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Women: Learn to Program This Summer

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Re: Women: Learn to Program This Summer

#71

Post by rubicon33 »

nck4222 wrote: post #50

I'm trying to figure out on what side of the debate I fall on this one. On the one hand, women have obviously been disadvantaged in many ways, for many years, which is wrong. The gender disparity in software development is well documented, and should be fixed. No one should be discouraged from learning, or opportunities denied because of gender. On the other hand, a for-profit company deciding to offer free services…

> The gender disparity in software development is well documented, and should be fixed. No one should be discouraged from learning, or opportunities denied because of gender.

I can tell you why. In part, it's explicit sexism and goal keeping from men, sure. But a far bigger reason there are less women in tech?

Step into any engineering course at a 4 year university. Come back and tell me how many women where in your class. Get the picture?

Of COURSE there are less women in engineering jobs. They are less women in engineering classes! So while there are definitely sexism problems, far BIGGER issues exist with reforming gender roles CULTURALLY.

Women should be encouraged from a young age to pursue science if it interests them. They should not be given artificial leg ups to help balance a problem which will never go away without addressing the root cause.

Re: Women: Learn to Program This Summer

#72

Post by dictum »

alexashka wrote: post #31
dzink wrote: post #4

Spreading this as far and wide as I can. Coding is as critical as literacy for the next 20 years and there are too many programs and teachers that teach it poorly, alienating large segments of the population. Lambda is among the best. I hope they can scale past 40 students for this in the future.

What? The average IQ is 100. Computer science is not a 100 IQ field. Science is not a 100 IQ endeavour. Coding at 100 IQ level will be automated away very soon the same way anyone can have a facebook account without knowing HTML.

At what IQ does one act upon the opportunities and circumstances available at present time?

Re: Women: Learn to Program This Summer

#73

Post by dang »

rudedogg wrote: post #66
austenallred wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, that's one way to look at the world. Lambda School's traffic is down 20% today as compared to yesterday, so if this was a marketing stunt it was a very inefficient and expensive one.

> Lambda School's traffic is down 20% today as compared to yesterday This seems weird; did you account for the time (since it's only around noon?)

Fridays are lower traffic on HN too. Maybe that generalizes.

Re: Women: Learn to Program This Summer

#74

Post by yakshaving_jgt »

ajiang wrote: post #58

EDIT: To clarify that the money is going directly to private individuals, as per Austen. Incredible, thanks for putting your money where your values are @jl. As for the numerous comments in this post around reverse sexism / reverse discrimination: 1. This is a private individual giving personal capital to other private individuals, supporting a personal cause. It is hard to both claim principles of free market and ra…

Overcorrecting for bias is not the same as removing bias.

You never heard the phrase "two wrongs don't make a right?"

Re: Women: Learn to Program This Summer

#75

Post by dang »

writepub wrote: post #15
chasingthewind wrote: post #2

I think this is really commendable. When you put your money where your mouth is you really show that you're serious about your values. All the best to the forty future winners of this grant!

This is excellent marketing at best, and nothing to do with values. Lambda school is a YC portfolio company, and this program/post has gotten YC and LS oodles of positive press. The gender of this batch is designed to generate positive buzz, there was never any restriction on admissions before this announcement, no bias in getting into LS. So what exactly is this supposed to achieve? Great marketing, guys and gals! C…

Jessica's posts explain exactly what exactly this is supposed to achieve.

Re: Women: Learn to Program This Summer

#76

Post by ajiang »

zimablue wrote: post #67
ajiang wrote: post #58

EDIT: To clarify that the money is going directly to private individuals, as per Austen. Incredible, thanks for putting your money where your values are @jl. As for the numerous comments in this post around reverse sexism / reverse discrimination: 1. This is a private individual giving personal capital to other private individuals, supporting a personal cause. It is hard to both claim principles of free market and ra…

1. Free market doesn't mean that your choices are exempt from criticism. I was going to say silly but honestly this is a very stupid point. "To people who are criticising me for funding ISIS - FREE MARKET".

I'd like to think HN is a place where people can have debate without resorting to saying things like "very stupid point" ;)

You're absolutely right that free market doesn't mean your choices are exempt from criticism. That isn't my point, nor where I applied 'Free Market'.

My point was: If you're going to argue against this donation, saying that it fuels the trend of reverse racism / sexism that makes the free market more distorted, I would argue that this donation is very much a part of the free market. Private donations to private organizations for private causes.

Re: Women: Learn to Program This Summer

#77

Post by pacala »

jakelazaroff wrote: post #51
pacala wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Never heard of an open and blatant 'women need not apply' in the 20 years I've been in the US. Not in the universities, not in the workplace, not anywhere. Not sure about NFL policies, though there aren't that many 6 foot 250 pounds fit women out there. Pretty sure there is no VC advertising 'we will fund no women' out there, if it were there would be a huge press coverage. And yet, the OP is openly and blatant 'men…

My point is, blatantly saying "X need not apply" isn't any worse than saying "this opportunity is open to both X and Y" and then only accepting Y. Implicit discrimination isn't somehow better than explicit.

If I read this correctly, what you're saying is:

* Implicit discrimination is bad. I'm saying: To use that as a guide for your actions you need to have an implicit discrimination detector able to account for all the confounding variables.

* Explicit discrimination is also bad. I'm saying: As a corollary, there should not be explicit 'X need not apply' policies.

* Two wrongs make a right.

Re: Women: Learn to Program This Summer

#78

Post by mettamage »

grondilu wrote: post #55

Isn't programming a skill that can be learned alone in a fairly straightforward manner? I mean, most programming languages have extensive documentation, tutorials and so on (at least FOSS dynamical languages like Python, Rust, Perl...). From my personal experience and what I can guess about hackers I've talked to for instance on IRC, that's how most guys learned it : the web is full of resources for whoever wants to…

> so if you have to do it, you'd better love it in the first place.

Depends on how much you think anything else sucks. Compared to physical labor you're not breaking your back over things.

Compared to other jobs you get paid relatively ok (EU centric view).

Compared to some jobs the hours aren't that crazy: hey McKinsey folk! How are you doing? :D

Really, it isn't that simple. It depends.

It helps if you like it, but a job is a job and if you can perform it, then why do you need to like it?

Moreover, did you ever read about the overjustification effect [0]? Long story short, if you like something, you might dislike it after you get paid for it.

Also, if you love programming you might be biased in always solving a problem in a technical way. You'd become that guy from the LEGO movie that always screams "SPACESHIP!" [2]

Full disclosure: I like programming and sometimes can force myself into loving it [1]. The consequences of loving programming: no social life, no normal diet, sleep rhythm is off. I'm basically just doing one thing as much as possible: programming.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overjustification_effect

[1] As a mettamage I have some control over my psyche and I can quite often, but not always, force myself to like or even love things that I initially hate ;-)

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7TYJyCCO8Dc

Re: Women: Learn to Program This Summer

#79

Post by r_smart »

nck4222 wrote: post #62
commandlinefan wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> discouraged from learning, or opportunities denied because of gender. Is there any evidence that this is happening, though? I've never seen anybody, even anecdotally claim "I'm a woman (who is qualified) and I've been unable to find employment". Mostly what I see is people trying to work backwards and say, "if group X makes up Y% of the population and only Z% of programmers, that in itself must be evidence of discr…

It doesn't have to be overt, or even knowingly done. Children are frequently subtly pushed towards different careers because of their gender, many times by their devoted parents. It's a societal problem. EDIT: Here's one paper that talks about how "widely shared cultural beliefs about gender" affect early decisions people make wrt to their careers https://sociology.stanford.edu/sites/g/files/sbiybj9501/f/pu... "The r…

My GF demonstrated an aptitude for STEM at an early age. She received an enormous amount of pressure to continue down that track despite not being interested in it as a career.

Your claim may have been true at one time, but I don't think it has been for awhile now.

*Edit: In response to your paper: It looks like it's a research paper, not a study, written almost 20 years ago, referencing material that was ~10 years old at the time of its publication. It well may have been true, but the time the original research was collected (in the 90s) is about the time I'd argue a major cultural shift happened.

Re: Women: Learn to Program This Summer

#80

Post by criddell »

grondilu wrote: post #55

Isn't programming a skill that can be learned alone in a fairly straightforward manner? I mean, most programming languages have extensive documentation, tutorials and so on (at least FOSS dynamical languages like Python, Rust, Perl...). From my personal experience and what I can guess about hackers I've talked to for instance on IRC, that's how most guys learned it : the web is full of resources for whoever wants to…

Different people learn in different ways and I think you are undervaluing how a good teacher and some structure can accelerate that process.
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