Women's History Month Special Edition
About Computers in the Classroom
Changing Girls' Attitudes About Computers
SO MUCH TO SEE, SO MUCH TO LEARN, SO LITTLE TIME - HURRY UP!
- Computer Wonder Women - see this first
- National Women's History Month
- What you can do to help GRRLS get into technology!
Here are all kinds of resources, mentoring programs, projects, and links for helping girls using science, math, technology, to cross that digital divide. - Anita Borg Institute: The 6 Attributes Of High Ranking Women In Tech
- Best Online Resources For Women and Minorities in Science and Technology
- Educating Girls in the New Computer Age (2000)
- HERSTORIES Classroom Project
- FEMALE RINGLEADERS ON THE PLAYGROUND
- RESOURCES FOR WOMEN ENTREPRENEURS
- Business Plan Resources for Women
- Grants for Women who are Entrepreneurs
- Grants for Women & Girls
- WOMEN PIONEERS
- GENDER DIVIDE
- MARCH IS "WOMEN'S HERSTORY MONTH"
- INTERNATIONAL GENDER EQUITY RESOURCES
- WOMEN GENDER AND TECHNOLOGY POWERPOINT PRESENTATION
- Enter your resume once and its available in a bunch of different formats including Word and PDF. http://www.emurse.com
2014 How to ask to get paid to speak
2014 Women don't need to figure out how to get more productive; instead, the system needs to be changed so that women are evaluated equitably.A Sociology grad student at Stanford has done a study in which she looked at 500+ assistant professors in each of 3 fields at research universities. She very carefully examined research productivity, as measured by publications and the prestige of the publications' venues. When controlling for research productivity, it turned out that women in computer science departments were 55% less likely than men to get tenure.
Pushing Our Own
Boundaries
Stop Sabotaging Your Own Success: A Manifesto
The reality is, in most cases no one will be there to give you permission to act. To try. To succeed. And to fail. No one will take you by the hand and say, "Now it's time. You're ready." No one will be so sure to say, "Don't worry, you won't fail." No one will lay their hand on yours as you click that submit button, as you fill out that form, as you sign up for that chance, as you raise your hand.Teachers' and Girls' Attitudes Towards Computers
THE SUCCESSFUL WOMEN - SMART IS BEAUTIFUL!!
Women invented networking, computer languages, and programming. In 1946 ENIAC
(Electronic
Numerical Integrator And Computer ) was the first 30 ton Electronic Digital Computer. My father Jerome H. Ellis was just back from the WW11 and had the occasion
be
in the room with this computer. I don't really remember the story about why he was there, but I do
know
that the women were the known as the original computers they were the ones who worked to
make ENIAC run. Computing was their job. It was womens work, and it was a women who literally found the
real
bug that messed up Eniac.
Radia Perlman was dubbed the “Mother of the Internet”. Perlman's algorithm forms a
sort
of road map to navigate the internet. Jean Bartik was one of the six women who programmed ENIAC. Kay
McNulty
Mauchly Antonelli graduated from Chestnut Hill College in 1942 and was recruited as a human computer.
Betty
Snyder Holberton of Philadelphia and Rear Admiral Grace Hopper helped create Cobol and Fortran. Dr.
Dorothy Danning is responsible for cryptography and data security. The actress Hedy Lamarr was the
first to describe frequency hopping
SMART IS BEAUTIFUL
It's quite apparent what the value is in something so obscure and mysterious as "smart is beautiful" - it lets everyone see their own idea of it. Some people see sexy chicks, some see elegant science, some see pretty female faces, some see - whatever you see. My male nerd colleagues loved it because it allows them in the "beautiful" picture too. It can fit anyone. It certainly wasn't meant as "sexy chicks" or "pretty female faces". If you are reading it that way, you are simplifying it, dragging it down into something it isn't. So a statement like that is a little of a koan, you need to relax your mind and go into it and kinda meditate on it. If you are getting defensive immediately, it is hitting a button in you and needs a little reflection. The intent behind the statement is to open something inside, and to think wider and deeper, to get something beautiful in. To feel the beauty in oneself, science, computers, and life in general. And to finish, there is a Navajo song: I walk in beauty. Beauty is before me, Beauty is behind me, Above and below.
Hedy Lamarr Female Inventor
Find out about of Hedy Lamarr aka the famous Austrian actress Hedwig Kiesle Inventor of Wireless Technology during National Women's History Month.
2007 Females now constitute an undeniable majority of the US Internet population. eMarketer estimates that there will be an estimated 97.2 million female Internet users ages 3 and older in 2007, or 51.7% of the total online population. In 2011, 109.7 million US females will go online, amounting to 51.9% of the total online population.
4/11/2000 The Philadelphia Inquirer RE: Martha
Woodall
To the Editor:
Your article, "Girls Turned Off by Computer Culture," accurately reported the
findings of the American Association of University Foundation report, "Tech-Savvy: Educating Girls in
the New Computer Age," but the article failed to acknowledge efforts under way in Philadelphia and
across the country to address these problems.
The article included only a scant mention of those who are working diligently to increase computer fluency
and no mentions or URLs for Webs sites that are trying to address these issues. Examples include:
- Computer Women Pioneers
- Top 25 Women of the Web for 2000
- Best Online Resources For Women and Minorities in Science and Technology.
The article provided a good look at the problem. It should have provide a better look at those who are working on solutions.
Jim Leonhirth
Educational CyberPlayGround
Philadelphia, PA
Tech jobs are usually male-dominated and techie women often not 'typically' feminine
2007 sexual harassment and 'non-feminine' behaviour
"BEHAVING like "one of the boys" to get ahead at work may not be the best strategy for
women. A study had found that alpha-females are more likely to suffer sexual harassment. "Women who
display what many regard as traditional male traits - such as assertiveness, independence and ambition -
are
more often the targets of sexual harassment than "feminine" women, the Canadian research has
found. The situation is worst in workplaces dominated by men, where women with so-called masculine
personalities - described in the study as "uppity" - suffered more than twice the harassment of
other women. "The researcher, an assistant professor at the University of Toronto, Jennifer Berdahl,
says it is the first systematic evidence that women who veer furthest from the feminine ideal are most
likely to be sexually harassed at work and socially.... 'These results highlight the double bind faced
by women who are dismissed and disrespected if feminine but scorned and disliked if masculine, limiting
their ascent up the organisational ladder,' Dr Berdahl said." http://snipurl.com/1ksn4
Mitchell Baker Chairperson for the Mozilla
Foundation
As Chair of Mozilla, Mitchell continues her commitment to an open, innovative Web and the infinite
possibilities it presents. TIME Magazine profiled Mitchell under “Scientists and Thinkers” in its 2005
TIME
100. She has also appeared on “The Charlie Rose Show” and “CNN Global Office” to discuss open source
software and the Firefox phenomenon. In 2009, Mitchell was honored as winner of the Anita Borg
Institute's 2009 Women of Vision Award. In 2010 she was the recipient of the Aenne Burda Award for
Creative Leadership and was honored as the recipient of Frost & Sullivan's 2010 Growth, Innovation and
Leadership Award. She is also a part of the Henry Ford Museum's Innovator Program.
2015 WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT ASKING FOR A RAISE Think you can't ask for a raise? Think again. Almost 60% of workers don't ask for one. PayScale's salary survey, released this year, reports that 57% of employees haven't asked for a raise in their current field. Problem: women do speak up and if they find out that a man or woman doing the exact same job as they are and speaks up and says she wants a raise the boss can fire both of them. That is legal!
U.S. gender pay gap emerges early, study finds 2007
A dramatic pay gap emerges between women and men in America the year after they graduate from college and
widens over the ensuing decade, according to research released on Monday. One year out of college, women
working full time earn 80 percent of what men earn, according to the study by the American Association of
University Women Educational Foundation, based in Washington D.C. Ten years later, women earn 69 percent
as
much as men earn, it said. What we do know is not good.
Why companies need women
engineers 2007
Big practical reason why tech companies need more of us.
Two staff members ask for feedback in very different ways. One was male, one was female. Guess who was
which.... Also, guess who agonized more at making the point that he/she wanted to be told more
frequently
that he/she was doing well. Both wanted feedback more often.
1. I think that overall I'm doing a pretty good job. Do you agree?
2. When can we set up a time to talk about how I'm doing?
CHANGING GIRLS' ATTITUDES ABOUT COMPUTERS
Issue: Digital Divide/Gender 2004
As the San Jose Mercury reported yesterday, the American Association of University Women Educational
Foundation issued a new report, "Tech-Savvy: Educating Girls in the New Computer Age," which
recommends a number of ways that girls could be encouraged to take an interest in technology.
Recommendations include:
1) Teachers should use computers in innovative ways throughout the school curriculum, so that girls who
are
not necessarily drawn to the computer lab might have their interest in computing sparked in, say, a
literature class;
2) Teachers should receive better training not only in incorporating the computer into the classroom, but
in
ensuring that girls as well as boys use the equipment;
3) Computer games and educational software should display less gender bias;
4) Initiatives should be launched to combat stereotypes that many girls have about the antisocial nature
of
computer work; and
5) Support should be given to efforts to start computer clubs and summer-school computer classes for
girls.
The New Gender Gap MAY 26, 2003
From kindergarten to grad school, boys are becoming the second sex
http://www.businessweek.com
Lawrence High is the usual fortress of manila-brick blandness and boxy 1960s architecture. At
lunch,
the metalheads saunter out to the smokers' park, while the AP types get pizzas at Marinara's,
where
they talk about -- what else? -- other people. The hallways are filled with lip-glossed divas in designer
clothes and packs of girls in midriff-baring track tops. The guys run the gamut, too: skate punks, rich
boys
in Armani, and saggy-panted crews with their Eminem swaggers. In other words, they look pretty much as
you'd expect.
But when the leaders of the Class of 2003 assemble in the Long Island high school's fluorescent-lit
meeting rooms, most of these boys are nowhere to be seen. The senior class president? A girl. The
vice-president? Girl. Head of student government? Girl. Captain of the math team, chief of the yearbook,
and
editor of the newspaper? Girls.
It's not that the girls of the Class of 2003 aren't willing to give the guys a chance. Last year,
the juniors elected a boy as class president. But after taking office, he swiftly instructed his
all-female
slate that they were his cabinet and that he was going to be calling all the shots. The girls looked
around
and realized they had the votes, says Tufts University-bound Casey Vaughn, an Intel finalist and one of
the
alpha femmes of the graduating class. " So they impeached him and took over."
The female lock on power at Lawrence is emblematic of a stunning gender reversal in American education.
From
kindergarten to graduate school, boys are fast becoming the second sex. "Girls are on a tear through
the educational system," says Thomas G. Mortenson, a senior scholar at the Pell Institute for the
Study
of Opportunity in Higher Education in Washington. "In the past 30 years, nearly every inch of
educational progress has gone to them."
Just a century ago, the president of Harvard University, Charles W. Eliot, refused to admit women because
he
feared they would waste the precious resources of his school. Today, across the country, it seems as if
girls have built a kind of scholastic Roman Empire alongside boys' languishing Greece. Although
Lawrence
High has its share of boy superstars -- like this year's valedictorian -- the gender takeover at some
schools is nearly complete. "Every time I turn around, if something good is happening, there's a
female in charge," says Terrill O. Stammler, principal of Rising Sun High School in Rising Sun, Md.
Boys are missing from nearly every leadership position, academic honors slot, and student-activity post at
the school. Even Rising Sun's girls' sports teams do better than the boys'.
Study Finds Wage Gap Is Just the
Beginning
By Laura Koss-Feder 04/16/02
A new report finds a surprisingly large gender gap in salary, venture-capital funding, board positions,
and
just about every aspect of the business-executive world.
NEW YORK (WOMENSENEWS)--For all the success that women have enjoyed in the corporate world and in their
own
businesses over the years, hard data indicates that true gender equality remains a far off goal. The
prestigious Committee of 200, a 20-year-old network of top women entrepreneurs and corporate leaders,
recently completed its first-ever Business Leadership Index. It showed how businesswomen fared in relation
to men on a 10-point scale, with 10 representing parity with men. In an aggregate of 10 separate
benchmarks,
women scored an overall 3.95.
The study, released in January, also predicted how long it would take before women achieved parity. These
benchmarks, which included comparing men to women in the areas of board membership of Fortune 500
companies,
access to venture-capital funding, company size, enrollment in graduate business programs and gender wage
gap, each had their own index numbers as well.
"The numbers show the lack of progress. Those women who have done something wonderful and have
managed
to break through the glass ceiling are few and far between," says Anna Lloyd, president of the
committee.
Women Losing
Ground in Engineering, Technology 07/22/01 By Vera Haller
A major report says women and girls have made significant progress in science over the past two decades,
especially in medicine and the biological sciences. But the gains in the male bastions of computer science
and engineering are being erased.
Women, minorities high-tech group gets backing March 2, 2001 by Sharon Gaudin
Gender Bias in Computing
Work
A joint project between Glasgow's Department of Computing Science and Strathclyde's Department of
Human Resources Management is analysing the significant gender bias which exists within the software
industry, including the under-valuation of women's skills both as developers and operators.
Contact:
Mrs Janet Stack
Department of Computing Science
University of Glasgow
Tel: +44 141 330 6493
E-mail: jstack@dcs.gla.ac.uk
Study: Girls Don't want to be geeks
BY JACQUI PODZIUS COOK July 3, 2000
High school junior Katy Prendergast is pretty blunt
about
why she decided to take a computer programming class. She doesn't care what goes on inside her
computer.
She has no grand thoughts about a high-paying technology job. All that mattered to Katy was getting
another
credit toward graduation; the introduction to computer programming class happened to fit her schedule. She
did well, earning a ``B,'' but she'd still rather leave the technical work to someone else.
``It's tough work getting it to work exactly correctly and it's frustrating because one misspelled
word and you can't get it to work,'' Katy said recently during the final week of classes at
Mother McAuley Liberal Arts High School on Chicago's southwest side. Referring to Microsoft Corp.,
chairman Bill Gates, she added, ``I say let him have it all, let him do it all.'' Technology
experts
find that an alarming number of young girls feel the way Katy does. The number of computer science degrees
awarded to women is hovering below 30 percent at the same time technology companies are begging for highly
skilled employees.
Changing Girls' Attitudes About Computers April
12, 2000 By PAMELA MENDELS
If there is to be equality of the sexes in the world of information technology, educators and others need
to
make wide-ranging changes in how girls are taught about and exposed to computers, a new report
suggests.
The report, 18 months in the making, was released Tuesday in Washington by a commission of the American
Association of University Women Educational Foundation, which funds educational programs benefitting women
and girls. The 14-member commission was headed by Sherry Turkle, a sociology professor at the
Massachusetts
Institute of Technology known for her studies on computers and identity, and Patricia Diaz Dennis, a
telecommunications industry executive and a former member of the Federal Communications Commission.
The 102-page report, "Tech-Savvy: Educating Girls in the New Computer Age,"
recommends a number of ways that girls could be encouraged to take an interest in technology. If the
changes
work, the report suggests, the result will be not only a technology work force that includes more women,
but
a more inclusive computer culture.
REPORT URGES CHANGE IN MALE-DOMINATED CULTURE OF COMPUTING
Issue: Digital Divide/Gender
A report from the American Association of University Women (AAUW) scheduled for release today cites an
imbalance in the computing/science coursed taken by female and male high school students. Female students
account for 17 percent of the students that opt to take the College Board's Advanced Placement exam in
computer science; earn 28 percent of the computer science bachelor's degrees awarded; and make up only
20 percent of information technology professionals. What's needed is change in the culture that
discourages female participation in these academic and professional areas contends the report,
"Tech-Savvy: Educating Girls in the New Computer Age."
The male-dominated computer culture must change in order to attract girls and women to technology. Sherry
Turkle, professor of sociology at MIT, co-chaired the commission that wrote the report. The lack of
participation by females in these areas seems not to be related to a phobia of math or science, but
instead
a lack of interest in currently promoted uses of computers. When asked to describe a person who was really
good with computers, the girls interviewed would often describe a man. The report also noted: "Girls
outnumbered boys only in their enrollment in word processing classes, arguably the 1990s version of
typing." Parents are also providing boys more opportunities with computers. Boys tend to have a
computer in their bedrooms, attend computer camps, and are allowed to tinker with machines. The commission
report concludes that students need to be better educated about the range of career options that use
technology.
AAUW Educational Foundation Research
What they say about their own study.
Tech-Savvy: Educating Girls in the New Computer Age (2000)
PHYSICS IS FOR GIRLS
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-10/bis-aft102004.phpIndian schools tend to over emphasize natural sciences over social sciences. This may finally
explain why girls do overwhelmingly better in Indian high school examinations than boys.
A
survey of the finger lengths of over 100 male and female academics at the University of Bath by senior
Psychology lecturer Dr Mark Brosnan has found that those men teaching hard science like mathematics and
physics tend to have index fingers as long as their ring fingers, a marker for unusually high estrogen
levels for males. <summary>
It also found the reverse: those male academics with longer ring fingers than index fingers - the usual
male
pattern - tended not to be in science but in social science subjects such as psychology and
education.
The study also found that these hormonal levels may make male scientists less likely to have
children.
Academics find that finger of destiny points their way Male scientists are good at research because they
have the hormone levels of women and long index fingers, a new study says.
A survey of academics at the University of Bath has found that male scientists typically have a level of
the
hormone estrogen as high as their testosterone level.
These hormone levels are more usual in women than men, who normally have higher levels of testosterone.
The
study draws on research that suggests that these unusual hormone levels in many male scientists cause the
right side of their brains, which governs spatial and analytic skills, to develop strongly.
The study, which as been submitted to the British Journal of Psychology, also found that:
- these hormonal levels may make male scientists less likely to have children. - those men with a higher level of estrogen were more likely than average to have relatives with dyslexia, which may in part be caused by hormonal levels.
- women social scientists tended to have higher levels of testosterone, making their brains closer to those of males in general.
The study drew on work in the last few years which established that the levels of estrogen and
testosterone
a person has can be seen in the relative length of their index (second) and ring (fourth) fingers. The
ratio
of the lengths is set before birth and remains the same throughout life.
The length of fingers is genetically linked to the sex hormones, and a person with an index finger shorter
than the ring finger will have had more testosterone while in the womb, and a person with an index finger
longer than the ring finger will have had more estrogen. The difference in the lengths can be small - as
little as two or three per cent - but important.
A survey of the finger lengths of over 100 male and female academics at the University by senior
Psychology
lecturer Dr Mark Brosnan has found that those men teaching hard science like mathematics and physics tend
to
have index fingers as long as their ring fingers, a marker for unusually high estrogen levels for
males.
It also found the reverse: those male academics with longer ring fingers than index fingers - the usual
male
pattern - tended not to be in science but in social science subjects such as psychology and
education.
A further study also suggests that prenatal hormone exposure, and hence index finger length, can also
influence actual achievement levels. In a survey of male and female students on a JAVA programming course
at
the University, the researchers found a link between finger length ratio and test score. The smaller the
difference between index and ring finger - the higher the test score at the end of the year. "The
results are a fascinating insight into how testosterone and estrogen levels in the womb can affect
people's choice of career and how these levels can show up in the length of fingers on our
hands,"
said Dr Brosnan. In the general population, men typically have higher levels of testosterone than women,
but
the male scientists at the University of Bath have lower testosterone levels than is usual for men - their
estrogen and testosterone levels tend to match those of women generally.
This research now suggests that lower than average testosterone levels in men lead to spatial skills that
can give a man the ability to succeed in science. Other research has in the past also suggested that an
unusually high level of testosterone can do the same thing by encouraging the development of the right
hemisphere.
This right brain development is at the expense of language abilities and people skills that men with a
more
usual level of testosterone develop and which can help them in social science subjects like psychology or
education.
Dr. Brosnan said that men having levels of testosterone very much higher than normal for males would also
create the right hemisphere dominated brain, which could help in science. The extremes of low testosterone
and high testosterone for men would create the scientific brain, and the normal range in the middle would
create the 'social science' brain.
The question also arises as to why more women, who have this lower level of testosterone, are not in
science, which is male-dominated, with only one in 40 science professors being a woman.
The short answer is that we don't know: the high levels of estrogen in women may act differently on
the
brain and not give them the spatial skills that men with similar levels of the hormone have.
There may be social reasons: science has been male-dominated the past and this may be putting women off
entering it, even though they are able to. Why male scientists should have fewer children is not
known.
"The study of my colleagues at the University of Bath was also interesting in that it shows that
women
in social science tend to have a higher level of testosterone level relative to their estrogen level,
making
their brains closer to those of men in general, said Dr. Brosnan."