Cracking the Gender Code:
All-Girls’ Schools Are Key to Closing the Gap in STEM Fields
By Suzanne Fogarty, Head of Lincoln School; Rodrigo Fonseca, Associate Professor at Brown University’s Computer Science Department; Susan Amsler-Akacem, Lincoln School’s Ed. Tech Dept. Head & Technology Innovator
Today, our lives and our world are being affected by computing technology in unprecedented ways, and it’s difficult to imagine where technology will take us 10 years from now when the kindergartners of today will be graduating. What is simple to predict, however, is that in order to be a part of where technology is going, these students will need a very specific set of skills to take out into the world and workforce, none more so than girls.
The reason? To counteract the historic and persistent imbalance in the number of women in the science and engineering workforce[1], one fueled by gendered stereotypes about boys being inherently better at math and technology — a stereotype that takes root as early as elementary school.[2] A stereotype that is reinforced by the persistent underrepresentation of women in STEM fields by the popular press, as outlined in a recent article by Girls Who Code Founder and CEO Reshma Saujani. The truth is far from these misguided perceptions — a new study mapping the patterns of academic grades of 1.6 million students shows what we’ve long believed — girls and boys perform equally in STEM, including at the top of the class.[3]
But aptitude has a fierce foe when pitted against attitude — these stereotypes can often be self perpetuating. The way girls perceive their own ability can not only be skewed by society’s beliefs, but also dampened by something called ‘stereotype threat.’[4] Stereotype threat is a phenomenon during which members of a negatively stereotyped group become anxious about living up to the stereotype, therefore hindering their ability to live up to their full potential, regardless of whether or not they actually believe the myths that surround them.
Though there is no simple fix to solve the underrepresentation of women in STEM, by reframing computational thinking and technology skills as integral, genderless disciplines, educators can attack these stereotypes at the root, counteracting them before they have a chance to take hold and do lasting damage. And because of their single-sex focus, all-girls schools provide the ideal environment in which to do so.
Starting Early to See Beyond Stereotypes
Early intervention is the single most powerful tool to fight against STEM gender stereotypes. We know that as young as Grade 1, both boys and girls begin to associate brilliance with being male, and begin to separate skill in these disciplines based on gender. Even if girls do beat the odds to become interested in STEM, their interest sharply declines by Grade 9 when the compulsion to conform to societal expectations and gender roles peaks.[5]
But when girls grow up learning computational thinking as a component of literacy and as a bridge between the technical and traditional disciplines, and are reinforced by positive female role models and peers all around them, the benefits are clear. There is such power when girls are able to see evidence of their own capabilities each and every day. It’s a power that can dismantle stereotypes and lay the groundwork for a new definition of brilliance to take hold.
Although not every girl will become a computer scientist or programmer, being fluent in the language of computer science is becoming indispensable. In 2006, Jeannette Wing, then head of the Computer Science Department at Carnegie Mellon, introduced the term ‘computational thinking’, in a now classic article[6]. CMU’s Center for Computational Thinking defines it as “a way of solving problems, designing systems, and understanding human behavior that draws on concepts fundamental to computer science.”
As Dr. Marina Umaschi Bers (The Scratch Team), professor at Tufts University’s Eliot-Pearson Department of Child Study and Human Development, and author of Coding as a Playground, said:
“I believe that coding is the literacy of the 21st century, in terms that it will allow us to think in new ways, to solve problems that we never encountered before, and to open our world to new projects and new solutions that we don’t even know we need.”
Through tools like the KIBO robot, developed by Dr. Bers to teach programming skills to children aged 4–7 in a fun, engaging, and hands-on way; or Scratch Jr., an app that encourages creative expression through technology by allowing students to program their own interactive stories and games, the introduction of early computational thinking leads to confidence.
The concepts inherent in computational thinking teach critical skills — iterative learning, problem solving, and resilience, which in turn, lead to new and powerful ways to both think and represent thought. Yes, computers can be used to process all banking and flight transactions in the world, but also to do other amazing things such as create music, render the 3D water, hair, and fire in movies like Moana, or help design the sublime buildings of Zaha Hadid or Frank Gehry. But perhaps most importantly, it’s a dynamic tool that can be used to dig into the unknown, and that increasingly separates the producers and consumers of information. As a society, we can’t afford to leave half of our population unequipped to use it.
“We have to rethink the way we raise our girls,” said Reshma Saujani. “Boys are pushed to take risks; girls are not.” And that’s why computer science is so critical for girls. “The process of learning how to code is learning how to fail,” said Saujani. “We need to teach girls that it is all right to sit with that discomfort of not knowing the right answer right away.”
This shift can help to create what the future needs — engaged, tech-literate learners who grow up internalizing one core lesson: persistence is more imperative than perfection.
Engineering Tomorrow: Girls Will Change the World
All-girls schools, especially at the elementary level, are in a key position to create an environment in which girls are able to realize their own strengths in traditionally male-dominated fields. For context, just 18 percent of American computer-science college degrees go to women. Women make up less than one-quarter — 24% — of those employed in STEM occupations.[7] But a recent study shows that girls at single-sex schools are up to 85% more likely to take advanced STEM subjects than at coed schools[8], proof positive that all-girls schools are uniquely poised to combat gender imbalance by providing an environment that makes both interest and success in STEM the new normal.
By actively addressing these stereotypes in a curriculum that integrally incorporates computational thinking early, by teaching girls to be unafraid of failing, and by providing strong female leaders and learners all around them, all-girls institutions can be agents for change in promoting the confidence, exposure, and enduring engagement between girls and technology. The result? A pioneering generation of women in the workforce, one fluent in the language of the future and armed with both purpose and power, who will rewrite the code of conduct in STEM fields going forward.
[1] According to the report National Science Board Science & Engineering Indicators 2016, the percentage of women in the workforce for Computing and Mathematical Sciences in 2013 was 25.3%, and 29% overall for all S&E occupations.https://www.nsf.gov/statistics/2016/nsb20161/#/report/chapter-3/women-and-minorities-in-the-s-e-workforce accessed online on November, 2018
[2] “Gender stereotypes about intellectual ability emerge early and influence children’s interests” by Lin Bian Sarah-Jane Leslie and Andrei Cimpian
[3] R. E. O’Dea et al, Gender differences in individual variation in academic grades fail to fit expected patterns for STEM, Nature Communications (2018). DOI: 10.1038/s41467–018–06292–0
Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2018-09-reveals-patterns-stem-grades-girls.html#jCp
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereotype_threat
[5]According to a 2017 survey from Microsoft
[6] Jeannette Wing, ‘Computational Thinking’, Communications of the ACM. 49 (3): 33. https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~15110-s13/Wing06-ct.pdf
[7] Ryan Noonan, Women in STEM: 2017 Update (US Department of Commerce, Economics and Statistics Administration, Office of the Chief Economist, November 13, 2017).
[8] https://phys.org/news/2018-03-girls-single-sex-schools-advanced-stem.html
