Is there anything more inspiring than women coming together to create a support system in one of the most challenging fields out there: Computer Science? Computer Science is a field dominated primarily by men and pursued by few women. Some young women at BC took it upon themselves to start their own women’s chapter of the National Association for Computing Machinery at BC and are revitalizing the dormant Women in Computer Science club, or WiCS. WiCS is a student organization that supports and promotes women in technology through encouragement, discussion, and raising awareness about the issues that women in this field face. WiCS also aims to broaden the scope of Computer Science by reaching out to pre-college girls of all ages and showing them that Computer Science isn’t intimidating or just for boys, but fun and exciting for girls too.
Julie Bacon and Meg Bednarcik, Computer Science majors at BC, want more support for girls in Computer Science. They recently took the initiative to apply for an ACM-W chapter and refurbish the WiCS club at Boston College, and with the help of Professor Lowrie, the only female Computer Science professor at Boston College, they are promoting women in Computer Science. The objective of ACM-W and WiCS is to promote women in technology.
Julie Bacon
Meg Bednarcik
Forbes frequently discusses this “Pipeline Problem,” a steady decline in female participation in Computer Science. Women are not equally represented in high tech careers because the number of women studying computer science in school has dropped dramatically.
So what is the problem? Many girls don’t really know what Computer Science is. The clear solution is to educate them. If girls understand what Computer Science actually is and its endless opportunities, when it comes time to choose what they want to study, Computer Science remains on the table as an option rather than an unknown.
With ACM-W and WiCS, Julie, Meg, and the rest of the girls hope to create a community of women in Computer Science at Boston College, network with other women professionals across the country, educate young girls about the opportunities in technology, and develop of their own skills by attending workshops, meetups, and conferences.
Julie gave me a visual of what computer science looks like at BC. As previously stated, there is only one female professor in the entire department. One of her computer science courses ranges from approximately 30 to 40 students—6 of those students are female. WiCS hopes to bring those numbers up.
Sources:
Forbes.com – The Pipeline Problem
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