When Women Stopped Coding

Modern computer science is dominated by men. But it hasn’t always been this way.

A lot of computing pioneers — the people who programmed the first digital computers — were women. And for decades, the number of women studying computer science was growing faster than the number of men. But in 1984, something changed. The percentage of women in computer science flattened, and then plunged, even as the share of women in other technical and professional fields kept rising.

What happened?

We spent the past few weeks trying to answer this question, and there’s no clear, single answer.

But here’s a good starting place: The share of women in computer science started falling at roughly the same moment when personal computers started showing up in U.S. homes in significant numbers.

Who Studies What? Men, Women And College Majors PLANET MONEY Who Studies What? Men, Women, And College Majors These early personal computers weren’t much more than toys. You could play pong or simple shooting games, maybe do some word processing. And these toys were marketed almost entirely to men and boys.

This idea that computers are for boys became a narrative. It became the story we told ourselves about the computing revolution. It helped define who geeks were, and it created techie culture.

Movies like Weird Science, Revenge of the Nerds and War Games all came out in the ’80s. And the plot summaries are almost interchangeable: awkward geek boy genius uses tech savvy to triumph over adversity and win the girl.

Why diversity matters to your tech company

PALO ALTO, Calif. — As the push for diversity in tech continues, a growing number of companies and leaders are confronting the topic for the first time.

Those that are new to diversity and inclusion often are unsure how to approach it — how to talk about the subject internally and externally, how to rank it among competing priorities and how to allocate appropriate resources. Before answering these questions, it’s helpful to identify why diversity and inclusion matters to you and your company specifically.

Diversity efforts are most successful when they’re driven by a commitment from company leaders. And meaningful commitment requires leaders to understand why diversity matters. At Paradigm, we spend a lot of time brainstorming with CEOs and other company leaders about what is or should be driving their diversity and inclusion efforts. Here are five themes that have emerged from those conversations:

Diverse teams are smarter and more creative