I tried to find out how, but there was too much filler to find the reason in under a few minutes.
Discrimination against ubernerds In addition to demonstrated academic competence, the Admissions Office began giving more weight to non-academic factors, looking for applicants with leadership potential and a commitment to give back to the community.
Mentoring Programme The most extensive single activity of the Women@SCS Advisory Council has been the Big Sister/Little Sister program, which pairs upper-class and graduate students with firstyear and sophomore CS majors.
Changing emphasis/delivery of (introductory) courses Even more, insights provided by the Council are likely to have profound impact on the curriculum. In her green paper circulated at a meeting with faculty, senior Ting-Chih Shih clearly pointed out that the current CS undergraduate curriculum serves male students far better than females. For one, the entry programming courses favor students with more experience (usually men) who seem to get better scores effortlessly As a result, many women begin thinking that learning computer science takes innate talent and no amount of hard work will pay off They start to lose confidence and forget their initial interest in computer science Moreover, the way lectures are presented seem to appeal to men more. In general, females feel that the birds-eye view of a problem, and the end result, are more relevant than the coding details in between
Doesn't this suggest that men are more likely to be wired for programming?
Not stating a fact, just pointing out that in the context of a technical profession, that citation actually sounds derogatory.
1. Not every CS graduate will work as a programmer. Many will work in other technical roles within the industry. Do not assume that CS knowledge is only appliable to programming. I graduated from a CS course and I'm currently a sysadmin, and having a CS degree makes me a better professional;
2. Having little interest in the details is usually just common-speak for lack of technical skill. Having the skill/competence and lacking the interest is seldom found in the same person;
3. It's the introductory classes that lay out the ways in which one faces every programming problem. Not paying attention to detail means allowing bad habits to root themselves. I still remember some of those "details" from my introductory classes to programming 12 years ago, and I frequently other people (otherwise experienced) commiting mistakes that I manage to avoid due to those "details".
They had a smaller usegroup they used for their study and show that women drop out thinking that they're not doing as well as men in the same classes when really, they're doing about above average.