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Comment by krstck | Hacker News Reader

Pretty tired of hearing women who aren't programmers or in tech telling other women that they need to program.

This. I am a woman in engineering and share your sentiment. Can't describe how annoyed I have been to find non-engineer/non-programmer women beat the drums about getting more girls to code or more women into STEM while the actual deserving technical women toil away silently.

Yep. As a fellow woman in tech, I know that we have issues that need to be addressed. But what do Chelsea Clinton and Mindy Kaling have to do with this? Are they going to start programming professionally?

There are many women involved in Girls Who Code who are programmers. If you go to the site, www.madewithcode.com, the women highlighted are engineers.

Moreover, no one here is telling anyone that they need to code.

The public face for Girls Who Code is Reshma Saujani (law / politics background). As krstck pointed out, the public faces here are Mindy Kaling, Chelsea Clinton. While there are engineers involved behind the curtains in each of these programs, I don't like the fact that the ones who stand to gain the most (publicity, credibility, funding, access to resources and powerful contacts) are people who don't have anything to do with tech themselves except flying around the country giving talks about how everyone should code (Reshma Saujani, I am looking at you). I am being bitter here, but I would hope to live in a world where real engineers are the women in the limelight for the kids to look up to.

I totally agree with you that the people that kids can look up to in these programs should actually be engineers. I think there is a danger of forgetting the power of spokespeople and the ability for people who aren't engineers to help lead these organizations. I agree they shouldn't be held up as role models themselves, though, at least in this area.

Honestly, though, my experience with Girls Who Code (and why I mentioned it) has been entirely local, where the women up front have all been engineers or close enough. This is the first time I've actually heard of Reshma Saujani (or, if it's not, she wasn't notable enough to stick in my memory).

Are they programmers or engineers then?

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