Posted on 11/15/2008 8:33:25 PM PST by neverdem
Digital Domain
ELLEN SPERTUS, a graduate student at M.I.T., wondered why the computer camp she had attended as a girl had a boy-girl ratio of six to one. And why were only 20 percent of computer science undergraduates at M.I.T. female? She published a 124-page paper, “Why Are There So Few Female Computer Scientists?”, that catalogued different cultural biases that discouraged girls and women from pursuing a career in the field. The year was 1991.
Computer science has changed considerably since then. Now, there are even fewer women entering the field. Why this is so remains a matter of dispute.
What’s particularly puzzling is that the explanations for under-representation of women that were assembled back in 1991 applied to all technical fields. Yet women have achieved broad parity with men in almost every other technical pursuit. When all science and engineering fields are considered, the percentage of bachelor’s degree recipients who are women has improved to 51 percent in 2004-5 from 39 percent in 1984-85, according to National Science Foundation surveys.
When one looks at computer science in particular, however, the proportion of women has been falling. In 2001-2, only 28 percent of all undergraduate degrees in computer science went to women. By 2004-5, the number had declined to only 22 percent. Data collected by the Computing Research Association showed even fewer women at research universities like M.I.T.: women accounted for only 12 percent of undergraduate degrees in computer science and engineering in the United States and Canada granted in 2006-7 by Ph.D.-granting institutions, down from 19 percent in 2001-2. Many computer science departments report that women now make up less than 10 percent of the newest undergraduates.
In 1998, when Ms. Spertus received her Ph.D. in computer science, women received 14 percent of the doctorates granted in the field...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
I code a great deal better than youngsters. I keep my skills current through a lot of reading. Generally speaking, I write as much code as six other people; and, those figures come from company metrics rather than my own. I code without letup while the youngsters gossip or surf the net.
I am far more versitile than most, like yourself I have assembler experience. I know the internals of the CPU and the peripherals. I also design electronics and lay our boards.
I don't do web crud. I am strictly an embedded software author. Most of that has moved offshore. I am currently employed, yet I do touch the employment information just in case. Jobs in my line of work have nearly dried up, regardless of the angle of your view.
That show thwe salaries, but doesn't show the job counts or the open job postings. There are very few job postings compared to only a few years ago.
Yes, there is lots of software to write as the demand for tech widgets has not declined. The software is being developed "outsource style".
Where are you working to have not observed the real world? Maybe I want a peice of that action.
Now I'm in aviation and the numbers are reversed.
Adm. Hopper was one of those outstanding exceptions to the rule that you can run into in every discipline.
My father was in business from the 1930's until 1976 or so. His company acquired another firm in a merger and one of the best managers in the acquired company was a 50 year old woman. I remember him shaking his head because the only women he knew in business were the secretaries.
He got over it as soon as he realized that she could make him money.
That show thwe salaries, but doesn’t show the job counts or the open job postings.
All I can say is that we place all our kids. I’m glad to hear that you’re a demon coder, but if you’re 40+, your the exception rather than the rule. And obviously not all kids are good—maybe 20-30% are. The bottom 25% has trouble keeping their heads erect; they typically end up as network admins or computer security types. I actually have a business on the side where I hire students to do development work, but I make sure I only hire the good ones.
I can see by you’re bent that you look down on “web crud”. Not all web work is HTML. Maybe that’s your problem.
We have an assembler course in our program that is currently required, but our Dept is debating just folding it into computer org. 20+ years ago you needed to know it, but now its a lot less important. Very few employers care about it—they mostly want people with OOP, sw eng, web programming, and database courses. It is a prerequisite for compiler design, however (another area that is almost dead).
But how many people know the code??
As a systems guy in a large production shop, and watching the variety and quality of the folks I see retiring, I can tell you this:
Learn Cobol/CICS/DB2 and you will be able to write your own ticket.
There are literally hundreds of billions of lines of code out there that will need to be supported for another decade at least.
I have been working in Comp Sci for most of my life, I would not recommend the field to any kid starting out today. Its not worth it.
Fed and Companies are doing its best to destroy the industry with virtualized slave labor of the H1B program, and most companies view IT as a set cost with no benefit and treat folks like crap.
There is still money to be made, but the industry is not remotely what it once was.
If I had it to do all over again I’d have probably gone for an MD.
She is a domestic, white woman...
When we toured the campus and town I was amazed at how much there is to do and how historically rich the area is. He says that Halloween is a non-stop freak show for a whole week.
I have always loved assembler, aside from its tediousness. It's like the difference between driving the car and giving orders to a chauffeur over a teletype.
I was astounded to find CS grads who knew NOTHING about assembler. No wonder Vista is such bloatware.
Over the last 30 years, I've spent many holidays, weekends and birthdays pressing to complete software projects. Inevitably, the "management" wants computer systems updated when the impact is minimal on the business and employees. That means you work while everyone else is enjoying time off. It means you work when everyone else is working too. There's a reason I have over 560 hours of leave on the books. It takes 180 weeks to accrue that much time. That has been accrued since May 1998 when I returned to my current position after working at a startup for 2 years.
The epitome of the nonsense that permeates the field was the Millennium Madness...planes were going to fall out of the sky, computers were going to go down, not knowing what year it was, blah, blah, blah...and then there were all the security “experts” who stayed home on New Year's Eve while their underlings stood by their work stations, ready to do...what? if the worst case scenario took place.
I have no idea. Does the author. Maybe becuse they can't wear pocket protectors?
I are a software engeneer (inside joke) but I'm no geek. A lot of the younger ones are but a lot of old timers are just guys with good problem solving skills. They didn't offer "computer science" where I went to school "Data Processing" my degree says. Not a lot of female engineers where I work but the ones we do have can hold their own. I prefer working with men though. There's more logical. *ducks*
I'm well aware of the diversity of tasks. I write requirements, create the appropriate system architecture, design the hardware, check the schematics and parts placement, design the firmware, code the firmware, write the unit tests and system tests, install the hardware and field test. You know the drill. End to end responsibility for hardware and software. Along the way, you discover the imperfections in operating systems, libraries, compilers and sometimes even the hardware. Along with the technical tasks there is marketing, budgeting and customer interface tasks. My last "easy" job was working in a Radio Shack store in Mission Valley in 1977.
I hope your daughter enjoys the new career path. The work itself is just fine. It's all the administrative and legal baggage that makes it less appealing. The shift work and long hours on your feet take a toll. Just as with computer science, weekends and holidays will have to be covered. It may take years to build enough seniority to enjoy a holiday off.
I hate to share your abject cynicism, but some of the most mind-numbing work I've ever done is web-site design.
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