Why I Do What I Do...
Read this first: National Center for Women & Information Technology Statistics on Women in Computer Science (will open a PDF)
I've never thought much about women in the sciences, particularly women in computer science. However, it's come up a lot of times in the past couple weeks, and it's becoming and issue that is more and more on my radar.
My thesis advisor just came back from a diversity in computing conference, and talked about how the percentages of female computer science students have been declining since the 1980's. Declining?! Yep. If you look at the PDF I linked above, it seems that percentage of women in computer science degree programs have dropped an alarming 35% since 1986. Folks, there weren't that many women in the field in 1986!
Another professor mentioned, when I asked him for advice on choosing grad schools, that I might want to look for departments with women faculty that I could use as mentors during the next 4-6 years. Wow. The idea hadn't even occurred to me, but the more I look the more obsessed I get.
I spent several hours the other night looking at research departments at schools I am thinking about applying to. One side effect of this was that I got so excited about all of the potential research I could be working on in the near future that I stayed up WELL past when I had meant to go to bed, and had trouble going to sleep once I got there. Oops...
I also realized that finding women in this field is MUCH harder than I expected. While looking through the 15 or 20 schools that I was considering, I kept an eye out for female faculty. There are some. Some. Here and there, I saw women in Computer Science departments. But then I started looking out for women in Computer Science fields studying Artificial Intelligence. There were...a few. And of those, I think one or two did NOT study Natural Language Processing (a part of the field I find less than thrilling). Female grad students are possibly even rarer. Some schools I looked at had only one or two female PhD candidates amongst an army of men.
I understand that this is probably a phenomenon of percentages. A small percent of computer scientists are female, and logically speaking if you look at a smaller portion of the field, you'll find less women than you would in the whole. But wow. No wonder people are making such a big deal of finding a department where I would have women to use as resources.
I know I need female mentors to look to. I've never been able to socialize well with women, regardless of how smart I know they are. Someday I'm going to want to balance work and family, and it would be great to be able to watch people do it in practice before I have to do it myself. What's it really like to work in a department where you may not have any female peers? What drove a woman a few years ago to ask that a leading science publication only publish her paper with her initials because she didn't want people to know she was a woman? Is it really a problem to get people to take you seriously because your female, and if so, how do you deal with it? None of these are really things that men could answer for me.
I have been saying for years that I want to do independent research rather than working at a university because teaching is really something I would rather not do. But I'm beginning to wonder if I don't have a responsibility to stick around in the academic sector to help future women like myself navigate academia. Sure, in the private sector I could talk to any women who came through, but they would have to GET there first. And it seems like the hard part is getting from college to where you want to end up.
I might still elect for a private sector research job someday. After all, it's not impossible to mentor and be an example for women from a research job outside of academia. However, I'm certainly not as opposed to teaching as I once was. It's not about assignments and grades, it's about helping people find their goals and how to get where they want to be. In the meantime, I'm doing my part to fight statistics. I very nearly dropped the computer science major two years ago because it was "too hard." A single conversation with a couple grad students convinced me to give it a little more time. Boy am I glad I did. The more I learn, the more I want to know. I can't imagine a better place for me.
I've never thought much about women in the sciences, particularly women in computer science. However, it's come up a lot of times in the past couple weeks, and it's becoming and issue that is more and more on my radar.
My thesis advisor just came back from a diversity in computing conference, and talked about how the percentages of female computer science students have been declining since the 1980's. Declining?! Yep. If you look at the PDF I linked above, it seems that percentage of women in computer science degree programs have dropped an alarming 35% since 1986. Folks, there weren't that many women in the field in 1986!
Another professor mentioned, when I asked him for advice on choosing grad schools, that I might want to look for departments with women faculty that I could use as mentors during the next 4-6 years. Wow. The idea hadn't even occurred to me, but the more I look the more obsessed I get.
I spent several hours the other night looking at research departments at schools I am thinking about applying to. One side effect of this was that I got so excited about all of the potential research I could be working on in the near future that I stayed up WELL past when I had meant to go to bed, and had trouble going to sleep once I got there. Oops...
I also realized that finding women in this field is MUCH harder than I expected. While looking through the 15 or 20 schools that I was considering, I kept an eye out for female faculty. There are some. Some. Here and there, I saw women in Computer Science departments. But then I started looking out for women in Computer Science fields studying Artificial Intelligence. There were...a few. And of those, I think one or two did NOT study Natural Language Processing (a part of the field I find less than thrilling). Female grad students are possibly even rarer. Some schools I looked at had only one or two female PhD candidates amongst an army of men.
I understand that this is probably a phenomenon of percentages. A small percent of computer scientists are female, and logically speaking if you look at a smaller portion of the field, you'll find less women than you would in the whole. But wow. No wonder people are making such a big deal of finding a department where I would have women to use as resources.
I know I need female mentors to look to. I've never been able to socialize well with women, regardless of how smart I know they are. Someday I'm going to want to balance work and family, and it would be great to be able to watch people do it in practice before I have to do it myself. What's it really like to work in a department where you may not have any female peers? What drove a woman a few years ago to ask that a leading science publication only publish her paper with her initials because she didn't want people to know she was a woman? Is it really a problem to get people to take you seriously because your female, and if so, how do you deal with it? None of these are really things that men could answer for me.
I have been saying for years that I want to do independent research rather than working at a university because teaching is really something I would rather not do. But I'm beginning to wonder if I don't have a responsibility to stick around in the academic sector to help future women like myself navigate academia. Sure, in the private sector I could talk to any women who came through, but they would have to GET there first. And it seems like the hard part is getting from college to where you want to end up.
I might still elect for a private sector research job someday. After all, it's not impossible to mentor and be an example for women from a research job outside of academia. However, I'm certainly not as opposed to teaching as I once was. It's not about assignments and grades, it's about helping people find their goals and how to get where they want to be. In the meantime, I'm doing my part to fight statistics. I very nearly dropped the computer science major two years ago because it was "too hard." A single conversation with a couple grad students convinced me to give it a little more time. Boy am I glad I did. The more I learn, the more I want to know. I can't imagine a better place for me.
posted by Liz at 12:39 AM
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