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My experiences at a woman's programming workshop

blog.emacsen.net

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Re: My experiences at a woman's programming workshop

#51

Post by [deleted] »

WayneDB wrote: post #41
hk_kh wrote: post #14

That's why we do not see more women involved with software, and I am not talking about Dave. I am talking about both, the writer and Dave. Why do you think most women stick to managing projects instead of being involved in Free Software? Too much drama. Too much shit to cope with, that involves dicks and egos. In the article we assume that Dave was a jerk (and it probably was). But, see, the author was in a comfortab…

So, are you saying that women can't or aren't willing to deal with drama or cope with shit that involves dicks and egos? Where there's muck, there's brass. Are you saying that women have no brass?

[deleted]

Re: My experiences at a woman's programming workshop

#52

Post by vilhelm_s »

bitboxer wrote: post #4

That bully is a reason why on railsgirls events you have tables for differen skill levels. You could easily send that guy to another table with more advanced people without throwing him out.

Someone I talked to who has TAed intro-level programming classes suggested doing something similar there: split it into a section for "beginners" and one for "experienced programmers". But the sections would teach exactly the same material.

His point was that in practice, students who actually already know basic programming test out of the intro class, but there always seems to be a contingent that _thinks_ that they are experts, and who ruin the class dynamics by acting superior, asking show-offy questions, etc. It would be better for everyone if they could self-select into a single section.

Re: My experiences at a woman's programming workshop

#53

Post by chernevik »

mrleinad wrote: post #18
jellicle wrote: post #11

That's not a call for single-sex education. That's a call for good teachers who are willing to crack down on the class clown. There's always a class clown, and he always needs to be cracked down upon for the good of the class. This is teaching 101. Sorry you didn't have a good teacher. >Dave was really excited by the class, and, like me and the other volunteers, had a lot of experience with Python. Sounds like Dave w…

> That's a learned technique for getting assistance. It worked on you, didn't it? I was going to point out the same thing. A women playing dumb to get help from a man, is not uncommon at all.

It could also just be an expression of generalized anxiety, or a disavowal of expertise to keep one's self from getting cocky. I'm a guy, I often make clear statements of my confusions to keep myself straight on what I do and don't understand.

And she may have felt, accurately, that she didn't understand the material as well as the OP thought. You can produce a lot of code in a tutorial without knowing enough to produce that architecture yourself.

Personally I think the people who have the clearest view of what they don't know are the ones prepared to learn the fastest. There's a huge difference between "programming is hard!" nonsense that stops people from starting in the first place and "I'm not getting this" consolidations that help a _started_ person figure out what they need to learn.

Re: My experiences at a woman's programming workshop

#54

Post by peterwwillis »

When I went to a Java programming class at a local hackerspace, it was something like 70/30 women/men. I didn't really see anything in the way they learned or progressed through the session that was in any way different than the men. What struck me was that holy crap, there's a lot of women here while everybody keeps saying there's no women in tech.

I think the author is dead right about the single-sex classes being a comfortable way to introduce women to technical topics. But having men there did not stop them from asking questions and following the material at the hackerspace. I think getting involvement from female-oriented communities will provide that comfort level to start with. Also, female teachers (my scientist female friends said they'd love to teach little girls to become science and math geeks if they had the time)

Re: My experiences at a woman's programming workshop

#55

Post by lnanek2 »

We just have the author's word that the other volunteer was trying to show off and challenge the instructor. He was a volunteer expert, maybe he just thought he and the teacher were partners, and it was their job to discuss high level material for the class.

E.g. instructor illustrates no need for semi-colons, meaningful white space -> excited volunteer explains how much cleaner it looks than other programming languages and how great he finds it, maybe with a real world anecdote, or he compares how it is like working with other languages without that, hell maybe even says it isn't a feature he likes, etc..

I'd rather he be open and egregious about his knowledge like this, than just sitting there like a robot for whenever a classmate asks him to help with step 5 or something. It would be a much richer, varied, and more interesting class than some textbook recitation of a tutorial anyone can follow at home anyway.

Re: My experiences at a woman's programming workshop

#56

Post by sltkr »

waterlesscloud wrote: post #22
yummyfajitas wrote: post #9

This article begs the question: why do women respond disproportionately badly to the "helpful jerk"?

I wonder if they do. I've seen a room full of men respond exactly the same way.

But then the suggestion remains that only a man can be a "helpful jerk" (because the author comes out in favour of single sex education because of this incident).

Re: My experiences at a woman's programming workshop

#57

Post by emacsen »

gphilip wrote: post #10
irahul wrote: post #6

> I saw Dave’s behavior as a challenge, a call to action. And it was at that moment that the gender difference became most apparent to me. Oh, for fuck's sake, how is some Dave being jerk is making gender difference apparent? The guy was at the wrong place, and was being a show-off. But no, you must attribute it to his gender. As pointed out by threads below, the author was talking about how the room tuned out when D…

>Oh, for fuck's sake, how is some Dave being jerk is making gender difference apparent? >The guy was at the wrong place, and was being a show-off. >But no, you must attribute it to his gender. If you read the article again, you may find that the gender difference which became apparent to the author has to do with the /response/ to Dave's behaviour, and not with his behaviour /per se/. Also, here is a (perhaps interes…

> If you read the article again, you may find that the gender difference which became apparent to the author has to do with the /response/ to Dave's behaviour, and not with his behaviour /per se/.

This is correct.

I'm the author of the article, and the tough part about writing this was trying to balance my personal perspective with making a larger point.

What I may not have expressed well was that before last Saturday, I did not see any point in single sex workshops. I felt they were segregating the community, and that they perpetuated the idea that either women were meek, or that men were predatory.

What I came out of the experience with was an appreciation of the differences in interaction between men and women, how women were more comfortable in an environment full of other women, and how there was a difference in the way I reacted to a challenge in comparison to these students.

Of course individual differences will override any generalized statement, but my experiences led me to reconsider my position regarding women oriented groups and their role in the Free Software community.

Re: My experiences at a woman's programming workshop

#58

Post by emacsen »

Udo wrote: post #49
ordinary wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't like how the article implies this makes me less of a man. I don't think it does that, but nevertheless, this raises an interesting question that I've been having real trouble answering, so maybe you (or others) could help me out: why do you dislike it when people make such implications? Do you feel you're worth less if you're perceived to be less manly?

> Do you feel you're worth less if you're perceived to be less manly? No, I simply dislike it when other people tell me how I'm supposed to act based on their proprietary rules. I don't give a shit about my masculinity per se, but I do not like to be mashed in by association with stereotypes that feel alien and artificial to me.

I'm sad that you feel that the post was dictating behavior based on gender.

I'm surprised and frustrated at how many people are reading things in the article that I never wrote, and never implied- like the sentiment you expressed, or the idea that I'm somehow an advocate for single sex education, or (as one poster on another forum put it, I come off like a "feminist bitch".

Re: My experiences at a woman's programming workshop

#59

Post by KaoruAoiShiho »

NotMyMorals wrote: post #40
Symmetry wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that all the women there had explicitly signed up to do programming, I doubt that any of them have eyes that glaze over at the mention of computers. Surprisingly for some people, there are variations among women just as there are variations among men. I'm pretty sure that most men also have no interest in computer programming. Finally: http://xkcd.com/385/

Which is probably why pwpwp didn't specifically refer to the self-selected women in the class, but made a general point about the industry and the ridiculous attempts to impose a completely artificial 50/50 gender ratio. The comic could have just as easily said "one girl is good at math therefore exactly as many girls as boys are good at math."

While I agree a 50-50 gender ratio seems artificial at the moment, fact of the matter is the tech industry is becoming one of the great sources of power in society (think skynet). I think for the sake of civilization, we should try to involve women as much as we can and aim for the 50-50.

Re: My experiences at a woman's programming workshop

#60

Post by rmc »

NotMyMorals wrote: post #28

these questions seemed designed to show off his own knowledge, or to challenge the instructor. Yes, Dave was showing off to an audience of women. she asked me a question she giggled and told me she had no idea what the project was about, or what to do. Yes, the woman was acting like a bimbo to elicit male help. Congrats, you now have the grasp of female/male dynamics usually figured out by middle school. I’d never re…

Do you actually compare a desire to get more women into tech with forced castration?!
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