Cynthia Lanius, GirlTECH Co-director, Rice University

Julie Foertsch, LEAD Center, University of Wisconsin-Madison

Introduction. Research now confirms what both teachers and computer scientists have observed for quite some time. In general, girls and women aren't as engaged with computer technology as boys and men are.

The American Association of American Women's (AAUW) recent study, Gender Gaps: Where Schools Still Fail Our Children documents a diminishing gender gap in achievement in mathematics and science, with one exception -- technology. The study concludes, "While girls have narrowed the gender gaps in math and science, technology has become the new 'boys' club'" (reference).

College Board data show only 17% of high school students who took the Advanced Placement Computer Science test in 1997 were female - the lowest percentage of all tests given. AB Calculus is up to 47%, Chemistry is 42%, Biology is 56%, and Physics, although still lagging, is almost 30% (College Board, 1997).

The AAUW study also concludes

• Girls are significantly more likely than boys to enroll in clerical and data-entry classes, the 1990s version of typing. Boys are more likely to enroll in advanced computer science and graphics courses.
• School software programs often reinforce gender bias and stereotypical gender roles.
• Girls consistently rate themselves significantly lower than boys on computer ability, and boys exhibit higher self-confidence and a more positive attitude about computers than do girls.
• Girls use computers less often outside of school. Boys enter the classroom with more prior experience with computers and other technology than girls.

A National Science foundation report showed that although the numbers and percentages of science and engineering bachelor's degrees awarded to women in most fields are increasing, they have decreased drastically in computer science. Degrees awarded in computer science decreased among both men and women from 1985 to 1995, and women went from earning 36% of those degrees in 1985 to only 28% in 1995 (Hill, 1997).

We need women in the highest levels of the computing industry. Computer science and computer engineering are the routes to the top, and we must find ways to encourage young women to pursue those routes. This technology gap threatens to disadvantage girls as they confront 21st-century demands. The Bureau of Labor Statistics lists computer scientists, computer engineers, and systems analysts as the top three occupations with the fastest employment growth, 1996-2006 (BLS, 1996). Computers may become the newest impediment to women’s achieving equity in both the workplace and the sciences.

How do we make key people, like high school teachers, for example, aware of and ready to tackle this newest threat? Since 1995, GirlTECH, a professional development program sponsored by the Center for Research on Parallel Computation, headquartered at Rice University, has brought Houston area K-12 teachers to the university for intensive workshops with a long-term goal of increasing women’s participation in computer science. Critical to that goal are two immediate goals: to raise teachers’ awareness of and sensitivity to the underrepresentation of women in computer technology fields and to increase teachers’ own computer skills and knowledge of informational technology. From the onset of the program, GirlTECH leaders have striven to create a force of technically competent teachers who are sensitive to the special needs of all students. In order for teachers to assist students, male or female, become adroit with computer technology, teachers, particularly those at the K-12 level, must become much more adept at using computer technology themselves and much better informed about how to incorporate Web-based materials into their curriculum (Mendels, 1997).

During GirlTECH's initial two-week training period, participating teachers:

• Are provided with Rice University Internet accounts and software for Internet access.
• Receive intensive computer technology training from master teachers, especially in the use of the Internet.
• Explore diversity issues in the computational sciences through presentations and group discussions.
• Utilize online resources as a research, teaching, and collaboration tool.
• Create their own home pages, design and publish Web-based math and science lessons.
• Gain an awareness of the latest research in the computational sciences and hear from business and industry leaders' expectations of students for the 21st century;
• Explore representation issues and teacher practices that impact girls' interest in computers.
• Become members of an ongoing teachers' technology electronic support group that communicates throughout the year.
• Establish a student technology project on their campuses to ensure a transfer of knowledge from teacher to students.
• Make a one-year commitment to advanced training and to an integration of technology into their teaching practices.

Summer of 1999 will find not only Houston-area teachers, but four university/teacher teams from across the country (California, Hawaii, Illinois, and New Mexico) attending the program. Sponsored by the Education, Outreach, and Training Team of the National Science Foundation-funded Partnership for Advanced Computational Infrastructure (EOT-PACI), teams will work together over the next year to create a national-level plan for attacking the problem of women’s underrepresentation head on.

In the summer of 1997, the EOT-PACI commissioned the Learning through Evaluation, Adaptation, and Dissemination (LEAD) Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison to evaluate GirlTECH to determine the feasibility of either replicating the program or disseminating guidelines for creating similar programs throughout the nation. The evaluators found that during the two-week workshop, participants significantly increased their Internet searching and programming skills, their awareness of the field of computational science, and their understanding of how issues of gender and ethnicity effect computational science. In the school year that followed the workshop, substantial increases were seen in thenumber of participants using computers in various educational contexts, their use of computers as an instructional tool, and the diversity and sophistication of their general computer use. Teachers who participated in the workshop became members of an ongoing, supportive community of fellow teachers and computational scientists at Rice University who were dedicated to incorporating computer- and Internet-based educational materials into the K-12 curriculum, and about a quarter of the participants contacted went on to become technology resources or advocates in their schools. Quantitative and qualitative analyses of survey and interview data were used to identify the essential elements that were critical in bringing about the success of the workshop. The evaluation report provides guidelines to administrators at other institutions who are

interested in creating similarly successful technology training programs for the K-12 teachers in their area.

What is it about the workshop that led to these largely successful outcomes? From an integrated analysis of the interviews, focus groups, surveys, and list serve observations carried out by the LEAD researchers, seven essential elements of the program emerged.

GirlTECH participants become leaders in promoting girls’ use of technology. Some run Girls-Only computer clubs. Others use proactive strategies to get girls engaged in mainstream computer activities. Some have become advocates for girls in broad state and national computer science circles (an Advanced Placement Computer Science email list, for example). Roberta Furger in her book Does Jane Compute? Preserving Our Daughters’ Place in the Cyber Revolution, highlighted activity of four of GirlTECH’s teachers. In it, computer teacher Jane Holzapfel credits GirlTECH with "opening her eyes." Susan Boone, mathematics teacher at St. Agnes, an all girls school, began a computer club. Furger calls computer science teacher, Barbara Christopher, a "rarity" because she teaches so all her students will achieve success, rather than the few gurus. When Furger asked Cynthia Lanius’ female students why they joined the technology club, despite their already full schedules, each one credited the influence of Ms. Lanius on their decisions.

The first step to addressing the problem of female underrepresentation in computing is to assess how much of a problem is in the programs offered by your own school. AAUW's Tech Check, a guide to help schools assess the technology opportunities they offer female students, is available from AAUW's HELPLINE, 800/326-AAUW, helpline@aauw.org. All computer courses, labs, and software offered by your school should be assessed to determine whether they meet the needs and encourage the interest of all the students in your school, not just certain types of students.

Then intervene with effective strategies. Through working with girls in her high school, Cynthia Lanius developed suggestions on getting girls interested in computers (Lanius, 1997, 1998).

1. Girls like to join clubs and take classes with their friends. A lone girl, who likes computers, is unlikely to join a computer club by herself. So if you sponsor a computer club, or teach computer science, invite girls to join clubs or classes as a group.

2. Girls need role models; they need to see women using computers competently and confidently. Check out computing magazines - almost all of the photographs are of men. On high school campuses, being a computer geek raises a male student's coolness factor; it doesn't have the same effect for girls. To offset this, when you invite speakers to classes or clubs, make sure you include women. Share information

about women who are leaders in the field.

3. Make a conscious effort to encourage girls. Make them lab assistants. In class, call on girls more often, even if they don't volunteer. Ask them difficult questions that require higher order thinking. Try to find time for girls to be on machines when the boys are not around. (Then they won't be tempted to ask the

gurus for help.) Choose a girl to help set up new hardware or software. Start a club designed to appeal to girls. Make sure they take the highest level of computing offered. Personally invite them to go to a computing contest. Don't let anyone deter them.

4. Inform them of what computer science as a career is really like. Girls may perceive it as a job spent day in a cubicle with nothing but a machine.

5. When they ask, don't tell. Girls tend to ask for assistance when something won't work. Boys tend to try to figure it out. Encourage them to be daring with the machine. It's a real confidence booster when they succeed. Only step in if you really need to, and then try just a hint or help them to read the manual.

6. For young girls, purchase games that appeal to them. The more time a young child can spend on a computer, the more confident she will become with the machine.

7. In class, collaborate more; compete less. (I need to add a disclaimer here because I am so competitive myself.) In general, girls respond better to collaborative projects rather than competitive. Encourage collaborations, but be alert to boys dominating the group.

8. Girls like to see what computers can do for them. They see computers more as a tool and less as a toy. (Maybe that's a good thing!) Let them type their papers on the computers, show them how to write web pages, or teach them to make a graph using a spreadsheet.

9. Put the home computer in a centralized location and give girls equal access with their brothers. Is it any wonder that girls aren't using the computer at home if it's in the boy's room?

10. Find out what percentage of the students in the highest level of computer science taught at your school (Computer Science II or AP Computer Science) is girls. If it's not at least 50%, make the school aware of the problem. Talk to counselors, parents, and other teachers to enlist their help in encouraging the girls in your school into the highest levels of computer science.

References

Bureau of Labor Statistics. (1996). Employment Projection. Http://www.bls.gov/news.release/ecopro.table6.htm.

College Board Online (1997). Http://www.collegeboard.org/press/senior97/table14.html.

Foertsch, J., Daffinrud, S., & Alexander, B. B (1998). The GirlTECH Workshop:

Furger, R., (1998). Does Jane Compute, Preserving Our Daughters’ Place in the Cyber Revolution. New York, NY: Warner Books.

Hill, S., (1997). Science and Engineering Bachelor's Degrees Awarded to Women Increase Overall, but Decline in Several Fields. Washington, D.C.: National Science Foundation. http://www.nsf.gov/sbe/srs/databrf/sdb97326.htm.

Lanius, C., (1997). Getting Girls Interested in Computers. Http://math.rice.edu/~lanius/club/girls.html.

Lanius, C., (1998) Getting Girls Interested in Computer Science. Http://math.rice.edu/~lanius/club/girls3.html.