S/O: Females in computer science

[Matryoshka]

Back in the mists of time, I took the freshman CompSci weeder course (it was in Pascal at the time).  There was a separate intro course for non-majors, but I took the one for majors, because I always found I did better in courses the more challenged I was.  I had never even seen a computer before. (This was 1983).  I did my programming on a rented dumb terminal.  I had to go to every class and every discussion section and work hard, but I got an A.  And decided I had Zero interest in ever programming again, LOL.

 

I'm still really glad I took the course, though, because I did end up working in the software industry for 10 years (program mgmt, marketing, and QA), and I married an EE, and I am able to follow what he is talking about when he rambles on about the latest problem he's having with one of his programs (which he does a lot; dd thinks she might have picked up a ton by osmosis during her childhood... ;) ).  The basics of the underlying logic of programming remains the same, and that's what I got from that course.  I was working in the industry when the big switch to OOP went on, and I was able to grok the main issues causing hand wringing among all the veteran C programmers who know had to wrap their heads around this new paradigm.  I think some basic programming course should be standard in high school.

 

My own dd took 4 years of programming in high school (she's my one kid who went to ps for hs).  The intro teacher for the pre_AP classes was awful.  She did virtually no teaching.  Kids either 'got it' or got horrible grades.  Dd 'got it' and spent the first year finishing early and helping the other kids who didn't.  Tons of kids had to get overrides to get into the next classes (there's a minimum grade to move on).  Fortunately her AP and post-AP teachers were great, but a lot of kids still didn't do well because they lacked a good foundation because they did those overrides.  The post AP class was based on the old AP CS B exam materials and was on Java Data Structures.  

 

Her CS program does not require any previous knowledge of programming, but it sure has helped her.  She ended up not skipping the intro class because it was in C, not Java, and the school insisted that a lot of AP kids who skipped the C intro class floundered in the next one (also in C). In her case she probably would have done fine skipping it, but it made for a very easy first year.  She's liked her prof, but she says he's introduced things in completely bizarro order.  For example, he introduced recursions before if...then statements.  If...then statements are super-basic, usually first weeks of first programming class.  Dd had already done recursions, but she says it was either in AP or later (I forget which).  But she did wonder how kids without previous programming experience were managing this upside-down order.  That's another way to weed, I guess...

 

She has decided to double-major in math, so that connection is there for her.  Her twin sister always struggled with math, but lately has fallen in love with Logic.  She has started solving symbolic logic problems in her spare time.  She's also interested in Linguistics and plans to combine the two, which will include courses in Computational Linguistics, where I'm guessing there is some programming involved, so maybe she'll end up programming some too.  CSdd is trying to convince her that higher level math is way more fun and she should take more math too... lol

Edited August 6, 2017 by Matryoshka

[shawthorne44]

I read an interesting article about why there are more men than women in STEM.  It didn't have any great revelations, but one statistic that I thought was interesting is that while most people who score highly in math but not verbal domains, go into STEM areas, but the majority of people who score high in both math and verbal domains, tend NOT to, despite those being, in general, better paying.  People who are good at verbal and math areas tend to go into humanities, bio sciences, or soft sciences.  And the majority of people with high scores in both domains are women. 

 

 

I wonder why that is?   Those are the people that could Really rake in the big money.  So many programmers don't have enough social skills to be let out of their cubicle.  Where I work, half of us are programmers.  A friend of mine was promoted to manage a group of programmers because "He was the most socially capable person".   I strongly suspect he is undiagnosed Aspergers that has worked REALLY hard on social formulas.  Sometimes the formulas lead to funny situations, but he has a good heart, so people laugh.   Another guy occasionally has to talk to customers to fix an extremely sticky problem.   He is such a turd that he isn't allowed to talk to customers.   So another employee gets on the phone and the turd messages what needs to be said.   The other employee filters out the grumbles, and says what needs to be said.   Not that they are all turds.   My Dad was one, and he was the nicest guy you'd ever meet.   Of course, he did very well too. 

[catz]

I wonder why that is?   Those are the people that could Really rake in the big money.  So many programmers don't have enough social skills to be let out of their cubicle.  Where I work, half of us are programmers.  A friend of mine was promoted to manage a group of programmers because "He was the most socially capable person".   I strongly suspect he is undiagnosed Aspergers that has worked REALLY hard on social formulas.  Sometimes the formulas lead to funny situations, but he has a good heart, so people laugh.   Another guy occasionally has to talk to customers to fix an extremely sticky problem.   He is such a turd that he isn't allowed to talk to customers.   So another employee gets on the phone and the turd messages what needs to be said.   The other employee filters out the grumbles, and says what needs to be said.   Not that they are all turds.   My Dad was one, and he was the nicest guy you'd ever meet.   Of course, he did very well too. 

 

:iagree: Totally agree.  The people with the really deep tech understanding AND strong communication skills are highly in demand.  Both my husband and I did well because of this. 

 

The program I graduated out of with the average ACT composite of 32+, that particular group must be fairly balanced in their profiles with that kind of score?  Maybe.  I hate to read too much into timed tests.  My kid does do better at English vs. math on the ACT.  But I think if he had a little more time, he'd do just as well in the math section.  It's a speed/accuracy thing for him in that section.  He is a great math student.

 

Edited August 6, 2017 by WoolySocks

[Arcadia]

I read an interesting article about why there are more men than women in STEM.  It didn't have any great revelations, but one statistic that I thought was interesting is that while most people who score highly in math but not verbal domains, go into STEM areas, but the majority of people who score high in both math and verbal domains, tend NOT to, despite those being, in general, better paying.  People who are good at verbal and math areas tend to go into humanities, bio sciences, or soft sciences.  And the majority of people with high scores in both domains are women.

 

My engineering management job paid a lot better than my husband's phd (EE) job. Both in tech giants. My first degree is in engineering because I enjoy hands on. To get better pay, I switched from technical track to management track. I still get my hands on because I was setting up the computer servers for HPC marketing events.

 

My husband felt pigeonholed into STEM because that was where high school kids in our region go for if they are not fantastic at English. Those who are great at verbal went to law school. Our home country's system is direct admission system so high schoolers apply direct to law school and medicine school for freshmen. I know many guy friends who are lawyers and fantastic at math because we go pub crawling together though it is for people watching and not drinking (most of us didn't drink).

 

My kids went to public elementary school and they were expected to be good in math and weak in languages :p The Asian boy stereotype was at the back of most teachers mind. Both my kids verbal scores happen to be high year after year but that goes unnoticed.

 

 

Yes, OOP is a major paradigm shift from procedural programming.  When I tried to self-learn it in the early 2000s, I didn't get very far.  But DS19 had no issue getting through the Java class on his own when he was in 8th grade. 

I started with GW-Basic on DOS 3.3 on a 286 desktop computer my parents bought for me in 11th grade in 1989. OOP shift was happening while I was in college. The college students in my cohort that had a hard time were those that were used to procedural thinking. Those who had a hard time with COBOL, Fortran, C had a hard time with flow charts at the reading flow charts level. Those who had a hard time with C++ and Java had difficulty with the encapsulation concept. It was a mind shift for them.

 

For our kids, they have a blank slate and it is easier for them to pick up OOP concepts. They laugh about Emmet in Lego the Movie but they get the concept of a blank slate.

[Katy]

Huh.  I found my first programming class in college to be easy***, but I got weeded out by the math requirements.  My school required the same math requirements for CS as they did for engineering.  Despite being advanced by a couple of years from high school, I wasn't at all prepared for the college exams where you were to devote 3 hours to 2-3 problems and not have time to finish.  I love AOPS because the goal seems to be teaching perseverance through solving hard problems, verses just breezing through.

 

If I'd taken the time as a freshman to understand that MIS required only business math classes, and had the (easy) business core classes with a handful of programming courses thrown in, and that it tended to lead to intro programming jobs and getting promoted into management later, I probably would have chosen MIS as a major when I was a kid.  But I didn't learn any of that until I was well into adulthood. 

 

DH dropped CS when he was almost done because he realized he wouldn't be any good at sitting at a desk all day.  IE was a much better fit for him.

 

 

ETA: *** Well easy is not quite the right term, because you couldn't fake your way through it without doing the work like you could in other classes.  But as long as you did the assignments, it wasn't challenging intellectually.

Edited August 6, 2017 by Katy

[Terabith]

I wonder why that is?   Those are the people that could Really rake in the big money.  So many programmers don't have enough social skills to be let out of their cubicle.  Where I work, half of us are programmers.  A friend of mine was promoted to manage a group of programmers because "He was the most socially capable person".   I strongly suspect he is undiagnosed Aspergers that has worked REALLY hard on social formulas.  Sometimes the formulas lead to funny situations, but he has a good heart, so people laugh.   Another guy occasionally has to talk to customers to fix an extremely sticky problem.   He is such a turd that he isn't allowed to talk to customers.   So another employee gets on the phone and the turd messages what needs to be said.   The other employee filters out the grumbles, and says what needs to be said.   Not that they are all turds.   My Dad was one, and he was the nicest guy you'd ever meet.   Of course, he did very well too. 

 

My guess is that the reason for this is that if it's women who tend to have the high scores in both verbal and math, and women tend to be oriented towards people and not objects.  Very high gender correlation between those orientations.  But, yes.  People with degrees in math/ computer science/ engineering/ hard sciences who also are good writers and good communicators would be in high demand.

[Frances]

My guess is that the reason for this is that if it's women who tend to have the high scores in both verbal and math, and women tend to be oriented towards people and not objects. Very high gender correlation between those orientations. But, yes. People with degrees in math/ computer science/ engineering/ hard sciences who also are good writers and good communicators would be in high demand.

Besides management type positions in tech, what other types of careers would suit these people? My son has a chemistry degree, but verbal stuff is really his strength (800 on SAT on first try) and is very good at explaining things to people at all different levels and is an excellent writer. But at least for now, high salary is also important to him, so he is not interested in something like teaching, even though he is very good at it. And since we're discussing computer science and programming, he has done some programming for his upper level chemistry classes and research, but he doesn't consider it a strength or interest.

[RegGuheert]

Besides management type positions in tech, what other types of careers would suit these people?

Technical sales: either the salesperson in a two-legged sales team or the technical part of a four-legged sales team.  Pay is excellent and he can apply both his communications and his technical skills.

 

My son has a chemistry degree, but verbal stuff is really his strength (800 on SAT on first try) and is very good at explaining things to people at all different levels and is an excellent writer. But at least for now, high salary is also important to him, so he is not interested in something like teaching, even though he is very good at it. And since we're discussing computer science and programming, he has done some programming for his upper level chemistry classes and research, but he doesn't consider it a strength or interest.

Your son sounds quite a bit like my daughter.  Yet DD24 got her undergraduate degree in biochemistry and is currently a PhD candidate in chemistry.  She is working in the nascent field of computational quantum chemistry which will likely continue to improve (and grow) for decades.  She is not the person who is developing the core simulation tools, but rather she is the chemist who is applying these tools to solve interesting chemistry problems.  She is not a "pure-play programmer" by any stretch, but she does do scripting to control the simulators.  In her case, her chemistry background allows her to operate in a growing field in which she needs some programming skills, but uses them as a tool to accomplish chemistry tasks.

 

Chemistry is much later in adopting simulation tools because the problems are much more difficult than other tasks such as electrical simulation.  Biochemistry is trailing chemistry in this trend since it involves much more complex molecules than combustion chemistry that she is currently considering.

[Katy]

Besides management type positions in tech, what other types of careers would suit these people? My son has a chemistry degree, but verbal stuff is really his strength (800 on SAT on first try) and is very good at explaining things to people at all different levels and is an excellent writer. But at least for now, high salary is also important to him, so he is not interested in something like teaching, even though he is very good at it. And since we're discussing computer science and programming, he has done some programming for his upper level chemistry classes and research, but he doesn't consider it a strength or interest.

 

MIS type degrees (business and programming) sound perfect for him.  Combine it with an MBA if his school has that type of program where he can get the MBA in only one additional year.

[Frances]

Technical sales: either the salesperson in a two-legged sales team or the technical part of a four-legged sales team. Pay is excellent and he can apply both his communications and his technical skills.

 

Your son sounds quite a bit like my daughter. Yet DD24 got her undergraduate degree in biochemistry and is currently a PhD candidate in chemistry. She is working in the nascent field of computational quantum chemistry which will likely continue to improve (and grow) for decades. She is not the person who is developing the core simulation tools, but rather she is the chemist who is applying these tools to solve interesting chemistry problems. She is not a "pure-play programmer" by any stretch, but she does do scripting to control the simulators. In her case, her chemistry background allows her to operate in a growing field in which she needs some programming skills, but uses them as a tool to accomplish chemistry tasks.

 

Chemistry is much later in adopting simulation tools because the problems are much more difficult than other tasks such as electrical simulation. Biochemistry is trailing chemistry in this trend since it involves much more complex molecules than combustion chemistry that she is currently considering.

I can definitely see him in technical sales. He had a very lucrative very part time sales job throughout college.

 

He might also be interested in something like your daughter is doing, as his main field of research was physical chemistry. He's been in Germany doing physical chemistry research and learning German. But at this time he's not interested in chemistry grad school.

[Frances]

MIS type degrees (business and programming) sound perfect for him. Combine it with an MBA if his school has that type of program where he can get the MBA in only one additional year.

Sounds very interesting, I'll pass the recommendation to him.

[6packofun]

USNews 2016 article: Women Can Code – as Long as No One Knows They're Women https://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/data-mine/2016/02/18/study-shows-women-are-better-coders-but-only-when-gender-is-hidden

 

 

 

I must have missed it in the article...were all the female users unidentifiable as women?  Were they disguising their gender?  Just because someone doesn't list a gender on an online forum or form doesn't mean they are using a generic, genderless username.  lol

 

(I'm not even saying I doubt this conclusion, btw, I'm just curious how we know that people accepted their coding advice because they were assumed to be men or whatever it's claiming.)

[Barb_]

This was in my inbox this morning, so I thought I'd drop it here. I don't want to believe this sort if thinking is still a problem, but there you go.

 

Sexism has long been recognised as a problem in Silicon Valley. But a lengthy memo written by a Google software engineer, and leaked online, has laid bare the ugly underbelly of how some in this male-dominated world think about women. The “manifesto†(which at the time of writing remains anonymous) uses scientific evidence in an attempt to explain that women are, on average, biologically different from men, in ways that make them less likely to work in the same jobs. “Women generally have a stronger interest in people rather than things,†the software engineer writes.

 

{snipped}

 

Weak scientific evidence and empty theories are still being used to support troubling ideologies. Women are making enormous strides in science and engineering – yet, with some half-cocked hypotheses in their back pockets, male software engineers feel they have the right to tell them they are somehow biologically unsuited to this kind of work.

 

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/aug/07/silicon-valley-weapon-choice-women-google-manifesto-gender-difference-eugenics?utm_source=esp&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=GU+Today+USA+-+Collections+2017&utm_term=238528&subid=21688839&CMP=GT_US_collection

[Arcadia]

I must have missed it in the article...were all the female users unidentifiable as women? Were they disguising their gender? Just because someone doesn't list a gender on an online forum or form doesn't mean they are using a generic, genderless username. lol

They didn't say in the article. My DS11 has a feminine sounding username for his art of problem solving account and people did ask if he is a girl. When I was working, my initials and last name makes a very gender neutral username. People in the same company but not my department won't know if I am a female or male, and is likely to think male because I was the only female engineer.

 

My longtime girlfriend (ETA: she is a programmer) also has a very gender neutral username. Unless someone is familiar with Chinese names, they won't be able to guess whether she is female or male just by the romanized form of her Chinese name.

Edited August 8, 2017 by Arcadia

[Arcadia]

This was in my inbox this morning, so I thought I'd drop it here. I don't want to believe this sort if thinking is still a problem, but there you go.

He was fired. People knew he would be fired and he probably expects it. Being in Silicon Valley, many people are PC in the workplace and in college. Most people are good at scrubbing their social media presence. My husband's office is extremely quiet as are all my former workplaces in big tech companies, no one wants to be misconstrued. It is not just gender issues that are going PC. Tech conferences used to be fun exchanges of views, now people keep the talk to properties of silicon wafers and processor chips.

 

My former boss has four daughters and would like to have a son. In the 90s, it was okay to say that without being slammed as chauvinistic. Now my friend's husband don't dare to say that except to close friends and my friend was scolded for wanting a son after a few daughters. However someone who wants a daughter after having a son gets supportive comments and well wishes that her next pregnancy would be a girl.

 

I am from an Asian country and I prefer blunt non-PC crap than diplomatic scripted crap. Just because teachers don't say certain sexual stereotypical things does not mean they don't believe them. Better the devil you know than the devil you don't.

Edited August 8, 2017 by Arcadia

[catz]

This was in my inbox this morning, so I thought I'd drop it here. I don't want to believe this sort if thinking is still a problem, but there you go.

 

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/aug/07/silicon-valley-weapon-choice-women-google-manifesto-gender-difference-eugenics?utm_source=esp&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=GU+Today+USA+-+Collections+2017&utm_term=238528&subid=21688839&CMP=GT_US_collection

 

I heard this story on public radio yesterday.  I left a job in the mid-90's due to sexual harassment in a small software company.  It's really depressing this is still going on and especially at such a large and established company.  I hope it's inspires some action in leadership there.

 

The last full time software engineering job I had was at least 1/3 women, racially diverse, and fantastic. 

[gardenmom5]

Besides management type positions in tech, what other types of careers would suit these people? My son has a chemistry degree, but verbal stuff is really his strength (800 on SAT on first try) and is very good at explaining things to people at all different levels and is an excellent writer. But at least for now, high salary is also important to him, so he is not interested in something like teaching, even though he is very good at it. And since we're discussing computer science and programming, he has done some programming for his upper level chemistry classes and research, but he doesn't consider it a strength or interest.

 

consider Ops.  1dd loves it.  she's a classics major (extremely verbal) she is now running the tech dept.  one reason she was hired was they wanted someone who could communicate with NON-tech staff.  like - the ceo, to whom she reports.  (and he's an engineer - but not computers.)

ops gives a much broader understanding of how the systems work, and how the pieces fit together - dev's a really very narrow focus.

 

about your son - 2dd has a chem degree,  then got a pharmD.  average start is six figures.

she has incredible people skills - we joke she could give the pied piper lessons. 

she's in a hospital - (in-patient pharmacy - 24/7) so she gets patients after hours when the out-patient pharmacy is closed. (she finally agreed with me hospitals are much more interesting than a regular dispensing pharmacy/strip-mall/grocery-store)    she still gets to lecture the nurses/staff on rx protocols,  and consult with the mds about drugs.

they are starting to offer one or two year residency programs for pharmds to become specialized to work specifically as part of a team on direct patient care.   they make more.   

[Arcadia]

RegGuheert,

 

There is also the emotional cost to the job that might hit females more than males. Layoffs of people they oversee may hit them harder emotionally. The rest of the article quoted below is a good read as well.

 

Inside the world of Silicon Valley's 'coasters' — the millionaire engineers who get paid gobs of money and barely work

"She was making $1 million a year, mostly in stock, and running a team of about three dozen people, she told Business Insider. And she had worked herself into a state of exhaustion in the three years since Facebook had acquired her previous company. The acquisition had been highly political, the integration wasn't going well, and she had been killing herself to make it more successful and protect her people from losing their jobs over it."

 

As tired as she was, she couldn't just quit this job. She owed a big chunk of money in taxes thanks to that stock and needed her salary to pay those taxes.

 

But after getting violently ill at the thought of going to work, she decided not to go in. Not that day. Not ever again. And she knew she wouldn't get fired.

 

Because not going to work was actually her manager's idea.

 

The previous day she had told him she would be leaving the company at the end of the year, six months away. She wanted to spend the rest of the year wrapping up her projects but not taking on any more, collecting on the stock that would vest by year end and making the money she needed to pay her taxes." http://www.sfgate.com/technology/businessinsider/article/Inside-the-world-of-Silicon-Valley-s-coasters-11737691.php

[Frances]

consider Ops. 1dd loves it. she's a classics major (extremely verbal) she is now running the tech dept. one reason she was hired was they wanted someone who could communicate with NON-tech staff. like - the ceo, to whom she reports. (and he's an engineer - but not computers.)

ops gives a much broader understanding of how the systems work, and how the pieces fit together - dev's a really very narrow focus.

 

about your son - 2dd has a chem degree, then got a pharmD. average start is six figures.

she has incredible people skills - we joke she could give the pied piper lessons.

she's in a hospital - (in-patient pharmacy - 24/7) so she gets patients after hours when the out-patient pharmacy is closed. (she finally agreed with me hospitals are much more interesting than a regular dispensing pharmacy/strip-mall/grocery-store) she still gets to lecture the nurses/staff on rx protocols, and consult with the mds about drugs.

they are starting to offer one or two year residency programs for pharmds to become specialized to work specifically as part of a team on direct patient care. they make more.

What is Ops? It sounds interesting. How did your daughter get into it from classics?

 

My husband is also an in-patient pharmacist at a hospital and loves the lifestyle and pay after a career of long hours and low pay in academia. My son has spent time shadowing him, but thinks it is too boring. Ironically, I said the same thing to my mom when she suggested it as a career when I was in high school. Knowing what I now know, I think it would have been a great fit.

[Terabith]

The thing is, it's not bias to state that in general, girls (who grow up to become women) are more oriented towards people than to things.  The difference in gender based interests is gigantic - 0.93, and evident within two days of birth, and among other primate species as well.  Not EVERY woman prefers people over things, and not every man prefers things over people.  But the difference is among the largest in social psychology.  That interest orientation difference is gigantic. 

[Katy]

Now that the Google memo from last week has wider news coverage, I'm curious if this thread was inspired by it?

[RegGuheert]

Now that the Google memo from last week has wider news coverage, I'm curious if this thread was inspired by it?

Not in the slightest.  I had no knowledge of the Google memo when I posted this thread.  And besides, the premise of this thread is the *opposite* of what is expressed by the Google memo.

 

[gardenmom5]

What is Ops? It sounds interesting. How did your daughter get into it from classics?

 

My husband is also an in-patient pharmacist at a hospital and loves the lifestyle and pay after a career of long hours and low pay in academia. My son has spent time shadowing him, but thinks it is too boring. Ironically, I said the same thing to my mom when she suggested it as a career when I was in high school. Knowing what I now know, I think it would have been a great fit.

 

 

 

ops = operations. the nuts and bolts.  she took a certificaiton program for the most desired certs.  you can do them through a cc, tech program, or online. 8 -12 weeks.   then she was off at big tech company doing sql and database admin.  now she's at a small business that desperately needs someone who knows what they are doing.  she's have a blast.  but it's intense.

there are cisco certs that can also be done in a fairly quick time-frame - and can be profitable.  1ds was making $15 an hour right out of high school with the ccna - and he was limited in what he could do because he was under 21. there are three levels of certification for cisco networking- and if you get the third level - you can practically write your own ticket.

 

dh's niece started in the university genome lab - and they sent her off to learn database admin as she was low man on the totem pole.  she loved the power - especially when things crashed and they were dependent upon her saving them.  she now makes A LOT of money working part time.

 

2dd - pharmacist - did eventually admit she should have listened when I suggested engineering for her. . . . 

[Arcadia]

My ragweed allergy is acting up so can't do much except web surfing :(

 

If I look at California's AP Computer Science A results breakdown for 2016, the results are very even between the genders. Same for National level. What is obvious is more males than females took the exam in California and at the national level. There is no data on the 2017 AP Computer Science Principles exam yet.

 

Out of 10,244 students who took the exam, (7,474 males, 2770 females)

Score of 5: 655 females, 1978 males

Score of 4: 602 females, 1575 males

Score of 3: 598 females, 1599 males

Score of 2: 305 females, 793 males

Score of 1: 610 females, 1529 males

Mean: 3.14 females, 3.22 males

 

National level: 54,379 students 12,642 females, 41,737 males

Mean: 2.9 females, 3.03 males

 

Source:

https://research.collegeboard.org/programs/ap/data/participation/ap-2016