I Belong Here: 3 Ways to Attract More Women to STEM
Source: Merrilyn Datta
"It's a girl, it's a girl," the audience murmured. As my daughter took the stage to receive an award at coding camp last summer, the other parents looked at each other in surprise, every other child in the camp was a boy. My daughter was the first girl to walk on stage that morning. Where was everyone else's daughter? Why did this elementary-age tech camp already mimic the vast gender disparity of the Silicon Valley tech world?
As a mom who has spent her entire career in the technology field, this was a proud moment. But it is unfortunately a scenario that still happens all too often. Despite the rapid growth of technology in recent years, there is still a significant imbalance in gender representation when it comes to Science Technology Engineering and Math (STEM) fields.
When Facebook and Google released their diversity numbers last year, it created a buzz of conversation on diversity in tech. Over half of the US population ages 15 to 64 is female, yet only 14 percent of computer science majors are female. A report released last year by the American Association of University Woman reports that not only do women make up only 26 percent of computer scientists and 12 percent of engineers, but the numbers have worsened over the past 30 years. This is a huge disconnect, especially considering that published studies, such as by Harvard Business Review, show having a woman on a team raises the team’s performance and collective intelligence.
As a female tech executive, I have walked into countless rooms -- including boardrooms -- where I am the only female. The difference today versus 25 years ago is that today I know I belong here. Deals done, technologies commercialized -- that's only a part of it; I don't question that I should have a seat at the decision-making table, which is as much about attitude as it is track record.
As a society, we need to make changes to not only attract women to STEM, but also to create an atmosphere in these traditionally male-dominated fields where women intrinsically belong. So what can we do to address this?
Get girls to "opt in" early.
The deficit of women in STEM starts with the fact that, according to the American Association of University Women, many girls "opt-out" of STEM in middle school. Why? Most of these girls cite an increasing lack of confidence in using technology. They see boys obsessing over Minecraft mods but generally find current video games less compelling. The answer to keeping girls engaged in technology is about reframing the paradigm.
Passion for making a difference is what gets girls into technology and it is often why they stay in tech companies. In fact some of the top performing women in both my graduate program at Harvard and in the tech industry all say things like, "I was so fascinated by figuring out how developmental genetics worked, that I couldn't stop myself.” And these women often say that it was not about the mastery of a technology itself that interested them; it was that they saw a problem and they learned the technology to solve the problem.
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