tory CS courses to encourage high-performing women to take a second course and consider majoring in computing. If the institution offers an introductory course aimed at non-CS majors, it should ensure that students who do well in it are able to become CS majors without losing credit for the introductory course.

˲ Provide and publicize opportunities for science students to enter CS majors after completing their second year. Many female students start majoring in biology or chemistry with the intention of going to medical school

has spearheaded and supported a number of regional conferences modeled on the Hopper conference. In addition, ACM-W recently launched a program that provides scholarships to female students so that they can attend research conferences.

˲Form an ACM-W chapter (see women.acm.org/activities.html).

˲ Engage female students in computing research during the summer after their first or second year.

Much has been written about ways to enroll more women in CS programs at the graduate level and retain them.

 

“Illegitimi non carborundum,

which is mock-latin for ‘don’t let
the bastards grind you down’.
(see Wikipedia.)
it’s helped me a lot over the years!”

PRofessoR Dame WenDY haLL: aCm PResIDent; sChooL of eLeCtRonICs anD ComPuteR sCIenCe, unIVeRsIt Y of southamPton.

 

but realize during the second year that their choice is unlikely or undesirable.

˲ Provide bachelor’s or master’s programs in CS for people who already have a bachelor’s degree in another field. ¹³

˲Encourage female students to participate in mentoring programs at their institution in person or by email. See, for example, Mentornet (www. mentornet.org).

˲ Encourage female students to attend computing conferences, and help to finance the excursion. For example, the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing has an outstanding track record of improving recruitment, retention, and advancement. Positive outcomes reported by attendees include inspiration, decreased feelings of isolation, renewed commitment to a computer science or technology degree, and the establishment of a professional network that aids in career advancement. ACM-W

Basic approaches to enhancing enrollment include the funding of visits by accepted students to the department, recruitment visits by female graduate students to their undergraduate institutions, and departmental delegations to conferences, such as Hopper, attended by many women undergraduate and graduate students majoring in computing fields. But in our view, three kinds of experiences make undergraduate females most likely to commence graduate work in CS: encouragement by a faculty member; research experience as an undergraduate; and sustained interaction with graduate students.

In the U.S., many universities and colleges offer Research Experiences for Undergraduate programs (REUs, often funded by NSF) during the summer. For over a decade, CRA-W has run its Distributed Mentor Program (DMP), which matches female under-

graduates with female faculty members (usually at a different institution) for the purpose of doing research together, and the program provides funding for the effort. A research study by Harrod¹² demonstrated that students participating in DMP were significantly more likely to enter a graduate program later on. Similarly, many programs connect female undergraduates with counterparts in graduate school. Over the past few years, the Women in Computing Society program at Carnegie Mellon has sent groups of female graduate students to several academic institutions in order to talk to female undergraduates about graduate school. MentorNet provides email mentoring for undergraduates by graduate students, faculty, and computing professionals; and many departmental mentoring programs pair undergraduates with graduate students or conduct tri-men-toring programs that group an undergraduate, a graduate student, and a computing professional.

Retention initiatives fall into two groups: those conducted within the institution, usually at the departmental or school (faculty, college) level; and regional, national, or international programs that bring together women graduate students from more than one institution. Most of the with-in-institution initiatives are designed to build a sense of community among the students and provide mentoring, especially at critical retention points in the graduate programs. An example of the second group of initiatives is CRA-W’s long history of offering grad-uate-student programs—beginning with academic career workshops at computing conferences and more recently at the annual Grad Cohort symposia—that bring together hundreds of women graduate students from across the U.S.

At the faculty level, the primary goals are to recruit more women faculty and ensure that they ultimately achieve tenure and promotion.

Significant efforts has been made over the last decade, supported by ADVANCE and other NSF grants, to establish best practices that achieve more diversity—that is, the recruitment of more women and underrepresented minorities—in science and engineer-

 

72 CommunICatIons of the aCm | feBRuaRY 2009 | vol. 52 | No. 2