 1980s, it was a relatively new field and had yet to be “gendered.” Many of the women who went into it got exposure through secretarial fields (e.g. doing the grunt work of old punch card computers, shifting over from typewriters/paper filing/paper spreadsheets etc. to early applications for personal computers.) It was with the rise of the “boy gurus” (Gates, Jobs etc) as celebrities in the 1990s that the field became more gendered in the public consciousness. These companies also had a well-documented history of sexism and harassment toward women employees.
Thank you for these links about the trades. One thing that struck me was that most of the “female” trades have requirements for formal schooling and licensing (dental hygiene, radiology tech, cosmetology) while many of the “male trades” allow direct entry (construction) or a path to licensing through apprenticeship (electrician, plumbing) without any formal schooling.
I’m usually the only woman at our state’s structural engineering association meetings. I really thought the situation would change by this point.
It’s not just a tech problem.
Ten years ago I was at a lunch sponsored by one of the many organizations trying to get more women onto corporate boards. (public companies). If you think about the Fortune 1000… that’s a lot of board seats. We all joked that five years from now, the pipeline would be so full and the mission would be accomplished so thoroughly that we’d have to have a picnic in Central Park and pat ourselves on the back for a job well done.
Ummm…no. It is still VERY challenging despite the yelling and screaming about how woke and diversity have taken over the boardroom. And gender is NOT irrelevant when it comes to many decisions that a board has to make. A consumer products company where 70 or 80% of the buying decisions are made by women-- what insights and strategy are they missing when their senior leadership and board is comprised of men?
I have been in the room (and delivered) the powerpoint which shows that you can’t solve your leadership problem until you solve the pipeline problem. Which is true. But if every talented and diverse hire a company makes ends up getting shunted into HR (guilty as charged) or the GC’s office (where MANY large corporations have a majority of female lawyers) which are NOT pipeline jobs to CEO or eventually a board role- wow. Gonna take a while.
Having spoken with many senior women (both in the context of board work and operating leadership) there is a very common phenomenon. The path is tough- sometimes blocked, sometimes just very, very difficult. Until the company is in trouble-- and all of a sudden there’s an SVP or EVP who has “just what we need” to right the ship.
That would be great- except many times the horse has already left the barn. Women joke that it’s a glass cliff, not a glass ceiling. Nobody wants to promote the woman- who is ready, battle tested, has the right experience and tenure-- to a growing, successful division. But once there’s an existential crisis-- sure, let’s let Joanne have a crack at it. Hence the cliff- nobody will miss Joanne if she fails (which 99 out of a hundred leaders would do if the business is in crisis) and then we shove her off the cliff.
Could the rise of computer games in the 1980s have attracted more (high school age) boys than girls to computing in the later 1980s and beyond?
Perhaps that is some of the reason behind the lesser enrollment of men than women in what is ordinarily seen as post high school education (although education through apprenticeships is actually a form of education).
Because I am interested in the decrease of women in tech topic, I have read many explanations. Some blame the video game world - boys got video games as gift snot girls and went on to pursue tech careers. Others say it was a toxic bro culture that developed over time. I have heard that the good female STEM students are more attracted by careers in bio, health, etc. - softer sciences instead of math and computer science. I think we need to look forward (isn’t that what this thread is about - what changes we need to make) and figure out how to get those women back into math and computer science. I have done my part - raised a female tech worker!
I think I had an advantage that I had no brothers, only one sister. My dad is a sports nut, so I started accompanying him to UT basketball, baseball, and football games when I was 4. I think I was the son he never had and he expected a lot of me. I wonder if things would have been different if I’d had a brother?
This possibility hit home when I found out he’d decided to leave his UT football championship ring (which he got because he was chair of the Men’s Athletic Council at the time) to my nephew. What?!? My nephew didn’t even go to UT! For a change, I spoke up to my dad, letting him know how disappointed I was (since I went to UT for six years, even though I could have gone to a lot of other schools), and he said I could have it if I agreed to leave it to my nephew after my death. I really think he wants a male heir to end up with it.
I’m not sure why it’s the case. Girls have outnumbered boys in college and yet engineering/math numbers are not reflecting that. So, where are they going and why? And does it matter if everyone is happy with their choices?
I’ve heard the video game argument but I’m mot convinced because I don’t think that would influence math, electrical engineering, mech engineering, etc. and even most data science fields.
I think the “bro culture” argument goes hand in hand with the video game argument not enough to explain the lack of enrolled girls.
I certainly do not have a ton of visibility but both our kids are in engineering type fields. S is out of college now, but worked with and studied under women in CS. In his current job he works along side women with graduate degrees in CS.
Our D is currently enrolled and has women profs and has joined a lab led by a woman.
So, while the numbers may not be there, it seems like the quality is. Maybe that’s OK - a good start.
The video game argument is only in the context of CS, where the rise of video gaming in the 1980s seemed to match the decline in women in CS. It does not seem to correlate to any other major (others of which are much less obviously related).
So help me out here. Is the argument that high school girls are interested in CS but decide not to pursue it in college because of interactions with high school boys playing video games? Or do the girls start out as CS majors but don’t like boys that are playing video games. Or is it something else?
No, it is that more high school boys than girls are attracted to CS through computer gaming. I.e. not a negative factor against girls, but a greater positive factor for boys.
Ah, interesting. I always thought gaming was an overall negative even for boys.
Gotta get more girls gaming ?? 
Gaming could be negative in various ways for many boys, but can inspire some to look into doing CS, which can be positive for some of those (not necessarily all, since not necessarily all become good at it). I.e. it may be overall negative, but not universally negative for all individuals.
My D was never a big gamer, but did robotics camps and competitions, took CS classes in high school, dabbled with arduinos and programmable robots, but thought engineering was more her jam over straight CS. She does a fair amount of data analytics/data science in her current role though so that background was helpful.
So seems like she had great opportunities. Any idea why other girls in her school did not pursue CS?
As I mentioned in another thread, the elementary school D attended did not consider her or other girls for math acceleration. I don’t know about the others, but it convinced D she was not a math person. H and I tried to counteract that and were not successful. She did continue to get A’s in math including AP Calc (scored a 5 on the AP exam).
She majored in English in college and worked in a related field until she left to pursue an MBA full time. Turns out she did really well in the Finance and Quantitative classes.She is now a Marketing Manager and does a lot of analytics and loves it. Too bad it took her 20 years to believe she was good at math.
She went to a HS that was STEM focused so yes, lots of opportunities. Interestingly there were a number of girls that went into engineering, but none into CS. I’m not really sure why! I think there is only one friend in her entire circle that went into CS. I’ll have to ask my D if she has any ideas of why.
there was an absolutely horrific english class discussion at my school last week that was almost all senior boys except for two girls, discussing the handmaid’s tale. a LOT of things were said. i think we need to put more effort into men understanding that misogyny is still present and that all these efforts for women’s rights didn’t happen very long ago!