The big reason why women drop out of engineering and computing: It isn’t in the classroom

Yep. Though I’ve seen a lot of in-classroom culture that drives out women, the bigger driver is that computing culture drives out many people, like the Stack Overflow results recently mentioned here.

Engineering classes and assignments do not “weed out” women; indeed, data show that women students do as well or better than male students in their course work. Instead, women students often point to the culture of engineering itself as a reason for leaving engineering.

This starts with activities that are designed to show novices how the profession actually does its work, how to interact with clients and other professionals, and how to exercise discretionary judgment in situations of uncertainty. Many discover that the engineering profession is not as open to being socially responsible as they hoped.

And, during the more informal, out-of-classroom training and socialization, women experience conventional gender discrimination that leaves them marginalized. These factors appear to be the main reasons these accomplished women leave their chosen profession.

Source: The big reason women drop out of engineering isn’t in the classroom – MarketWatch