The actual title of the article is "This Popular Math Class Is At The Heart Of The STEM Gender Gap, Study Suggests" which such transparent clickbait that I refuse to believe the article could possibly be worth my time reading it, despite the fact that the subject could actually be interesting and important.
Calculus at the heart of the STEM gender gap, study suggests
21–30 of 62 posts
Re: Calculus at the heart of the STEM gender gap, study suggests
#22My college is weird and bad in that it requires no math aside from basic discrete math (as in, sets and truth tables). The gender gap is inexistent until late sophomore year when we start learning more advanced CS concept that require math.
It's weird seeing 30-50% women become 10-20% in the course of a semester.
Re: Calculus at the heart of the STEM gender gap, study suggests
#23> the notoriously difficult college math class, Calculus I Are college courses in the United States standardised? Does every college have a course they call Calculus I and have the same content and level of difficulty? Calculus seems to be a really big deal in the US education system. In the UK we learn about differentiation and integration in what you would call highschool as just another topic among many, and I don…
Calc 1 in college is a common weed-out class.
Yes, and I believe many colleges make it intentionally difficult. My Calc I class was given by an instructor with a heavy Asian accent. I had to struggle to understand every other word.
My Chemistry for Engineers class was in a large classroom that was under construction.
Needless to say, I went for MIS instead of CS/EE. I ended up taking many CS classes, so it worked out well.
On a side note, teaching is really difficult. Knowledge of the subject is the minor skill. My parents were teachers and I considered it in college but didn't have the patience.
Re: Calculus at the heart of the STEM gender gap, study suggests
#24> The findings suggest that a major factor in women’s decisions to leave STEM paths after Calculus I have nothing to do with ability, but confidence in their ability. (Though this particular study did not examine students’ grades in the class, a 2015 paper about college math concluded that women outperform men in Calc I.) I don't understand. They have no confidence, yet they outperform the men? So, they take the clas…
It's not measuring performance at calculus. It's measuring confidence in performance at calculus. This is where sexism and all those icky social things come into play. Most women have spent their lives up to that point hearing subtle and not-subtle variations of "girls can't math". So even if they're good at it, they tend to believe they aren't.
Meanwhile, college-age men tend to be brimming with confidence, walking examples of the Dunning-Kruger effect. Even if they're not good at calculus, they often think they are. This is partly a result of a society that says, directly and indirectly, that people like them are natural rulers.
That's how sexism works, in both directions.
Re: Calculus at the heart of the STEM gender gap, study suggests
#25My college is weird and bad in that it requires no math aside from basic discrete math (as in, sets and truth tables). The gender gap is inexistent until late sophomore year when we start learning more advanced CS concept that require math. It's weird seeing 30-50% women become 10-20% in the course of a semester.
It's also a really bad thing that this happens in late sophomore year - you've wasted 2 years of someone's time on a trajectory they aren't suited for .
That's why traditionally colleges start with weedout courses. If someone isn't cut out for STEM (and in my experience teaching, some folks just aren't), better to find that out in semester 1 so they don't waste several more semesters doing the wrong thing.
Re: Calculus at the heart of the STEM gender gap, study suggests
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
Calc 1 in college is a common weed-out class.
Yes, and I believe many colleges make it intentionally difficult. My Calc I class was given by an instructor with a heavy Asian accent. I had to struggle to understand every other word. My Chemistry for Engineers class was in a large classroom that was under construction. Needless to say, I went for MIS instead of CS/EE. I ended up taking many CS classes, so it worked out well. On a side note, teaching is really diff…
Weed-out is a really bad way to look at teaching. It puts people in the mind set looking for excuses to get people to fail. The attitude should be teach-in.
If someone passes your entrance tests then in most cases if they fail either you failed to develop the ability that you decided they had, or your entrance test was wrong.
The UK military realised this a while ago and describing any activity as being 'weed-out' is a big no-no.
Re: Calculus at the heart of the STEM gender gap, study suggests
#27After going through 7 or 8 advanced level math courses in college, I noticed there was a dissociation of interests between the teachers and many of their students (90% STEM).
Mathematicians might be interested in math because they enjoy math purely for what it is: abstract and theoretical. However, many scientists and engineers just what to know where what they're learning might be useful or applied somewhere in their career.
Even if one never uses it directly in their jobs, it's at least nice to know where it actually has an application so it's in the back of your head. I ended up having to look much of that up on my own, but after I did, I had way more interest in calculus and linear algebra than I did beforehand.
Re: Calculus at the heart of the STEM gender gap, study suggests
#28> the notoriously difficult college math class, Calculus I Are college courses in the United States standardised? Does every college have a course they call Calculus I and have the same content and level of difficulty? Calculus seems to be a really big deal in the US education system. In the UK we learn about differentiation and integration in what you would call highschool as just another topic among many, and I don…
College courses aren't standardized, but calculus is often a weeder class and far more difficult than previous classes.
This is often unintentional. The real problems are that kids are being passed through high school without learning math and that the other college classes are far too easy and lack any rigor. Therefore a class that requires memorization/understanding of concepts and isn't open book is considered incredibly difficult.
If english/history/science general education classes weren't such jokes then calculus wouldn't be considered a bottleneck.
Re: Calculus at the heart of the STEM gender gap, study suggests
#29There's a significant portion of tech jobs that don't require degrees, yet these jobs aren't being filled by women either. I would have dropped CS immediately if it required difficult math, as even simple math problems can take me a considerable amount of time to finish. But i've worked in tech my whole life.
I guess my question is, do we really believe difficult college courses are the main thing supporting a STEM/tech gender gap, when many tech jobs don't even require college?
Re: Calculus at the heart of the STEM gender gap, study suggests
#30> the notoriously difficult college math class, Calculus I Are college courses in the United States standardised? Does every college have a course they call Calculus I and have the same content and level of difficulty? Calculus seems to be a really big deal in the US education system. In the UK we learn about differentiation and integration in what you would call highschool as just another topic among many, and I don…
They are only informally standardized, but are usually quite consistent between colleges/universities. You have single-variable differentiation, integration, and applications. Possibly some of the easier differential equations. The high school advanced placement (AP) curriculum usually goes a bit further but in a less rigorous manner.