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Whenever you see this type of article, written by a woman, you expect to read about the difficulties a woman has developing a career (and there are still difficulties), the delays in career progression caused by child birth (and there are delays), etc., but I want to start by saying the world has now changed for women. We see this in politics and international affairs. We all know about Angela Merkel in Germany, and in the UK (where I live), the UK prime minister is Theresa May, and the first minister in Scotland is Nicola Sturgeon. Women dominate political leadership in the UK, with women leading many of the political parties (e.g., Green Party, Plaid Cymru (Wales), and the Democratic Unionist Party), and the UK parliament has 208 female MPs (32% of total). We (women) need to ensure other professions feel a similar impact.

My Background

I am from Bogota, in Colombia, and studied Civil Engineering at Los Andes University in Colombia in the early 1990s. I was one of 15 girls in a cohort of 110 students: this (14%) is a very high percentage for a South American country. I always thought this percentage would increase with time; however, it has decreased considerably over the last couple of decades. Now, it is less than 10% in most countries in Latin America.

I now work in the UK, for a German company, and it is the same story here. 51% of the UK population are female, but only one in six (17%) of engineering undergraduates in the UK are women. This percentage drops dramatically after graduation: only 8% of professional engineers are female, and when we recruit female engineers we discover that four in ten leave the profession.

Are these low figures due to: actual interest in science and engineering careers; the remuneration; the male-dominated environment; or, the fact that we do not see many women in senior posts in engineering?

Let me give you my personal view on the reasons for these low figures, and I will group them into ‘challenges’, which can be addressed.

Challenge 1

Being a woman means that we are faced with the traditional barriers to career progression, and the biological barrier of having children, but both of these barriers can be managed.

Engineering is a male-dominated profession: in the USA, women make up only 13% of the engineering workforce[1]. The UK has similar statistics[2]. Engineering is mainly men; but, that is fine. Medicine was originally 100% men. Now, in the UK, 45% of doctors are female[3]. Let’s keep decreasing these gaps.

In my personal experience, I have not seen any bias in terms of female achievement compared to our male colleagues. I have worked with successful women, who are fairly paid, and have been promoted on merit. But the sample is small – you do not see many of them.

There are also certain jobs that female workers would prefer not to take. A female colleague once said she was excited before her first ‘Offshore Survey’ assignment on a ship in the UK North Sea – it was a great opportunity to gain experience, and it was seen as ‘we can [as girls] do it too’ attitude. I also remember when she came back from the assignment, and said: ‘it was the worst 2 weeks of my life’– and although she was very well-remunerated, she added ‘I would never do it again. It is not for us’. It is not easy for a woman to fit into a traditionally male-dominated environment and facilities, but I know of many men who do not like this type of work, and ‘is not for them’. That should not stop women changing this tradition.

Challenge 2

We need to actively encourage girls to enter engineering. We know women find engineering rewarding: 98% of women in engineering consider it a rewarding career[4]. We need to send this message out to other women, but we do not do a good job. Let me illustrate this point…

When I asked my daughter if she would consider engineering (both her parents are engineers) she emphatically said: ‘No thanks. I want to do medicine’. Not surprisingly, she did not want to go away to a ‘Careers Day’ at the local university her school offered in ‘Women in Engineering’ – in fact, they had 5 places on offer, but only 2 applications. For the Careers Day in the Medical School, they had 10 places on offer, and 30 applicants, and these applicants had to apply in writing justifying why they were interested….

So how does a girl decide to embark on an engineering career when most role models for engineers are male? Are they aware of what it really is about? The problem-solving element? The creativity? Do family members who are engineers inspire them (certainly not in our case!)? Will good school teachers inspire them?

Let’s keep encouraging both boys and girls to do engineering, but for the right reasons; i.e., it involves problem-solving, imagination, creativity, innovation – those are the skills you need and what it is interesting about engineering. Finally, let us also remind everybody that engineering is a ‘portable’ qualification – an engineer can work in almost any country without having to go through painful re-accreditation.

Challenge 3. We need to urgently change the image of women in engineering. The image I had when I was a young student (early 90s) was a woman in a hard hat ‘dressed up as a man’ working in a muddy environment, in a ‘high-vis’ jacket – not quite what somebody would associate with a female career success. Marketing materials, trying to encourage women into engineering still show this strange image. This is not always the case, but when you are 17, you believe that this is an engineer’s life. I now know that this image of an engineer is both incorrect and – frankly – what probably discourages teenage school girls. I do not wear a hard hat, or work in a muddy field. Very few of us will ever do that. Let’s drop this image.

Challenge 4

The general public do not know the breadth and depth of engineering work; therefore, engineers need to be ready to explain what an engineer does.

I started working in the oil and gas industry, combined with education in this sector. While I was doing my degree in Education (this was a multi-disciplinary group: medics, architects, scientists, etc., and me) we had to do a presentation to our cohort on our industry. When I presented my topic in the oil and gas industry, a nurse asked after the presentation: ‘It amazes me why any woman would ever be interested in that topic at all’. OK, the oil and gas industry has a poor image due to its effect on the climate, and the profits made by the oil and gas majors, but we rely on it to provide the world with most of its energy needs. My nursing colleague’s comment was: sexist (why would a woman not have broad interests?); and, naïve (she probably drives a car, has central heating in her house, and uses airplanes to go on holidays). The world would stop without engineers in all engineering sectors.

Challenge 5

A challenge for both men and women is being educated in engineering. When I was about 15, and did my first high school exams, I had a very good result in mathematics; a teacher said: ‘you are good at maths, you should do engineering…’. Is this right? Is this what it is about? When you are 15 and have no life experience, how do you judge? Well, this ‘pressure’ is not only placed on girls: we now know that both men and women had similar reasons for enrolling in engineering: being good at maths and science in high school and wanting an interesting, well-paid professional job¹.

Challenge 6

The first ‘big’ change/challenge for a woman comes when your family arrives – up to that point there was not any real difference between being a man or woman in engineering. The development of my career was delayed due to two children appearing, as I then decided to work part-time for several years. This is a problem, and will delay your career.

I worked part-time when I had my first child, and a friend said: ‘the problem with part-time working is that you are assigned low-interest work, with little responsibility. I don’t like it, and I wouldn’t do it, because it means you are a part-time mum, and a part-time worker, and you do 50% of each job – not very well….’. Well, I don’t think you can be a part time mum… but my friend’s comments were partly true.

In my personal experience, my career did slow down while I was working part-time. Combining being a mother and a professional engineer is hard work. You are not always available for business travel, meetings outside your working hours, etc.. You always feel ‘embarrassed’ every time there is a meeting outside your normal working hours, and cannot make it. You are constantly looking at your watch in the middle of a meeting, as the children’s pick-up time, hoping it finishes on time. You rush to work in the morning, you rush in the afternoon, you finish ‘work’, and then you start ‘work’ at home, and then you finish off work you didn’t do in the office ‘after hours’. Not easy.

Challenge 7

Women need flexible working more than men when they are having their families. That is obvious, but not all companies have that flexibility. I learnt that flexible working also means that while your company is flexible, you have to be flexible: I used to finish my work when the kids were in bed. I am very pleased with the way it worked – I have been lucky with my employers who have been flexible, and allowed me to progress my career at the pace I chose.

It can be challenging even when you have a very supporting partner or a very helpful boss: in the early days, my husband did the school run in the morning, so that I could start work at 7 am, and finish by 1pm. Everybody knew Michelle had to leave at a certain time for school pick up – some my colleagues ended up looking at the clock for me, and reminding me I need to go! We all adapted.

But are other professions more flexible when it comes to looking after a young family? I do know there are some ‘mum dominated jobs now’. A good example is medicine: many general practitioners are able to tailor their hours to fit in with the home life. School teachers are also fortunate to have hours of work that match child care needs. But, in my personal experience, engineering has also been a great choice for a ‘working mum’.

Challenge 8

We all need some help in our careers, and this means help at home and help at work: in the early days my boss did many trips on my behalf as he knew I could not travel very often. Colleagues are important.

Challenge 9

A very big challenge is moving into management, where some of the ‘flexibility’ you have as a more junior engineer is lost. I moved into management, and experienced management issues, which means dealing with technical issues and staff issues. Both are time-consuming, but as a manager you are always ‘on call’. This is not easy: I have seen that women (particularly those with young families) being very cautious about managerial jobs, as it means longer hours in the office, more travelling and time away from their kids – many concerts and little performances missed.

Challenge 10

An even bigger challenge is moving into a more executive level, with the additional responsibility of leadership, and business pressures replace technical pressures. Additionally, you have a lot of travelling to manage. This is time-consuming and disruptive to your family life. This will be the same for both men and women, but when you care about family life you need to be aware that management and executive positions will affect this, and you will need to manage your home life just as much as your working life. Not easy….

In summary…

The ‘glass ceiling’ (an invisible barrier that prevents women rising up the grades to the top) still exists, and, yes, inequalities exist, but I think that the ‘old’ barriers stopping woman progressing are disappearing. Women are still under-represented in engineering, and any change will be slow.

I think good engineering companies, like those I have been lucky enough to have worked for, encourage and support female engineers to reach their full potential. In those companies I have worked for, we have had a very flexible working week, flexi-time schemes, supportive management, etc.. I have not seen any difference in terms of opportunities: for me, it has been a matter of choice, and I have been allowed to balance my work and family life.

I enjoy being an engineer, and I want more women to share this enjoyment.

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About the Author

Michelle Unger, MEng. MSc. CertHE. FHEA.

Michelle is the Head of the Group Business Line ‘Education Systems and Services’ for the ROSEN Group, and is based in the UK.

She has over 20 years’ experience: her early career involved pipeline integrity consultancy, but her more recent experience is in technical training, learning, education, and competence development.

Michelle is a Visiting Lecturer at Newcastle University in the UK, and was a member of the development team of the MSc in Subsea Engineering and Management at Newcastle University. She was also the Program Director of the Distance Learning MSc in Pipeline Integrity Management at Northumbria University in the UK, which was awarded the ASME Global Pipeline Award in 2014.

Michelle is a Civil Engineer with a Masters in Pipeline Hydraulics. She has a PgC in Academic Practice from Newcastle University, and is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.

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[1] S S Silbey, ‘Why Do So Many Women Who Study Engineering Leave the Field?’. Harvard Business Review’. August 23, 2016. https://hbr.org/2016/08/why-do-so-many-women-who-study-engineering-leave-the-field

[2] http://www.wes.org.uk/content/useful-statistics

[3] http://www.medicalwomensfederation.org.uk/about-us/facts-figures

[4] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationopinion/11692958/Women-in-engineering-female-progress-is-not-set-in-stone.html

SOURCE: http://wise.subseaenergy.org.au/resource-library/women-in-stem-10-challenges/

At Microsoft, we’re focused on bringing out the best in people, supporting their goals, and allowing them to find deep meaning in their work.

Our commitment and approach

At Microsoft, we strive to create a respectful, rewarding, diverse, and inclusive work environment that enables our employees to create products and services that help others achieve more.

Read the article..

SOURCE: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/corporate-responsibility/empowering-employees

 

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Originally published at www.pcmag.com.

SOURCE: https://medium.com/pcmag-access/the-real-reason-voice-assistants-are-female-and-why-it-matters-e99c67b93bde

The gender pay gap is well documented: women make about 80 cents for every dollar that a man earns. Less well known: the gender investment gap. According to our research, when women business owners pitch their ideas to investors for early-stage capital, they receive significantly less—a disparity that averages more than $1 million—than men. Yet businesses founded by women ultimately deliver higher revenue—more than twice as much per dollar invested—than those founded by men, making women-owned companies better investments for financial backers.

Read the full article..

SOURCE: https://www.bcg.com/publications/2018/why-women-owned-startups-are-better-bet.aspx

 

What’s New in EDU: Building better pathways for women in STEM

SOURCE: https://educationblog.microsoft.com/2018/03/whats-new-in-edu-better-pathways-women-in-stem/#y2tM4jRl1J4cDAiF.99

 

Companies hiring for technical positions often slip language into their job postings that appeals to men. They say they’re looking for “ninjas,” who seek to “obliterate competition,” and are capable of “dominating.” By now, these wordings are a well understood form of bias that produces more male candidates than female.

But one job in the digital economy falls predominantly to women. It’s an oft-overlooked position, drawing on both marketing and editorial skills, that has become increasingly critical both to business success and online discourse. The pay is poor, and the respect can be limited. Take a look at the job posting for any social media manager. You’ll discover the same bias in its language, in reverse: a bias for sourcing female candidates.

By now, these wordings are a well understood form of bias that produces more male candidates than female.

Social media managers are “the behind-the-screens labor involved in media and technology, central to propelling our digital economy forward,” says Brooke Erin Duffy, who is an Assistant Professor in Communications at Cornell. Between 70 and 80 percent of social media workers self-identify as women on the salary compilation site Payscale. The career has been referred to as the Pink Ghetto.

According to a study, published by Duffy and University of Oxford researcher Becca Schwartz in New Media & Society and slated for a print release early next year, companies create this diversity gap by advertising social media as “women’s work”—at the same time as they routinely undervalue it. Duffy and Schwartz studied 150 job postings to determine how businesses recruit social media specialists. These companies, which included BuzzFeed, Equinox and Thrillist, advertised jobs that called for applicants to be sociable, exhibit deft emotional management and be flexible–all traits that Duffy says are typically associated with women.

The feminized nature of social media employment, Duffy and Schwartz argue, is connected to its “characteristic invisibility, lower pay, and marginal status” within the tech industry. The pair cites statistics from Payscale that place average pay for a social media specialist at $41,000. But that’s for staff jobs. Duffy, who last year published the book (Not) Getting Paid to Do What You Love: Gender, Social Media, and Aspirational Work, has been tracking this field for awhile. This spring, she conducted an additional 25 interviews with social media managers to better understand the dynamics of the job. Most social media jobs, she says, are contract positions; the ghost-tweeters responsible for upholding a brand’s social persona, for example, may be balancing two or three clients at a time.

In the job descriptions Duffy and Schwartz studied, which included both entry-level postings and calls for internships, companies often made the jobs sound like non-work: fun hobbies for which people just happened to get paid. (Or, occasionally paid. Many of the internships were offered without pay, or for school credit.) Postings referred to the job as sociable, blurring the boundaries between work and play. Perks on offer included everything from discounts on classes at Equinox to LaCroix and free massages at the digital media company Ranker. “The assumption was that these jobs were extensions of what people would be doing for fun anyway,” says Duffy.

“The assumption was that these jobs were extensions of what people would be doing for fun anyway”

Duffy notes that social media specialists’ roles are not simply to steward a brand’s presence on social media, but to act as a personal round-the-clock ambassador for the brand. Companies sought out workers who had active social followings already, and could prove they use many different services, from Twitter to Instagram to Pinterest, regularly. For these workers, tech addiction or obsession was not pathologized, but in fact “bound up with notions of the idealized worker,” according to the study. Candidates were encouraged to be always online–and passionate personally about the brands for which they worked. Companies sought workers who expressed social allegiance: Candidates were expected to show a “passion for travel and [The Points Guy] brand,” or a “deep passion for the UrbanDaddy brand and lifestyle.”

SOURCE: https://www.wired.com/story/how-social-media-became-a-pink-collar-job/amp

 

SOURCE: https://www.businessnewsdaily.com/10598-advance-women-in-stem.html

There are three reasons that men should care about the double bind, which happens when women are evaluated against a “masculine” style of leadership. Effective leaders have to take charge and take care, but women leaders trying to be bold and assertive can be labeled (by both both women and men) as unlikeable and bossy. On the other hand, when women leaders show their caring side, they may be perceived as “too soft.” The double bind is often seen as a “women’s issue,” but men should care as well about the impact of the unconscious bias that results from gender stereotyping.

#1. Be a “He for She”

First, men’s lives are deeply connected to the women that surround them: mothers, wives, daughters, sisters, friends, partners, co-workers and leaders.  For professional and personal reasons, the females in men’s lives will likely experience the realities of the double bind. To be an effective “he for she”, men can educate themselves to recognize the causes and effects of the phenomenon. Accordingly, they can help the women in their lives analyze and strategize more effectively when the double bind impacts them.

#2. Change the Culture to Maximize Team Performance

Any person in a leadership position is focused on ways to create high-functioning teams and good outcomes for their institution. Men in leadership need to empower and embolden all the members of their teams and they are in a unique position to keep double bind consequences from hobbling the females from achieving their best performance. As the leader, by paying attention to and addressing the subtle (and not so subtle) ways women are diminished in the workplace, a male leader can start to help everyone understand the consequences of the double bind. He can also use quantitative data to help highlight and evaluate accomplishments so that “hunches” and vague characterizations do not hinder females. Imagine a conversation like this with two people, Bill and Anya, being reviewed for promotion.

Leader: Let’s review these candidates.

Commenter: I find Anya a bit abrasive, so I think Bill would be the right person to promote. He seems to get along with everyone.

Leader: Let’s talk about this. Does Anya’s behavior impact her performance? Her sales team has been performing really well – even better than Bill’s.

Commenter: That may be so, but she is abrupt and too direct. I just have more of a sense that Bill is the right fit and he is smart and aggressive.

Leader: Well, it seems to me that Anya has also been aggressive and smart. And it doesn’t make sense to me to overlook her accomplishments just because you may have a personality conflict with a woman who has been aggressive, but not with a man. I really think we should stick to the data we have on performance.

#3. Free Yourself

Finally, a male leader should care about the deeper sources of gender-bias dynamics because these forces also impact his life. The truth is, unconscious bias can impact anyone who does not fit the stereotype for the gender the person identifies with. Let’s face it, the “hyper masculine” stereotype (aggressive, relentlessly competitive, void of emotional expression) probably does not fit the majority of men in the real workplace even though television (think: Axelrod in Billions) and movies (think: Gekko in in Wallstreet) would have us think otherwise. If we feminize the expression of emotion and masculinize violence and power, everyone is trapped.

Entering a more enlightened and informed understanding of the double bind can help men in the workplace extend the framework to see where gender stereotypes actually might be holding they themselves back. It is critical that the double bind discussion not be seen as a male vs. female debate. Instead, we should be re-crafting the dialogue to understand how each of us can escape the traps created by gender bias.

(For an excellent discussion and many practical steps, I highly recommend a study called Anatomy of Change, by Catalyst researchers Sarah Dinolfo, Jeanine Prime, and Heather Foust-Cummings.) #IWD2017 #BeBoldforChange

SOURCE: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/three-reasons-men-should-care-womens-issues-deborah-streeter/

In 2018, girls and women are getting the message they belong in computer science as much as boys and men, thanks to a greater push for STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) curricula in schools and a vast number of programs available to them outside of school.

Yet the numbers remain discouraging. Although computer science jobs are projected to grow 15% to 20% through 2020, the majority of these positions will be pursued and filled by men, according to Women in Computer Science (WiCS).

In 2016, 26% of professional computing jobs in the U.S. workforce were held by women; 20% of the Fortune 100 chief information officer (CIO) positions were held by women, and 23% of Advanced Placement (AP) computer science test takers were female, based on data from the National Center for Women and Information Technology (NCWIT).

“As STEM-related industries on a whole add over 1.7 million jobs in the coming years, there continues to be a notable absence of women in the field,” according to the WiCS website.

All that has not discouraged Tahsina Saosun, 20, a computer science major at Barnard College and events coordinator for the Barnard/Columbia University chapter of WiCS (CUWiCS).

Saosun became interested in studying computer science after participating in the program Girls Who Code the summer before her senior year of high school. After the eight-week session in which she was introduced to various programming languages, and learned how to declare variables and write code in loops, she was hooked.

Saosun’s experience “has been kind of mixed.” She says she found support in introductory computer science courses, but not as much in upper-level classes. Most of her professors have been male.

Figure. Source: National Science Foundation, American Bar Association, American Association of Medical Colleges.

“Overall, I haven’t felt uncomfortable,” she says, “but I would give credit to my involvement in CUWiCS.” It also helps to be studying at Barnard, a women’s college, she adds. “There’s lots of support and resume advice and career advice. That helps a lot.”

That is something Wendy DuBow is working to replicate for others. DuBow, senior research scientist and director of evaluation at NCWIT, says the organization focuses on generating awareness of computer science to girls in grades K–12, as well as in secondary education and industry.

While some research indicates girls should be exposed to computer science in middle school in order to best pique their interest, other research says “the best thing that could happen is that rigorous computer science be offered in high school so all students are exposed to it … the way they’re exposed to English, math, and science,” says DuBow. “Exposure is a huge influencer and predictor of who will go on to major or minor in [computer science] in college. So, we work on all fronts.”

DuBow believes computer science should be a graduation requirement, but points out there are still high schools that do not offer a single course in the discipline. Even when it is offered, she says, “only certain students will take it, so it doesn’t do anything to broaden participation in computing.” Students will get steered away from computer science unless they show a predilection or fit a stereotype, she says.

“So if you haven’t had exposure [to computer science] and people don’t see you as someone who does computing from an early age, you don’t see yourself that way, either.”

NCWIT offers a program to educate high school guidance counselors about computer science, and hopes to it expand to community colleges.

A female student might take a computer science class in college, but “sometimes there’s still a ‘weeding-out mentality’ going on in introduction to computer science classes,” DuBow says. “That’s not a welcoming environment, especially if you perceive people around you have had more exposure, and if it’s not an inclusive classroom, it’s going to be a turnoff.”

DuBow says it is important not to think of a computer science major as the indicator of success, since there are interdisciplinary majors from which students emerge with a deep understanding of computer science, such as bio-informatics, biomedical engineering, computational media, game design, and multimedia computing.

The overarching issue remains young women’s lack of exposure to computer science, DuBow says.

“As a society, we still have these stereotypes about who ought to be in what kind of field, so there’s still really strong biases against women going into computer science, and that gets inculcated in kids at an early age and instigated by parents, and also counselors.” She adds that there are also “lots of advisors that will steer girls and people of color one way and white boys another way.”

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has weighed in on the issue. During a February speech for the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, Guterres said, “Although both girls and boys have the potential to pursue their ambitions in science and mathematics, in school and at work, systematic discrimination means that women occupy less than 30% of research and development jobs worldwide.”

Guterres said it is important to the world that girls and women be encouraged to achieve their full potential as scientific researchers and innovators. He called for “concerted, concrete efforts” to overcome stereotypes and biases.

Eve Riskin has been an electrical engineer long enough to remember when biases against women in STEM were more obvious. Now associate dean for Diversity and Access in the College of Engineering at the University of Washington (UW), Riskin earned her bachelor’s degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), a school she says her mother picked for her. Her influences were strong; both of Riskin’s parents were programmers, and her siblings also worked in computer science.

Riskin decided she wanted to an electrical engineering professor during graduate school at Stanford University, but when she finished graduate school, “there will still very few women faculty, and I was number four in the electrical engineering department [at UW], which was a huge number in 1990.”

In 2001, the U.S. National Science Foundation launched the ADVANCE program to increase the participation and advancement of women in academic STEM careers. UW received an award to aid those efforts, says Riskin, who is also faculty director of UW ADVANCE.

The program provides professional development for women and junior faculty. This is important, Riskin says, “because if you’re a professor, you live in the department and if your chair is thoughtful and doesn’t have biases, your life will be better—as opposed to one who gives smaller salaries and lousy teaching assignments.”

Riskin says when she was studying, it was not uncommon to hear comments like “Why should I have you in my class when you’re just going to get married and have babies?” There are still stragglers from the old days on faculties, she adds.

Yet progress is being made. In 2016, 27% of the graduates in UW’s College of Engineering were women; today, Riskin says, there are eight or nine female faculty in her department.

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U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has called for “concerted, concrete efforts” to overcome stereotypes and biases that dissuade women pursuing careers in STEM.

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Riskin says there is more to be done to help women advance in computer science, because institutional cultures are ingrained and hard to change, especially when it comes to hiring practices.

“The way people are screened and hired is a problem,” Riskin says. When people’s credentials are questioned, they begin to feel they do not belong, and that perpetuates. “Venture capital firms generally don’t fund women,” Riskin says. “We all have biases and affinity toward people like ourselves.”

People need to be aware of those biases and not have knee-jerk reactions, she says. “We have to be more thoughtful in how we interview candidates.”

Of course there are exceptions, and women who have risen to management roles in STEM fields, like Angie Duong, who became the first female engineer at Irvine, CA-based transmission control protocol solutions provider Badu Networks. Today, Duong is software development manager at Badu, where she leads a team of 12 male engineers.

Despite her achievements, Duong still sees biases in the workplace to be overcome. “When you work with all men, you have to know what you’re doing, you have to establish your reputation, you need to step up and make the decisions,” she says. “Here [at Badu Networks] no one looks down at women, but just because they don’t say it doesn’t mean they don’t think it.”

In the meantime, efforts are on-going to help young women become interested in computer science as a career, and to make computer science welcoming to women rather than exclusionary.

In 2017, the Girl Scouts announced its first-ever cybersecurity badge for girls in grades K-12.

This year, 16 states and one U.S. territory partnered with the SANS Institute, a computer security training and certification organization, on the first “Girls Go Cyberstart,” a national competition to attract young women to cybersecurity.

“There are big barriers to women getting into this field, and we want to give them an on-ramp that is their own,” says Alan Paller, director of research at Bethesda, MD-based SANS Institute.

Paller was pleased that 6,647 girls from 1,000 U.S. schools participated in the competition. Participants performed tasks including cracking codes, plugging security gaps, and creating software tools.

Creating greater gender parity in STEM-oriented professions will take more than improving science education for girls and promoting overall gender equality, according to the 2018 report “The Gender-Equality Paradox in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics Education.” The study by the journal Psychological Science looked at almost 500,000 adolescents from 67 countries in the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), the world’s largest educational survey. It found that girls were at least as strong in science and math as boys in 60% of the PISA countries, and that they were capable of college-level STEM studies.

Yet the gender gap in STEM fields persists.

“The generally overlooked issue of intraindividual differences in academic competencies and the accompanying influence on one’s expectancies of the value of pursuing one type of career versus another need to be incorporated into approaches for encouraging more women to enter the STEM pipeline,” the study notes. “In particular, high-achieving girls whose personal academic strength is science or mathematics might be especially responsive to STEM-related interventions.”

Whether a girl has the desire to be involved in computer science, encouragement and exposure to the field remain focal points. In a time when the #MeToo movement has gained momentum, the push to empower young women to feel welcome in computer science continues as well.

These efforts have gone global. In January, for example, a female coputer engineer and some colleagues created Jiggen Tech Hub, West Africa’s first tech hub for women.

“It’s not about individual women changing their perspectives or doing something different,” says Dubow. “It’s about departments and school systems and industry and hiring practices that have to change to make a difference on this issue.”

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A study of almost 500,000 adolescents in 67 countries found girls were at least as strong in science and math as boys in 60% of PISA countries, and were capable of college-level STEM studies.

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ACM-W, ACM’s Council on Women in Computing, which advocates internationally for the engagement of women in all aspects of the computing field, sponsors ACM Celebrations of Women in Computing, providing monetary and other support in order to connect women working/studying in technical fields and break down feelings of isolation.

The intention of ACM-W in supporting these celebrations, says the organization’s chair, Jodi Tims, is to reach the broadest possible populations of women through an international network of self-sustaining small conferences, dovetailing when possible with ACM-W chapters.

Tims says 87 such Celebrations have been held since 2013, with a total 10,500 attendees through 2017. She says attendance has grown from about 1,500 in 2013-2014 to 5,800 for the first half of this year, and the number of countries in which Celebrations take place has grown from five at the outset to 16 this year.

Tims suggested a variety of things individuals can do to make certain their environments are inclusive, such as:

• Ensure everyone in a meeting, regardless of gender, have thechance to contribute to a discussion.
• Encourage young women to push back against negative peer pressure from both women and men to dissuade them from staying in computing.
• Mentor a female student interested in computing.
• Make certain hiring, tenure, and promotion committees, as well as teaching faculty and managers, understand how unconscious bias can affect their decisions, and help them to develop mechanisms that will disrupt those biases.

Tims points out that ACM “has the potential to set the standard for what it means to be an organization committed to solving issues of gender diversity in computing.”

 Further Reading

Stoet, G., and Geary, D.C.
The Gender-Equality Paradox in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Education, Psychological Science, 2018.

Stout, J.G., and Blaney, J.M.
“But it doesn’t come naturally”: How effort expenditure shapes the benefit of growth mindset on women’s sense of intellectual belonging in computing. Computer Science Education (pp. 1–14), http://bit.ly/2EIZMKP

Blaney, J.M., and Stout, J.G.
Examining the relationship between introductory computing course experiences, self-efficacy, and belonging among first-generation college women. In Proceedings of the 2017 ACM SIGCSE Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education (pp. 69–74). New York, NY: ACM.

Sax, L.J., Zimmerman, H.B., Blaney, J.M., Toven-Lindsey, B., and Lehman, K.J.
Diversifying computer science departments: How department chairs become change agents for women and underrepresented minority students. Journal of Women and Minorities in Science and Engineering, 23(2), 101–119.

DuBow, W., Farmer, R. Wu, Z., and Fredrickson, M.
Bringing Young Women into Computing through the NCWIT Aspirations in Computing Program, Communications of the ACM, December 2013.

Tims, J.L.
Achieving Gender Equity: ACM-W Can’t Do It Alone, Communications of the ACM, February 2018.

Barr, V.
Gender Diversity in Computing: Are We Making Any Progress? Communications of the ACM, April 2017.

SOURCE: https://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2018/8/229774-broadening-the-path-for-women-in-stem/fulltext

Something big happened in the world’s workplaces while Laura Boisvert was at home raising kids: The internet. From 1999 to 2011, while Ms. Boisvert was a stay-at-home mom in Toronto, the internet went from a fast way to send letters to the ubiquitous backbone of most workplaces.

She had used computers in her previous job at the Sears Canada head office, but so much had changed that she was way behind.

“I felt stupid,” said Ms. Boisvert, 52, describing her first attempt back into the work force, doing administrative tasks part-time at a friend’s law office. She had to learn so many new technical skills that she felt like a drag, and says she never really settled into the role. “It was challenging and frustrating.”

Toronto startup ThinkData Works has made it a priority to help women in this situation and is challenging other companies to do the same. Co-founder Bryan Smith said his data analysis firm is offering a “returnship” – a short-term paid placement aimed at helping women relaunch their professional careers after extended stints at home.

“We’re looking to provide the opportunity to people who may be more senior and experienced in the world they’re coming from but who require short-term, contract or part-time work as they transition back to work,” he said, noting there is no specific job description, salary or term because they will develop a role around a successful candidate’s skills. “We want to respect the knowledge of people applying.”

It’s not just the new employees who will benefit, Mr. Smith says. He sees it as a way to attract skilled senior people to the startup world while addressing the significant gender gap in tech at the same time. Shortly after posting the opportunities on the ThinkData Works’ website in April, the company began to hear from potential applicants, even though it has not advertised the positions at all, Mr. Smith said.

“A lot of the initial feedback [from applicants] is, ‘Is this really real?’ We have to say, ‘Yeah, it’s something real!’ ”

In the United States, returnships have become an increasingly popular option for women looking to brush up on skills and ease back into the work force, particularly in the startup world of Silicon Valley. Large companies such as IBM, Goldman Sachs and Deloitte all offer such back-to-work programs.

Toronto’s most prominent returnship is Women in Capital Markets’ Return to Bay Street, which works with a broad group of financial institutions to help women relaunch careers. In four years, the initiative has placed 42 women back in the industry.

Critics of returnships have said slotting experienced female workers into internship-type roles can undermine their skills or delay their search for a permanent job. But sometimes a taste of success is just what a woman needs to feel confident and ready to commit long-term, says Beatrix Dart, a professor at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management.

She believes a truly helpful returnship involves meaningful work and could lead to a permanent position.

Dr. Dart, who teaches strategic management, says when women are out of the work force for a long time, they often experience the collapse of their professional networks, which can make it harder to find the right opportunity. Other common hurdles include doubts that employers would hire someone who has been off for so long, guilt over stepping back from family responsibilities, and uncertainty about what types of jobs to pursue.

“Many women say, ‘I know what I don’t want to do, but what is it that I do want to do, and am I good enough for it? Can I prove that I have a skill set that is relevant for today’s world?’ ”

Dr. Dart is the executive director of the Rotman Initiative for Women in Business, which runs a Back to Work training program that gets hundreds of applications for 35 spots available each year.

“You have to allow women to work through all of those issues,” said Dr. Dart, adding the program concludes with participants giving a professional presentation to representatives from real businesses, which often leads to hires. “[These workers] have a different level of maturity and experience that shows very quickly, but might need some extra support finding their niche.”

For Ms. Boisvert, that niche was a multifaceted role at recruiting firm TalentMinded, which initially hired her for a short-term project that rolled into a permanent position, which she still holds.

TalentMinded is now helping ThinkData Works recruit for its returnships. Co-founder Kim Benedict has done a lot of thinking about the best ways to increase female participation in sales and tech, and says one solution is to address the language used in job postings. She says terms such as “rock star,” “ninja” and “relentless” can give the impression of a male-focused office culture, as can phrases like “don’t take no for an answer.”

Several mothers who recently returned to the work force have found employment at TalentMinded, which offers flexible hours and allows staff to work from home.

Ms. Benedict is excited about ThinkData Works’ returnships and hopes other firms offer similar positions. She cautions that increasing a company’s gender diversity takes conscious effort. Employers should start by thinking about how a woman with a family might feel about working there. Are the hours flexible? Is part-time work an option?

“Part of the problem is that there are just more men in the funnel,” she said, explaining businesses in a huge rush to hire are less likely to get diverse candidates. “You need to try harder, and it will take longer.”

SOURCE: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/small-business/talent/article-returnships-help-stay-at-home-mothers-get-careers-back-on-track/