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