In grad school, I was a member of the local student chapter of SWE (the society of women engineers) [1][2]. One of the studies they came up with had the implications that boys were steered towards engineering, while girls were steered away from engineering [3].
Part of the problem is that engineering and IT aren't cool for most values of "cool." I personally don't think that it is a problem, let alone something that needs to be cured. However, I also recognize that I'm not everyone.
1 - I'm tired of hearing about "well, what about the society of men engineers" as engineering is so overwhelmingly populated by men, almost every engineering organization is "SME".
2 - Why did I (a man) join? Mostly, my lab partner asked me to join because they didn't have enough students and were in danger of being decertified as a student club/group/organization.
3 - The numbers I remember were along the lines of: 95% of women who enter engineering have a family member or close/influential personal friend who is/was an engineer. With men entering engineering, the number is 60%. Also women engineers drop out of engineering at twice the rate of men dropping out of engineering.
Part of the problem is that engineering and IT aren't cool for most values of "cool." I personally don't think that it is a problem, let alone something that needs to be cured. However, I also recognize that I'm not everyone.
As an older developer, I'm also reminded of this comment: http://news.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1033515&cid=258...
Notes:
1 - I'm tired of hearing about "well, what about the society of men engineers" as engineering is so overwhelmingly populated by men, almost every engineering organization is "SME".
2 - Why did I (a man) join? Mostly, my lab partner asked me to join because they didn't have enough students and were in danger of being decertified as a student club/group/organization.
3 - The numbers I remember were along the lines of: 95% of women who enter engineering have a family member or close/influential personal friend who is/was an engineer. With men entering engineering, the number is 60%. Also women engineers drop out of engineering at twice the rate of men dropping out of engineering.