@creepycoug I hated math/science (my Pops was an engineer and math wiz with 1 semester of college, but got his education building landing strips in the South Pacific during WWII). When I got to grad school, (at age 24), I ate it up. There is no way I could have gone thru a math / science curriculum as an 18 year old...I wasn't mature enough to handle it.
I think a lot of kids run away from math around the time of middle school, because that's the time during which the serious kids hunker down and start doing the harder stuff, and incidentally that's the time when the public schools start offering different math tracks. So if you're like 75% of 13 to 15 year olds, you don't want to bust your ass doing hard math, so you leave it and, for most, never come back to it.
They have done studies that show that girls who mentally check out of math almost always do so in the 8th grade, and they never come back. Tragic. That has so much to do with caring about what boys think of them, not wanting to show them up in class, and dealing with asshole teachers. Private school has an edge here; because you're going to achieve some level of math curriculum or you're not graduating. There's no "math for _________" at a real college prep school. Public school is different.
The point of this is that there are a lot of people with innate talent for mathematics who, because of various life circumstances, aren't ready to be married to it at 12 or 13, and as soon as they make that decision, their fate is sealed. I would venture to say this happens to a whole bunch of people.
Its really interesting to me that the IT field is almost entirely dudes yet I believe the amount of women in the sciences hasn't actually changed. They just go into medicine.
I cant really think of any real reason it should be guys over girls in the tech stuff. Uncle Bob's talk on the future of programming was interesting because apparently until the mid to late 80s it was about 50 50
The number of women engineers and scientists is growing by leaps and bounds. As for programmers and other IT workers, there’s definitely a lag, but they’ll get there. Many of the lady IT people I know hail from Asia (India, China). I think US women will eventually catch up too, but it will be a little longer.
@creepycoug is right, I lost my love for math and comp sci freshman year of high school, for all the reasons he listed. (Remember, the internet was just getting off the ground at this point.) It wasn’t until my senior year that I took statistics that I got a teacher that was supportive and never spoke to me in a condescending manner. My senior project received the highest grade in the class. But by then the damage had been done and even though my SAT scores in math were high I had already told myself a STEM major wasn’t for me.
Yeah it's strange because in like a high school math class or something the girls did just as well or better than the boys. And yet it's entirely dominated by men.
I'm thinking it has to change. How can it not?
More focus needs to be done on those studies I mentioned. You have to get girls in middle school or they're gone for good. I don't know if they internalize the set backs more than the boys, but for whatever reason, once they make that decision in their minds they rarely recover.
Boys do much better fucking it up and then deciding to get back to it, pay the price to catch up, and get back on track in high school. Girls just don't. And they've really narrowed it down to that one year: 8th grade. Not 7th or 9th ... 8th grade. That's where we lose them.
I actually think the system that failed me is being slowly fixed now...I remember reading somewhere half of the degrees in science fields and engineering are being awarded to women (computer science is still way behind...I think it’s closer to 20% there). The next hurdle of getting these women hired, promoted, and retained is what needs to happen next.
Over and over, we see that these things are not helped with one simple change, like affirmative action or diversity programs aimed at clearing that first hurdle. It's a combination of things and, as I've learned raising 3 daughters, girls are different than boys. So you can't say, as maybe some of our friends in the Tug would, "Well, shit. The schools recruit them and give them an advantage in admissions, so what's the problem?" Well, the problem was never admissions. The problem is the messages girls get along the way, and if they manage to get there, the messages they continue to receive. We know it's not because they can't do the work. So you have to keep asking the question and finding solutions.
On the sports side, one of my girl's coaches used to say something to the effect that if you yell at them and try and coerce them into doing something, they'll do the minimum and they won't give you everything they've got. But if, after you've earned their trust, you ask them to do something for you, they'll run through a brick wall to get it done..
I think there may be something to that. But then again, that same kid's premier soccer coach was a Texas All American who was a ball buster, and my kid never played for anyone like she played for her. That includes college.
I have no answers, but I know it's not as simple as recruiting. It takes a multi-factor approach.
@creepycoug I hated math/science (my Pops was an engineer and math wiz with 1 semester of college, but got his education building landing strips in the South Pacific during WWII). When I got to grad school, (at age 24), I ate it up. There is no way I could have gone thru a math / science curriculum as an 18 year old...I wasn't mature enough to handle it.
I think a lot of kids run away from math around the time of middle school, because that's the time during which the serious kids hunker down and start doing the harder stuff, and incidentally that's the time when the public schools start offering different math tracks. So if you're like 75% of 13 to 15 year olds, you don't want to bust your ass doing hard math, so you leave it and, for most, never come back to it.
They have done studies that show that girls who mentally check out of math almost always do so in the 8th grade, and they never come back. Tragic. That has so much to do with caring about what boys think of them, not wanting to show them up in class, and dealing with asshole teachers. Private school has an edge here; because you're going to achieve some level of math curriculum or you're not graduating. There's no "math for _________" at a real college prep school. Public school is different.
The point of this is that there are a lot of people with innate talent for mathematics who, because of various life circumstances, aren't ready to be married to it at 12 or 13, and as soon as they make that decision, their fate is sealed. I would venture to say this happens to a whole bunch of people.
Its really interesting to me that the IT field is almost entirely dudes yet I believe the amount of women in the sciences hasn't actually changed. They just go into medicine.
I cant really think of any real reason it should be guys over girls in the tech stuff. Uncle Bob's talk on the future of programming was interesting because apparently until the mid to late 80s it was about 50 50
The number of women engineers and scientists is growing by leaps and bounds. As for programmers and other IT workers, there’s definitely a lag, but they’ll get there. Many of the lady IT people I know hail from Asia (India, China). I think US women will eventually catch up too, but it will be a little longer.
@creepycoug is right, I lost my love for math and comp sci freshman year of high school, for all the reasons he listed. (Remember, the internet was just getting off the ground at this point.) It wasn’t until my senior year that I took statistics that I got a teacher that was supportive and never spoke to me in a condescending manner. My senior project received the highest grade in the class. But by then the damage had been done and even though my SAT scores in math were high I had already told myself a STEM major wasn’t for me.
Yeah it's strange because in like a high school math class or something the girls did just as well or better than the boys. And yet it's entirely dominated by men.
I'm thinking it has to change. How can it not?
More focus needs to be done on those studies I mentioned. You have to get girls in middle school or they're gone for good. I don't know if they internalize the set backs more than the boys, but for whatever reason, once they make that decision in their minds they rarely recover.
Boys do much better fucking it up and then deciding to get back to it, pay the price to catch up, and get back on track in high school. Girls just don't. And they've really narrowed it down to that one year: 8th grade. Not 7th or 9th ... 8th grade. That's where we lose them.
I actually think the system that failed me is being slowly fixed now...I remember reading somewhere half of the degrees in science fields and engineering are being awarded to women (computer science is still way behind...I think it’s closer to 20% there). The next hurdle of getting these women hired, promoted, and retained is what needs to happen next.
See when I did pro sales (at a good company with high level sales) they promoted and we're crazy about promoting women. Not in a bad way. I just think that in certain fields where you have to hire grinders sometimes women can get in the door better. It really depends on industry but it was about 80 percent really sharp girls.
Yeah. Sales is a little bit different animal. You’re absolutely right, that’s one area (depending on the industry) where women crush it.
I’m curious though, how long do these women last? Are they promoted?
@creepycoug I hated math/science (my Pops was an engineer and math wiz with 1 semester of college, but got his education building landing strips in the South Pacific during WWII). When I got to grad school, (at age 24), I ate it up. There is no way I could have gone thru a math / science curriculum as an 18 year old...I wasn't mature enough to handle it.
I think a lot of kids run away from math around the time of middle school, because that's the time during which the serious kids hunker down and start doing the harder stuff, and incidentally that's the time when the public schools start offering different math tracks. So if you're like 75% of 13 to 15 year olds, you don't want to bust your ass doing hard math, so you leave it and, for most, never come back to it.
They have done studies that show that girls who mentally check out of math almost always do so in the 8th grade, and they never come back. Tragic. That has so much to do with caring about what boys think of them, not wanting to show them up in class, and dealing with asshole teachers. Private school has an edge here; because you're going to achieve some level of math curriculum or you're not graduating. There's no "math for _________" at a real college prep school. Public school is different.
The point of this is that there are a lot of people with innate talent for mathematics who, because of various life circumstances, aren't ready to be married to it at 12 or 13, and as soon as they make that decision, their fate is sealed. I would venture to say this happens to a whole bunch of people.
Its really interesting to me that the IT field is almost entirely dudes yet I believe the amount of women in the sciences hasn't actually changed. They just go into medicine.
I cant really think of any real reason it should be guys over girls in the tech stuff. Uncle Bob's talk on the future of programming was interesting because apparently until the mid to late 80s it was about 50 50
The number of women engineers and scientists is growing by leaps and bounds. As for programmers and other IT workers, there’s definitely a lag, but they’ll get there. Many of the lady IT people I know hail from Asia (India, China). I think US women will eventually catch up too, but it will be a little longer.
@creepycoug is right, I lost my love for math and comp sci freshman year of high school, for all the reasons he listed. (Remember, the internet was just getting off the ground at this point.) It wasn’t until my senior year that I took statistics that I got a teacher that was supportive and never spoke to me in a condescending manner. My senior project received the highest grade in the class. But by then the damage had been done and even though my SAT scores in math were high I had already told myself a STEM major wasn’t for me.
Yeah it's strange because in like a high school math class or something the girls did just as well or better than the boys. And yet it's entirely dominated by men.
I'm thinking it has to change. How can it not?
More focus needs to be done on those studies I mentioned. You have to get girls in middle school or they're gone for good. I don't know if they internalize the set backs more than the boys, but for whatever reason, once they make that decision in their minds they rarely recover.
Boys do much better fucking it up and then deciding to get back to it, pay the price to catch up, and get back on track in high school. Girls just don't. And they've really narrowed it down to that one year: 8th grade. Not 7th or 9th ... 8th grade. That's where we lose them.
I actually think the system that failed me is being slowly fixed now...I remember reading somewhere half of the degrees in science fields and engineering are being awarded to women (computer science is still way behind...I think it’s closer to 20% there). The next hurdle of getting these women hired, promoted, and retained is what needs to happen next.
See when I did pro sales (at a good company with high level sales) they promoted and we're crazy about promoting women. Not in a bad way. I just think that in certain fields where you have to hire grinders sometimes women can get in the door better. It really depends on industry but it was about 80 percent really sharp girls.
Yeah. Sales is a little bit different animal. You’re absolutely right, that’s one area (depending on the industry) where women crush it.
I’m curious though, how long do these women last? Are they promoted?
Yeah. If I had to give a solid guess I'd assume about 80 percent of the main area managers are women. But they were pretty hardcore about hiring and all these chicks are super sharp.
It kind of taught me that it's like 70 percent hiring 30 percent teaching.
@creepycoug I hated math/science (my Pops was an engineer and math wiz with 1 semester of college, but got his education building landing strips in the South Pacific during WWII). When I got to grad school, (at age 24), I ate it up. There is no way I could have gone thru a math / science curriculum as an 18 year old...I wasn't mature enough to handle it.
I think a lot of kids run away from math around the time of middle school, because that's the time during which the serious kids hunker down and start doing the harder stuff, and incidentally that's the time when the public schools start offering different math tracks. So if you're like 75% of 13 to 15 year olds, you don't want to bust your ass doing hard math, so you leave it and, for most, never come back to it.
They have done studies that show that girls who mentally check out of math almost always do so in the 8th grade, and they never come back. Tragic. That has so much to do with caring about what boys think of them, not wanting to show them up in class, and dealing with asshole teachers. Private school has an edge here; because you're going to achieve some level of math curriculum or you're not graduating. There's no "math for _________" at a real college prep school. Public school is different.
The point of this is that there are a lot of people with innate talent for mathematics who, because of various life circumstances, aren't ready to be married to it at 12 or 13, and as soon as they make that decision, their fate is sealed. I would venture to say this happens to a whole bunch of people.
Its really interesting to me that the IT field is almost entirely dudes yet I believe the amount of women in the sciences hasn't actually changed. They just go into medicine.
I cant really think of any real reason it should be guys over girls in the tech stuff. Uncle Bob's talk on the future of programming was interesting because apparently until the mid to late 80s it was about 50 50
The number of women engineers and scientists is growing by leaps and bounds. As for programmers and other IT workers, there’s definitely a lag, but they’ll get there. Many of the lady IT people I know hail from Asia (India, China). I think US women will eventually catch up too, but it will be a little longer.
@creepycoug is right, I lost my love for math and comp sci freshman year of high school, for all the reasons he listed. (Remember, the internet was just getting off the ground at this point.) It wasn’t until my senior year that I took statistics that I got a teacher that was supportive and never spoke to me in a condescending manner. My senior project received the highest grade in the class. But by then the damage had been done and even though my SAT scores in math were high I had already told myself a STEM major wasn’t for me.
Yeah it's strange because in like a high school math class or something the girls did just as well or better than the boys. And yet it's entirely dominated by men.
I'm thinking it has to change. How can it not?
More focus needs to be done on those studies I mentioned. You have to get girls in middle school or they're gone for good. I don't know if they internalize the set backs more than the boys, but for whatever reason, once they make that decision in their minds they rarely recover.
Boys do much better fucking it up and then deciding to get back to it, pay the price to catch up, and get back on track in high school. Girls just don't. And they've really narrowed it down to that one year: 8th grade. Not 7th or 9th ... 8th grade. That's where we lose them.
I actually think the system that failed me is being slowly fixed now...I remember reading somewhere half of the degrees in science fields and engineering are being awarded to women (computer science is still way behind...I think it’s closer to 20% there). The next hurdle of getting these women hired, promoted, and retained is what needs to happen next.
Over and over, we see that these things are not helped with one simple change, like affirmative action or diversity programs aimed at clearing that first hurdle. It's a combination of things and, as I've learned raising 3 daughters, girls are different than boys. So you can't say, as maybe some of our friends in the Tug would, "Well, shit. The schools recruit them and give them an advantage in admissions, so what's the problem?" Well, the problem was never admissions. The problem is the messages girls get along the way, and if they manage to get there, the messages they continue to receive. We know it's not because they can't do the work. So you have to keep asking the question and finding solutions.
On the sports side, one of my girl's coaches used to say something to the effect that if you yell at them and try and coerce them into doing something, they'll do the minimum and they won't give you everything they've got. But if, after you've earned their trust, you ask them to do something for you, they'll run through a brick wall to get it done..
I think there may be something to that. But then again, that same kid's premier soccer coach was a Texas All American who was a ball buster, and my kid never played for anyone like she played for her. That includes college.
I have no answers, but I know it's not as simple as recruiting. It takes a multi-factor approach.
Agreed. It might shock you guys that one of the things I think is important is to get more women in the industry. Not out of social justice bullshit reasons it's just I think women are equally capable as men in office type jobs and I think the industry is full of dudes who cannot advance because they have no social skills.
Its like being in a frat for years with no parties. Its like dick measuring bullshit for no reason.
@creepycoug I hated math/science (my Pops was an engineer and math wiz with 1 semester of college, but got his education building landing strips in the South Pacific during WWII). When I got to grad school, (at age 24), I ate it up. There is no way I could have gone thru a math / science curriculum as an 18 year old...I wasn't mature enough to handle it.
I think a lot of kids run away from math around the time of middle school, because that's the time during which the serious kids hunker down and start doing the harder stuff, and incidentally that's the time when the public schools start offering different math tracks. So if you're like 75% of 13 to 15 year olds, you don't want to bust your ass doing hard math, so you leave it and, for most, never come back to it.
They have done studies that show that girls who mentally check out of math almost always do so in the 8th grade, and they never come back. Tragic. That has so much to do with caring about what boys think of them, not wanting to show them up in class, and dealing with asshole teachers. Private school has an edge here; because you're going to achieve some level of math curriculum or you're not graduating. There's no "math for _________" at a real college prep school. Public school is different.
The point of this is that there are a lot of people with innate talent for mathematics who, because of various life circumstances, aren't ready to be married to it at 12 or 13, and as soon as they make that decision, their fate is sealed. I would venture to say this happens to a whole bunch of people.
Its really interesting to me that the IT field is almost entirely dudes yet I believe the amount of women in the sciences hasn't actually changed. They just go into medicine.
I cant really think of any real reason it should be guys over girls in the tech stuff. Uncle Bob's talk on the future of programming was interesting because apparently until the mid to late 80s it was about 50 50
The number of women engineers and scientists is growing by leaps and bounds. As for programmers and other IT workers, there’s definitely a lag, but they’ll get there. Many of the lady IT people I know hail from Asia (India, China). I think US women will eventually catch up too, but it will be a little longer.
@creepycoug is right, I lost my love for math and comp sci freshman year of high school, for all the reasons he listed. (Remember, the internet was just getting off the ground at this point.) It wasn’t until my senior year that I took statistics that I got a teacher that was supportive and never spoke to me in a condescending manner. My senior project received the highest grade in the class. But by then the damage had been done and even though my SAT scores in math were high I had already told myself a STEM major wasn’t for me.
Yeah it's strange because in like a high school math class or something the girls did just as well or better than the boys. And yet it's entirely dominated by men.
I'm thinking it has to change. How can it not?
More focus needs to be done on those studies I mentioned. You have to get girls in middle school or they're gone for good. I don't know if they internalize the set backs more than the boys, but for whatever reason, once they make that decision in their minds they rarely recover.
Boys do much better fucking it up and then deciding to get back to it, pay the price to catch up, and get back on track in high school. Girls just don't. And they've really narrowed it down to that one year: 8th grade. Not 7th or 9th ... 8th grade. That's where we lose them.
I actually think the system that failed me is being slowly fixed now...I remember reading somewhere half of the degrees in science fields and engineering are being awarded to women (computer science is still way behind...I think it’s closer to 20% there). The next hurdle of getting these women hired, promoted, and retained is what needs to happen next.
Over and over, we see that these things are not helped with one simple change, like affirmative action or diversity programs aimed at clearing that first hurdle. It's a combination of things and, as I've learned raising 3 daughters, girls are different than boys. So you can't say, as maybe some of our friends in the Tug would, "Well, shit. The schools recruit them and give them an advantage in admissions, so what's the problem?" Well, the problem was never admissions. The problem is the messages girls get along the way, and if they manage to get there, the messages they continue to receive. We know it's not because they can't do the work. So you have to keep asking the question and finding solutions.
On the sports side, one of my girl's coaches used to say something to the effect that if you yell at them and try and coerce them into doing something, they'll do the minimum and they won't give you everything they've got. But if, after you've earned their trust, you ask them to do something for you, they'll run through a brick wall to get it done..
I think there may be something to that. But then again, that same kid's premier soccer coach was a Texas All American who was a ball buster, and my kid never played for anyone like she played for her. That includes college.
I have no answers, but I know it's not as simple as recruiting. It takes a multi-factor approach.
Agreed. It might shock you guys that one of the things I think is important is to get more women in the industry. Not out of social justice bullshit reasons it's just I think women are equally capable as men in office type jobs and I think the industry is full of dudes who cannot advance because they have no social skills.
Its like being in a frat for years with no parties. Its like dick measuring bullshit for no reason.
You make a really good point. I have worked with and for a lot of men who aren't worth a shit at their jobs, but have figured out how to play the club game. I know few women who have mastered that game, which does not favor them.
@creepycoug I hated math/science (my Pops was an engineer and math wiz with 1 semester of college, but got his education building landing strips in the South Pacific during WWII). When I got to grad school, (at age 24), I ate it up. There is no way I could have gone thru a math / science curriculum as an 18 year old...I wasn't mature enough to handle it.
I think a lot of kids run away from math around the time of middle school, because that's the time during which the serious kids hunker down and start doing the harder stuff, and incidentally that's the time when the public schools start offering different math tracks. So if you're like 75% of 13 to 15 year olds, you don't want to bust your ass doing hard math, so you leave it and, for most, never come back to it.
They have done studies that show that girls who mentally check out of math almost always do so in the 8th grade, and they never come back. Tragic. That has so much to do with caring about what boys think of them, not wanting to show them up in class, and dealing with asshole teachers. Private school has an edge here; because you're going to achieve some level of math curriculum or you're not graduating. There's no "math for _________" at a real college prep school. Public school is different.
The point of this is that there are a lot of people with innate talent for mathematics who, because of various life circumstances, aren't ready to be married to it at 12 or 13, and as soon as they make that decision, their fate is sealed. I would venture to say this happens to a whole bunch of people.
Its really interesting to me that the IT field is almost entirely dudes yet I believe the amount of women in the sciences hasn't actually changed. They just go into medicine.
I cant really think of any real reason it should be guys over girls in the tech stuff. Uncle Bob's talk on the future of programming was interesting because apparently until the mid to late 80s it was about 50 50
The number of women engineers and scientists is growing by leaps and bounds. As for programmers and other IT workers, there’s definitely a lag, but they’ll get there. Many of the lady IT people I know hail from Asia (India, China). I think US women will eventually catch up too, but it will be a little longer.
@creepycoug is right, I lost my love for math and comp sci freshman year of high school, for all the reasons he listed. (Remember, the internet was just getting off the ground at this point.) It wasn’t until my senior year that I took statistics that I got a teacher that was supportive and never spoke to me in a condescending manner. My senior project received the highest grade in the class. But by then the damage had been done and even though my SAT scores in math were high I had already told myself a STEM major wasn’t for me.
Yeah it's strange because in like a high school math class or something the girls did just as well or better than the boys. And yet it's entirely dominated by men.
I'm thinking it has to change. How can it not?
More focus needs to be done on those studies I mentioned. You have to get girls in middle school or they're gone for good. I don't know if they internalize the set backs more than the boys, but for whatever reason, once they make that decision in their minds they rarely recover.
Boys do much better fucking it up and then deciding to get back to it, pay the price to catch up, and get back on track in high school. Girls just don't. And they've really narrowed it down to that one year: 8th grade. Not 7th or 9th ... 8th grade. That's where we lose them.
I actually think the system that failed me is being slowly fixed now...I remember reading somewhere half of the degrees in science fields and engineering are being awarded to women (computer science is still way behind...I think it’s closer to 20% there). The next hurdle of getting these women hired, promoted, and retained is what needs to happen next.
Over and over, we see that these things are not helped with one simple change, like affirmative action or diversity programs aimed at clearing that first hurdle. It's a combination of things and, as I've learned raising 3 daughters, girls are different than boys. So you can't say, as maybe some of our friends in the Tug would, "Well, shit. The schools recruit them and give them an advantage in admissions, so what's the problem?" Well, the problem was never admissions. The problem is the messages girls get along the way, and if they manage to get there, the messages they continue to receive. We know it's not because they can't do the work. So you have to keep asking the question and finding solutions.
On the sports side, one of my girl's coaches used to say something to the effect that if you yell at them and try and coerce them into doing something, they'll do the minimum and they won't give you everything they've got. But if, after you've earned their trust, you ask them to do something for you, they'll run through a brick wall to get it done..
I think there may be something to that. But then again, that same kid's premier soccer coach was a Texas All American who was a ball buster, and my kid never played for anyone like she played for her. That includes college.
I have no answers, but I know it's not as simple as recruiting. It takes a multi-factor approach.
Agreed. It might shock you guys that one of the things I think is important is to get more women in the industry. Not out of social justice bullshit reasons it's just I think women are equally capable as men in office type jobs and I think the industry is full of dudes who cannot advance because they have no social skills.
Its like being in a frat for years with no parties. Its like dick measuring bullshit for no reason.
You make a really good point. I have worked with and for a lot of men who aren't worth a shit at their jobs, but have figured out how to play the club game. I know few women who have mastered that game, which does not favor them.
I’ve found that to be a huge barrier in my career. I’m trying to work on it. I’m also shit at negotiating / promoting *myself*, which is another thing lots of women struggle with. You have to be your own advocate.
@creepycoug I hated math/science (my Pops was an engineer and math wiz with 1 semester of college, but got his education building landing strips in the South Pacific during WWII). When I got to grad school, (at age 24), I ate it up. There is no way I could have gone thru a math / science curriculum as an 18 year old...I wasn't mature enough to handle it.
I think a lot of kids run away from math around the time of middle school, because that's the time during which the serious kids hunker down and start doing the harder stuff, and incidentally that's the time when the public schools start offering different math tracks. So if you're like 75% of 13 to 15 year olds, you don't want to bust your ass doing hard math, so you leave it and, for most, never come back to it.
They have done studies that show that girls who mentally check out of math almost always do so in the 8th grade, and they never come back. Tragic. That has so much to do with caring about what boys think of them, not wanting to show them up in class, and dealing with asshole teachers. Private school has an edge here; because you're going to achieve some level of math curriculum or you're not graduating. There's no "math for _________" at a real college prep school. Public school is different.
The point of this is that there are a lot of people with innate talent for mathematics who, because of various life circumstances, aren't ready to be married to it at 12 or 13, and as soon as they make that decision, their fate is sealed. I would venture to say this happens to a whole bunch of people.
Its really interesting to me that the IT field is almost entirely dudes yet I believe the amount of women in the sciences hasn't actually changed. They just go into medicine.
I cant really think of any real reason it should be guys over girls in the tech stuff. Uncle Bob's talk on the future of programming was interesting because apparently until the mid to late 80s it was about 50 50
The number of women engineers and scientists is growing by leaps and bounds. As for programmers and other IT workers, there’s definitely a lag, but they’ll get there. Many of the lady IT people I know hail from Asia (India, China). I think US women will eventually catch up too, but it will be a little longer.
@creepycoug is right, I lost my love for math and comp sci freshman year of high school, for all the reasons he listed. (Remember, the internet was just getting off the ground at this point.) It wasn’t until my senior year that I took statistics that I got a teacher that was supportive and never spoke to me in a condescending manner. My senior project received the highest grade in the class. But by then the damage had been done and even though my SAT scores in math were high I had already told myself a STEM major wasn’t for me.
Yeah it's strange because in like a high school math class or something the girls did just as well or better than the boys. And yet it's entirely dominated by men.
I'm thinking it has to change. How can it not?
More focus needs to be done on those studies I mentioned. You have to get girls in middle school or they're gone for good. I don't know if they internalize the set backs more than the boys, but for whatever reason, once they make that decision in their minds they rarely recover.
Boys do much better fucking it up and then deciding to get back to it, pay the price to catch up, and get back on track in high school. Girls just don't. And they've really narrowed it down to that one year: 8th grade. Not 7th or 9th ... 8th grade. That's where we lose them.
I actually think the system that failed me is being slowly fixed now...I remember reading somewhere half of the degrees in science fields and engineering are being awarded to women (computer science is still way behind...I think it’s closer to 20% there). The next hurdle of getting these women hired, promoted, and retained is what needs to happen next.
Over and over, we see that these things are not helped with one simple change, like affirmative action or diversity programs aimed at clearing that first hurdle. It's a combination of things and, as I've learned raising 3 daughters, girls are different than boys. So you can't say, as maybe some of our friends in the Tug would, "Well, shit. The schools recruit them and give them an advantage in admissions, so what's the problem?" Well, the problem was never admissions. The problem is the messages girls get along the way, and if they manage to get there, the messages they continue to receive. We know it's not because they can't do the work. So you have to keep asking the question and finding solutions.
On the sports side, one of my girl's coaches used to say something to the effect that if you yell at them and try and coerce them into doing something, they'll do the minimum and they won't give you everything they've got. But if, after you've earned their trust, you ask them to do something for you, they'll run through a brick wall to get it done..
I think there may be something to that. But then again, that same kid's premier soccer coach was a Texas All American who was a ball buster, and my kid never played for anyone like she played for her. That includes college.
I have no answers, but I know it's not as simple as recruiting. It takes a multi-factor approach.
Agreed. It might shock you guys that one of the things I think is important is to get more women in the industry. Not out of social justice bullshit reasons it's just I think women are equally capable as men in office type jobs and I think the industry is full of dudes who cannot advance because they have no social skills.
Its like being in a frat for years with no parties. Its like dick measuring bullshit for no reason.
You make a really good point. I have worked with and for a lot of men who aren't worth a shit at their jobs, but have figured out how to play the club game. I know few women who have mastered that game, which does not favor them.
I’ve found that to be a huge barrier in my career. I’m trying to work on it. I’m also shit at negotiating / promoting *myself*, which is another thing lots of women struggle with. You have to be your own advocate.
You do. There is a subtle art to it. As with many things, it isn't a strength for me either. In women, I have found it to be more of black and white thing (generalizing massively here). Those who are bent on doing it often come off like it's over-the-top. But then again, would I perceive it that way if a man were doing exactly the same thing? I often think that Hilary gets a little of her shit because she's a woman ... said another way, would she we quite as despised if she were a man with the exact same behavior and personality? And then, there are those who just suffer in obscurity and work their asses off and are taken for granted.
It's quite a thing you're talking about here. It's real. I see it, and because I have girls, I pay attention to it and have tried to be empathetic and help where I can. My view is that if you can the work you should be treated accordingly.
Also, big of you to be aware of it, own it and work on it.
My unsolicited advice? Find a good mentor ... man or woman, who will champion you. If you have the resources, or if your company HR will pay for it, consider an executive coach. This will be a PhD in psychology who has organizational behavior expertise. Changed my life. Makes you see all kinds of things about yourself and you learn how others see you. Very important. PM me and I can give you a reference if you are interested. They're not cheap; but they're cheaper than lawyers.
Was talking with my wife last night about the maff thing, and she completely agreed. She said that she was drifting away from math in about 8th grade, and the one thing that saved her was a really good teacher (whom she is still in touch with). She considered going into the FBI, but by the time she figured out what she needed, she was married and moving around with her ex. She is in sales, and crushes it. She's a nerd, but she's my nerd...
She has gone thru the "promotion to management" phase, and was shocked at how generally incompetent her work force was, and how upper managers "old boy-ed" the men, and pressed the women until many broke. She earned roughly half of what she was making selling, with huge headaches every day, not of her making. It really opened my eyes when she would talk of all the bullshit she has seen in the workplace over the years, being talked down to by higher-ups that couldn't run a lemonade stand in the Mojave desert.
There are no shortage of shitty executives out there who have coasted their way into their jobs by being good at glad handing and fun to get a drink with. I've had the pleasure of firing some of them. I look forward to shit canning more of them in the future.
I completely agree with the multi-factor thing when it comes to affirmative action, women in the workplace, or almost any other long-standing societal problem. Dare I say there are some structural or even systemic problems in society that need to be addressed to fix the problems? Shit is getting better, but it's not going to change overnight.
One other big factor in this is just general inertia. Humans enjoy doing the same thing, or the easy thing, over and over, even if it comes with mixed (or poor) results. Do managers and executives really want to go to colleges and interview lots of people and find a top quality candidate and then train the hell out of them? Hell no. It's way easier to have HR put out a job post, and hire the first 6.5 out of 10 that you come across that has some related skills, even if there is a 0% chance they're going to become a superstar. Males typically end up benefitting the most from this arrangement.
One of my main rules in life is not to expect too much out of other humans. That doesn't mean everyone is shitty and is out to get you, just that most people are pretty lazy and have plenty room to improve, even if they're great to have a beer and play golf with.
@creepycoug I hated math/science (my Pops was an engineer and math wiz with 1 semester of college, but got his education building landing strips in the South Pacific during WWII). When I got to grad school, (at age 24), I ate it up. There is no way I could have gone thru a math / science curriculum as an 18 year old...I wasn't mature enough to handle it.
I think a lot of kids run away from math around the time of middle school, because that's the time during which the serious kids hunker down and start doing the harder stuff, and incidentally that's the time when the public schools start offering different math tracks. So if you're like 75% of 13 to 15 year olds, you don't want to bust your ass doing hard math, so you leave it and, for most, never come back to it.
They have done studies that show that girls who mentally check out of math almost always do so in the 8th grade, and they never come back. Tragic. That has so much to do with caring about what boys think of them, not wanting to show them up in class, and dealing with asshole teachers. Private school has an edge here; because you're going to achieve some level of math curriculum or you're not graduating. There's no "math for _________" at a real college prep school. Public school is different.
The point of this is that there are a lot of people with innate talent for mathematics who, because of various life circumstances, aren't ready to be married to it at 12 or 13, and as soon as they make that decision, their fate is sealed. I would venture to say this happens to a whole bunch of people.
Its really interesting to me that the IT field is almost entirely dudes yet I believe the amount of women in the sciences hasn't actually changed. They just go into medicine.
I cant really think of any real reason it should be guys over girls in the tech stuff. Uncle Bob's talk on the future of programming was interesting because apparently until the mid to late 80s it was about 50 50
The number of women engineers and scientists is growing by leaps and bounds. As for programmers and other IT workers, there’s definitely a lag, but they’ll get there. Many of the lady IT people I know hail from Asia (India, China). I think US women will eventually catch up too, but it will be a little longer.
@creepycoug is right, I lost my love for math and comp sci freshman year of high school, for all the reasons he listed. (Remember, the internet was just getting off the ground at this point.) It wasn’t until my senior year that I took statistics that I got a teacher that was supportive and never spoke to me in a condescending manner. My senior project received the highest grade in the class. But by then the damage had been done and even though my SAT scores in math were high I had already told myself a STEM major wasn’t for me.
Yeah it's strange because in like a high school math class or something the girls did just as well or better than the boys. And yet it's entirely dominated by men.
I'm thinking it has to change. How can it not?
More focus needs to be done on those studies I mentioned. You have to get girls in middle school or they're gone for good. I don't know if they internalize the set backs more than the boys, but for whatever reason, once they make that decision in their minds they rarely recover.
Boys do much better fucking it up and then deciding to get back to it, pay the price to catch up, and get back on track in high school. Girls just don't. And they've really narrowed it down to that one year: 8th grade. Not 7th or 9th ... 8th grade. That's where we lose them.
I actually think the system that failed me is being slowly fixed now...I remember reading somewhere half of the degrees in science fields and engineering are being awarded to women (computer science is still way behind...I think it’s closer to 20% there). The next hurdle of getting these women hired, promoted, and retained is what needs to happen next.
Over and over, we see that these things are not helped with one simple change, like affirmative action or diversity programs aimed at clearing that first hurdle. It's a combination of things and, as I've learned raising 3 daughters, girls are different than boys. So you can't say, as maybe some of our friends in the Tug would, "Well, shit. The schools recruit them and give them an advantage in admissions, so what's the problem?" Well, the problem was never admissions. The problem is the messages girls get along the way, and if they manage to get there, the messages they continue to receive. We know it's not because they can't do the work. So you have to keep asking the question and finding solutions.
On the sports side, one of my girl's coaches used to say something to the effect that if you yell at them and try and coerce them into doing something, they'll do the minimum and they won't give you everything they've got. But if, after you've earned their trust, you ask them to do something for you, they'll run through a brick wall to get it done..
I think there may be something to that. But then again, that same kid's premier soccer coach was a Texas All American who was a ball buster, and my kid never played for anyone like she played for her. That includes college.
I have no answers, but I know it's not as simple as recruiting. It takes a multi-factor approach.
If they don’t have daddy issues and stay off the pole. You deserve a medal sir
@creepycoug I hated math/science (my Pops was an engineer and math wiz with 1 semester of college, but got his education building landing strips in the South Pacific during WWII). When I got to grad school, (at age 24), I ate it up. There is no way I could have gone thru a math / science curriculum as an 18 year old...I wasn't mature enough to handle it.
I think a lot of kids run away from math around the time of middle school, because that's the time during which the serious kids hunker down and start doing the harder stuff, and incidentally that's the time when the public schools start offering different math tracks. So if you're like 75% of 13 to 15 year olds, you don't want to bust your ass doing hard math, so you leave it and, for most, never come back to it.
They have done studies that show that girls who mentally check out of math almost always do so in the 8th grade, and they never come back. Tragic. That has so much to do with caring about what boys think of them, not wanting to show them up in class, and dealing with asshole teachers. Private school has an edge here; because you're going to achieve some level of math curriculum or you're not graduating. There's no "math for _________" at a real college prep school. Public school is different.
The point of this is that there are a lot of people with innate talent for mathematics who, because of various life circumstances, aren't ready to be married to it at 12 or 13, and as soon as they make that decision, their fate is sealed. I would venture to say this happens to a whole bunch of people.
Its really interesting to me that the IT field is almost entirely dudes yet I believe the amount of women in the sciences hasn't actually changed. They just go into medicine.
I cant really think of any real reason it should be guys over girls in the tech stuff. Uncle Bob's talk on the future of programming was interesting because apparently until the mid to late 80s it was about 50 50
The number of women engineers and scientists is growing by leaps and bounds. As for programmers and other IT workers, there’s definitely a lag, but they’ll get there. Many of the lady IT people I know hail from Asia (India, China). I think US women will eventually catch up too, but it will be a little longer.
@creepycoug is right, I lost my love for math and comp sci freshman year of high school, for all the reasons he listed. (Remember, the internet was just getting off the ground at this point.) It wasn’t until my senior year that I took statistics that I got a teacher that was supportive and never spoke to me in a condescending manner. My senior project received the highest grade in the class. But by then the damage had been done and even though my SAT scores in math were high I had already told myself a STEM major wasn’t for me.
Yeah it's strange because in like a high school math class or something the girls did just as well or better than the boys. And yet it's entirely dominated by men.
I'm thinking it has to change. How can it not?
More focus needs to be done on those studies I mentioned. You have to get girls in middle school or they're gone for good. I don't know if they internalize the set backs more than the boys, but for whatever reason, once they make that decision in their minds they rarely recover.
Boys do much better fucking it up and then deciding to get back to it, pay the price to catch up, and get back on track in high school. Girls just don't. And they've really narrowed it down to that one year: 8th grade. Not 7th or 9th ... 8th grade. That's where we lose them.
I actually think the system that failed me is being slowly fixed now...I remember reading somewhere half of the degrees in science fields and engineering are being awarded to women (computer science is still way behind...I think it’s closer to 20% there). The next hurdle of getting these women hired, promoted, and retained is what needs to happen next.
Over and over, we see that these things are not helped with one simple change, like affirmative action or diversity programs aimed at clearing that first hurdle. It's a combination of things and, as I've learned raising 3 daughters, girls are different than boys. So you can't say, as maybe some of our friends in the Tug would, "Well, shit. The schools recruit them and give them an advantage in admissions, so what's the problem?" Well, the problem was never admissions. The problem is the messages girls get along the way, and if they manage to get there, the messages they continue to receive. We know it's not because they can't do the work. So you have to keep asking the question and finding solutions.
On the sports side, one of my girl's coaches used to say something to the effect that if you yell at them and try and coerce them into doing something, they'll do the minimum and they won't give you everything they've got. But if, after you've earned their trust, you ask them to do something for you, they'll run through a brick wall to get it done..
I think there may be something to that. But then again, that same kid's premier soccer coach was a Texas All American who was a ball buster, and my kid never played for anyone like she played for her. That includes college.
I have no answers, but I know it's not as simple as recruiting. It takes a multi-factor approach.
If they don’t have daddy issues and stay off the pole. You deserve a medal sir
Was talking with my wife last night about the maff thing, and she completely agreed. She said that she was drifting away from math in about 8th grade, and the one thing that saved her was a really good teacher (whom she is still in touch with). She considered going into the FBI, but by the time she figured out what she needed, she was married and moving around with her ex. She is in sales, and crushes it. She's a nerd, but she's my nerd...
She has gone thru the "promotion to management" phase, and was shocked at how generally incompetent her work force was, and how upper managers "old boy-ed" the men, and pressed the women until many broke. She earned roughly half of what she was making selling, with huge headaches every day, not of her making. It really opened my eyes when she would talk of all the bullshit she has seen in the workplace over the years, being talked down to by higher-ups that couldn't run a lemonade stand in the Mojave desert.
None of that surprises me in the least to read. Seriously. No hyperbole. It's absolutely typical. And anyone who argues that the old boys clubs aren't operating anymore isn't paying attention or doesn't have access to the view you need to see it.
Comments
On the sports side, one of my girl's coaches used to say something to the effect that if you yell at them and try and coerce them into doing something, they'll do the minimum and they won't give you everything they've got. But if, after you've earned their trust, you ask them to do something for you, they'll run through a brick wall to get it done..
I think there may be something to that. But then again, that same kid's premier soccer coach was a Texas All American who was a ball buster, and my kid never played for anyone like she played for her. That includes college.
I have no answers, but I know it's not as simple as recruiting. It takes a multi-factor approach.
I’m curious though, how long do these women last? Are they promoted?
It kind of taught me that it's like 70 percent hiring 30 percent teaching.
Its like being in a frat for years with no parties. Its like dick measuring bullshit for no reason.
It's quite a thing you're talking about here. It's real. I see it, and because I have girls, I pay attention to it and have tried to be empathetic and help where I can. My view is that if you can the work you should be treated accordingly.
Also, big of you to be aware of it, own it and work on it.
My unsolicited advice? Find a good mentor ... man or woman, who will champion you. If you have the resources, or if your company HR will pay for it, consider an executive coach. This will be a PhD in psychology who has organizational behavior expertise. Changed my life. Makes you see all kinds of things about yourself and you learn how others see you. Very important. PM me and I can give you a reference if you are interested. They're not cheap; but they're cheaper than lawyers.
She has gone thru the "promotion to management" phase, and was shocked at how generally incompetent her work force was, and how upper managers "old boy-ed" the men, and pressed the women until many broke. She earned roughly half of what she was making selling, with huge headaches every day, not of her making. It really opened my eyes when she would talk of all the bullshit she has seen in the workplace over the years, being talked down to by higher-ups that couldn't run a lemonade stand in the Mojave desert.
lol
I completely agree with the multi-factor thing when it comes to affirmative action, women in the workplace, or almost any other long-standing societal problem. Dare I say there are some structural or even systemic problems in society that need to be addressed to fix the problems? Shit is getting better, but it's not going to change overnight.
One other big factor in this is just general inertia. Humans enjoy doing the same thing, or the easy thing, over and over, even if it comes with mixed (or poor) results. Do managers and executives really want to go to colleges and interview lots of people and find a top quality candidate and then train the hell out of them? Hell no. It's way easier to have HR put out a job post, and hire the first 6.5 out of 10 that you come across that has some related skills, even if there is a 0% chance they're going to become a superstar. Males typically end up benefitting the most from this arrangement.
One of my main rules in life is not to expect too much out of other humans. That doesn't mean everyone is shitty and is out to get you, just that most people are pretty lazy and have plenty room to improve, even if they're great to have a beer and play golf with.