What are YOU doing in your courses to encourage more women to enter and continue?
The president of Harvey Mudd College shares the strategies it’s used to interest more female students in computer science.
1. Make courses more engaging.
I’ve been doing this for at least 20 years: bonus points; using games AS programming assignments; inquiry-based approaches; etc. Just look over my publications, and the “gamification” posts in this blog.
What are YOU doing to make YOUR courses more engaging (for women)?
2. Build confidence and community.
Again, I’ve been doing this for at least 20 years: bonus points; re-submission; multiple pathways to completion; flexible deadlines; removing the risk to allow people to try new things; allowing and encouraging collaboration (EVEN when the assignment is NOT groupwork),….
What are YOU doing to build confidence and community (and I don’t mean “boy’s clubs”)?
3. Demystify success.
I am a sessional right now, which means I get paid to teach specific courses. I do NOT get paid to do course development (though I do that), and I don’t get paid to do extra-curricular things (though I do some).
However, when I was full-time faculty, I did these things – and even today, I talk about my experiences out in “the real world” to help connect students to the roles they are likely to fill once they graduate.
What are YOU doing to demystify success?
