Why is it that not many girls are into robotics?

[busterblade16]

I am serious about this. Why dont they?

[JakeGallagher]

I know plenty of girls in robotics...Sure, there aren't nearly enough, but there are a lot. Maybe it's because for the longest time engineering (like many other fields) has been seen as one that girls aren't supposed to be in. Lately, however, that is being changed and more and more girls are joining :D
Give it time, I'm sure plenty of girls will be in FIRST sooner or later, it just needs to catch on.

[IanT]

I know plenty of girls in robotics...Sure, there aren't nearly enough, but there are a lot. Maybe it's because for the longest time engineering (like many other fields) has been seen as one that girls aren't supposed to be in. Lately, however, that is being changed and more and more girls are joining :D
Give it time, I'm sure plenty of girls will be in FIRST sooner or later, it just needs to catch on.

Have to agree with you not many girls find engineering as a field that they might be interested in. look at it though it seems that as the years go by more and more girls are starting to join FIRST :yikes:

[busterblade16]

ok. that really needs to change... :ahh:

[Koko Ed]

I am serious about this. Why dont they?
It's because for many years girls were conditoned not to seek work that was deemed only for men and many still think that way. That's what FIRST is for to encourage people who do not traditionally seekto participate in robotics to join up and realize that it's for everybody.

[JulieB]

i really don't know why

but we have 4 girls
me: build and coach
girl 2: build
girl 3: inventor
girl 4 media

I like to take thing apart and a lot of girls like to gossip.
Yeah i love to gossip but i like to take thing apart MORE!!

[Conor Ryan]

It's because for many years girls were conditoned not to seek work that was deemed only for men and many still think that way. That's what FIRST is for to encourage people who do not traditionally seekto participate in robotics to join up and realize that it's for everybody.

this is also why women such as Carly Fiorina, the ex CEO and Chairwomen of HP, and the only woman ever to head up a Dow Jones Listed company are such popular speakers and role models to women entering the business and hopefully the engineering world. But yeah, its a stereotype that has carried over from thousands of years of women being oppressed.

[Winged Wonder]

:) i've gotta agree with everything everyone before me has said.

thats why we've got the Robotics Chicks Union (RCU), in order to promote more women being involved with FIRST robotics.

every year i try to get more and more of my girl friends to join robotics, simply because its so much fun and i love it to death. there is so much FIRST teaches everyone--not just girls or minorities or majorities or whoever--and people shouldnt be left out just because of previous steryotypes.

but all in all... yeah, this sport is dominated by waaaaaay tooo many guys... we girls need to change that :)

[Goobergunch]

If you're interested: RCU Website (http://www.robotchicksunion.org/)

[roboguy #1]

Ok first off Usually there are about 2 girls and 5 guys t meetings all the girls that come to meetings on our teem are very helpfull. Really we have a lot of girls about 5 come to meetings which is abou tthe number of boys that cometo meetings. Usually I go to every meeting even if its just me and a co-captain. Today me and a co-captain worked and that was it not and official meeting but only about 5 underlings ever show up and there the same people every time. Me I am always ther meeting or private work.

[Amanda N.]

Well.. as several other people mentioned, it's mostly the stereotype issue. I think a lot of it has to do with how girls in our generation grew up. Just about all of my girl friends grew up as "girly-girls" playing with Barbies because that's what people expected them to play with. Meanwhile, most boys played with Legos and trucks. A majority of these girls stick with the girly stereotype; only with a lot of encouragement and a bit of instruction do they break out of that shell and get involved in something like robotics :)

I think the other reason for the small amount of female FIRSTers is that they usually feel overshadowed.. because we usually grow up as "girly-girl"s, most of us don't have much experience and don't have the confidence to step in and ask for help.. especially when one of our male classmates is standing there acting like they know everything and you're stupid for not knowing it.. (high school and jr. high guys act like they know wayyyy more than they do :rolleyes: )


anywhooo.. I didn't really mean to make my post so long, I just got started and couldn't stop.. :rolleyes: Hopefully more girls will discover the joys of robotics and learn to jump in and get involved!! :D

[Wayne Doenges]

Our second FIRST year :D we had three girls. One of them was an exchange student from Italy who knew her way around a shop better than any of the boys :)

Wayne Doenges
CAD Mentor

[Jeffrafa]

We are also a second year team and this year we have a total of 7 girls on our team, mostly because one of our members from last year encouraged all her friends to join. Their attendance is also fairly strong, really only missing because of conflicting jobs, activities, and/or homework assignments.

I've been trying to get my g/f involved but have been unsuccessfull as of yet. Both of us participated in science bowl and the corresponding miniature solar car competition in middle school, and she seemed to be interested in that. The main problem is that she seems to have the same mindset as many other non-FIRST people that I talk to around school, basically that you half to be some sort of genious or something in order to be capable of building a robot, and this is certianly not the case.

I think one of the main points of FIRST is to be able to gain knowledge from experience. Our school has absolutely no industrial arts whatsoever, so starting a FIRST team has given many of my friends and I something we can really get involved in, enjoy, and learn from. Its amazing some of the things that people just don't get the chance to learn without opportunities like FIRST - Things many of us would take for grated and would consider "common knowledge" things - like what a nylon locking nut is, what 'fluid power' means, and basic electronics - like how to crimp and solder wires.

I'm going to continue to encourage my girlfriend to join - who knows, maybe next year i can get her on the team. She is going to come and see the local regional so i'm hoping that will help her to see more of what it is and encourage her to become a part of it. I think a big part of her problem is that she dosen't see where she could really fit in and be invloved on the team, since she's not particularly experienced with mechanical things or into programming and software - but really all it takes is an interest and a willingness to learn.

Anyways, thats my couple of cents - i'm gonna keep trying to talk my g/f into it, until then she's missin out!

Jeff

[Koko Ed]

One requirement that our team has for all students is to participate in building the robot for at least one year so we don't automatically assign girls to the PAW room. This is so students get the full FIRST experince. We pay for it on the field but we don't just build robots, we build people so it all pays out in the end.

[tiffany34990]

yes there is still a lack of girls in FIRST... some may get discouraged because on some teams i know the guys don't let the girls do things because they are girls. and well yes that's why we have the RCU and i am the captain of the Southern Florida Chapter and i hope that more girls will join the chapter and union and FIRST in general.

[Erin Rapacki]

I wouldn’t say that there’s a lack of girls in FIRST. I attended a meeting with Paul Shay a month ago and he reported that 30% of FIRST students were female. Indeed, he hopes for 50%, but lets stop there. Don’t let FIRST turn into industry where there is reverse discrimination for the Caucasian male (they are people with feelings too).

If women wanted true equality we wouldn’t need a special club to achieve it. Being a minority is not an excuse for obtaining extra attention. Everybody in general should go out, get educated, try new things, test themselves, and they’ll be certain that they were hired for their ability and not because they have met a quota for a team or company. There shouldn’t be any handouts. The idea of fighting discrimination is to give the most qualified person the job no matter of race, color, or gender. That concept has been achieved; however, the scale has been tipped too far in the opposite direction (this is highly noticeable when entering college and/or looking for jobs).

Do any FIRST teams deny access for students of non-minority groups? I certainly hope not. FIRST is about inspiring High School Students, not girls and minorities exclusively. Teams should have open arms to any student who wishes to join and there are plenty of girls who do find their way onto a team. In general, I believe that high school is too late to get girls interested in science and technology unless they have some kind of lingering desire already inside them. If we wanted more girls who were really into building robots, we’d have to find a way to start young. It would seriously have to be a cultural infusion, which won’t happen easily. So, lets stop trying to use cunning to trick every girl into wanting to build robots and just make sure that every student at the school, town, or general area know that they have an option to join a FIRST team with open arms. A brilliant mind is a brilliant mind, and it doesn’t matter what race or gender has the ability to make a positive difference in this world. We need each and every one of them to contribute to society no matter how the percentages break down.

My basic point being: some people (not all, I do know many smart women & minorities who do fantastically well in school and work) take advantage of affirmative action instead of going out and educating themselves. In some situations it has gotten out of hand.

erin

p.s. CEO and Chairman of HP, Carly Fiorina, was ousted last week.
http://money.cnn.com/2005/02/15/technology/fiorina.reut/index.htm?cnn=yes

[lalala]

I would join a FIRST team, but there aren't any close enough to where I live. I love robotics (I'm in Technology Lab 2, which encompasses all types of technology such as: robotics, CAD, CNC, Plastics, etc.). I would love to start a team at my school, but I'm in my last semester of high school. How long does it take to start a team and what types of materials would we need? (There's only one other girl in my class and we have the highest grades!!! :p )

[Erin Rapacki]

I would join a FIRST team, but there aren't any close enough to where I live. I love robotics (I'm in Technology Lab 2, which encompasses all types of technology such as: robotics, CAD, CNC, Plastics, etc.). I would love to start a team at my school, but I'm in my last semester of high school. How long does it take to start a team and what types of materials would we need? (There's only one other girl in my class and we have the highest grades!!! :p )

Are you looking to go to a college/university? Maybe decide on a school that already has a team.

It takes at least six months to start a team. You'd have to start looking for sponsorship and have that fee secured by the time team registration ends in fall. You'd need a space to work, a high school to team up with, tools, and that's just the beginning! www.usfirst.org would have more information. However, when starting college, joining up with a team that already exists may be a little more promising when it comes to the ever-so-important issue of keeping your grades up.

[doyler]

We have 2 girls on our team - CAD and Mechanical

[Joe Matt]

Lucky for us, we have seen a 100% growth in girl members this year.

[Emily Pease]

On my team, I'm the only female college mentor out of at least 15-20 college mentors, but I actually didn't even notice that until we were making travel arrangements and I was thinking about who would share a hotel room with me. I guess that means that I don't feel singled out for being a girl! Either that, or nearly four years in the Electrical Engineering program at Northeastern has desensitized me. I have had quite a few classes in which I was the only girl out of 30ish students. It doesn't really bother me, because I don't think I'm treated any differently, but I'm optimistic about the future of women in technology.

[Lux]

I take issue with the idea posted earlier that encouraging girls to participate in FIRST is somehow an example of reverse discrimination. As other posters have pointed out, girls have, at least in the past, received the message that the science and engineering fields are not appropriate for them. Even recently, we heard the president of a prestigious university state that he believes women are innately less capable of achievement in math, science, and technology.

What does this message mean for today's girls? It means that the effects of the decades of continued discouragement linger, and that the attitudes still linger, are expressed, and probably even acted upon by certain individuals. It is only really in this generation that we start to see an increase in terms of girls participating in events such as FIRST robotics and studying math, science, and engineering in college. This increase speaks of a genuine interest among many girls to pursue careers in science and engineering, and it is necessary, now, to sustain this interest.

Accordingly, I feel that organization such as SWE and RCU have an important place in our society. These are not incapable, unmotivated women asking for special privileges or for success to be handed to them. These are like-minded, motivated, capable individuals who see a real issue and are actively working towards improvement and development. This is not dissimilar to people combining their strengths and resources to attain the right to vote, for example. While we would all like to believe that equality is a right granted at birth, we have seen from history, society, culture, and circumstance that for some groups equality becomes a right that must be fought for and earned.
Organizations who further this message surely have a legitimate place in society.

As a young woman who has been involved in FIRST for 6 years, who is a junior in aero/astro at MIT, who has worked for the Naval Undersea Warfare Center, Aurora Flight Sciences, MIT's mechanical engineering fluid dynamics lab, and who is currently a co-op at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, I would like to make clear that I have received a great deal of positive, helpful encouragement from both male engineers and professionals and have had great experiences in the workplace. However, I have also spoken with women for whom this has not been the case, and even for me this has not always been the case.

For example, when I first joined FIRST in high school, I had a difficult time getting some male engineers to listen to me and afford me the same respect that they freely granted to male students of similar age and experience. It was only through continued efforts for several years that I was able to achieve this goal, eventually becoming the driver from sophomore to senior year and being heavily involved in the mechanical side of things. At the same time, I had female friends who were genuinely interested in engineering and really wanted to make a contribution, but were discouraged and eventually turned away from engineering because of the continued discouraging messages they received. The discouragement can sometimes be insidious and very subtle.

Now, I'm a staunch proponent of equality. Let's stop discouraging girls from science and engineering. Let's get rid of affirmative action, but while we're at it let's get rid of societal constructs such as legacy admissions, which allow certain parties to hold onto their power by bestowing extra advantages upon their own group. Let's think about the people who get jobs and internships because their parents or relatives know so-and-so. Let's think about the person who doesn't have these advantages and has to overcome these significant barriers to entry. Let's base admissions and jobs on ability, and at the same time think about those who never have the opportunity to demonstrate what they can do. Let's think about all the ways privilege manifests itself. Now let's really level the playing field.

Will all of this happen overnight? No. This, I think, is the real point. Society is changing for the better, but not rapidly and thoroughly enough that the lingering effects of the past are wiped clean. Girls need to understand that they are capable of achievement in math and science. I once volunteered at a robotics event at the University of Rhode Island which involved programming Lego Mindstorms. I helped a group of three girls who were interested, but also very intimidated and didn't think they "could do it." They just didn't know where to start. With a little bit of basic explanation, they realized that they did understand what was going on and started thinking of some great ideas and got their robot to work. Sometimes all it takes is to get someone started.

Clearly, we are not done yet. If girls don't want to join FIRST or don't want to be mathematicians, scientists, and engineers, obviously that's okay. The point isn't to force anyone to be something they don't want to be. The point is that there are girls who are genuinely interested in science and engineering, but still may face discouragement or have internalized the message that they can't do it.

Compared to the past, we have it good. I realize this and am grateful. However, we still have a ways to go. I consider myself very fortunate to have always had great parents, teachers, and mentors who have supported me. We owe a debt to the trailblazers and to those who support us. It is their encouragement that keeps us (at least me!) going through various challenges I have faced, and I really feel that extending this encouragement to interested girls and guys will have a great benefit not only to them, but to society as well.

I apologize for the length of this post, but this is an issue that is very important to me. Thanks for reading. :)

[Jasmin]

It's disappointing to me that I'm the only girl that ever really shows up at the meetings. There's one other who's decided to show up more frequently, but that's about it. In total I think there's about five or six, but life happens, and they're not always able to make it. The guys outnumber us way too easily, and I'd definitely like to change that.

Girls are good for the team, even the mentors and teachers agree. ;P

[aziandorkess]

hmm.. more girls are getting into engineering though..
for example, our team is probably 60-70% girls, 30-40% guys. the arm group and programming group are primarily made of girls, there are a few girls in drive train and electrical. our community outreach is also primarily girls, but most probably have experimented with one building group or another... :shrugs:
it's somewhat true that more guys than girls tend to dedicate more time to FIRST... i often find myself in the midst of all guys, with maybe one or two other girls... hours after most people left... but more and more girls are starting to stay later, and becoming more interested.
all our engineers, unfortunately, are all guys... but change occurs over a long period of time... hopefully, there will be more girls involved... it'll take time though.

[AmyPrib]

I do think that all types of people should be actively encouraged to join the team and be involved in every aspect. I do, however, feel that some girls need a little more encouragement than others. Teams that have few to no girls on their team may have more trouble attracting more girls. Why? It's a comfort level thing, I think. It's easier to hold onto a group of friends than 1-2 individual girls, in some cases, and definitely easier if there's already girls on the team or at least a female mentor. They can be intimidated by all the males doing the "guy work" and not being experienced in it, and if the guys and mentors don't actively try to involve the girls, then they may never reach their comfort level in this atmosphere.

This past fall we followed the lead of Team 180, and held a "girls night" with the group we had recruited so far. I think it has positively affected their involvement. There were about 8-9 girls originally and we have at least 6 very active ones. This was not to be discriminatory or "special treatment". This was to get them introduced to the shop and equipment, without the entire team surrounding and overpowering them, so that come build season, they were confident in working on parts. We encourage it - and if they're not interested in it, we don't force it.. There are many other parts of the team that they can find interest in if they so choose.

If the the less aggressive girls dont' get a little bit of attention to encourage their involvement, they may slip thru the cracks... Some girls aren't always going to bust their way into the shop and say "show me how to do this, I want to learn", if there's a bunch of guys rushing around the shop doing their thing. They may feel like they'd be bothering others, and if the girls aren't close friends with them, they probably aren't comfortable being aggressive. I encourage mentors and the guys to make a conscious effort to include everyone, even if the kids look disinterested. Build season gets busy and you have less time to spend on teaching basics.. But that amount of time you do spend, either in the fall or during build season, can help shape the kids lives.
Many teams do this well, maybe some need to improve... I really don't know.... But it's just another possibility as to why girls aren't as active, despite the % of female members. It helps to try and twist recruitment to encourage girls to join as well - vs. just describing it as a robot building organization.

My two cents... being a girl and all... :)

[Bremma]

Sadly, I am the only active female member on my team. One of the other girls is ont he website team, and another showed up for a few meeting earlier in the season, but stopped coming for some reason. This almost made it hard for me to be able to come to nationals, since I would be offsetting the hotel cost by taking a room to myself. We did get another gril that had helped us with organization stuff int he background to come and help the cost. I wish there were more girls on the team, and maybe next year their will be. Need someone to control all you crazy guys.

[BLAZE]

Sorry to just drop in, but I think the amount of girls you see on the teams really varies by regional... in New England for example. There are teams made up of 90% girls, which, not to be offensive to the girls that read this, is great as a guy member on a team with maybe 4 girls that show up now and then. :yikes: Gotta love a variety of races, genders, and "peoples"! Just my thoughts... :o :]

[busterblade16]

It's cool that there are girls that are interested in robotics. I was just wondering about it because we only have 2 girls on our team, and one of them is in middle school. That is a good thing for when she comes to our school in the next couple years.

[hansTP2S]

Imagine that, not many girls in a club where the work is either: play with computers, or build a robot. Hmm.

We should have a shopping subteam.

[chocolateluvrlr]

Imagine that, not many girls in a club where the work is either: play with computers, or build a robot. Hmm.

We should have a shopping subteam.

That's highly offensive. I'm a girl and I prefer by far both playing with computers and building robots to shopping. You shouldn't stereotype like that.

[Amanda Morrison]

Imagine that, not many girls in a club where the work is either: play with computers, or build a robot. Hmm.

We should have a shopping subteam.

Maybe I should just give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you meant 'shopping for gears online'.

You know, the team you report to be on was started by a girl. That same girl drove to make the Boilermaker Regional that your campus is supporting a reality. In fact, there's many girls on your team that do a lot for 461. You should think about that.

Show a girl how to use a wrench, and she'll put those skills to use for a lifetime. Hand it to her and tell her she's probably better off shopping, and she'll clonk you over the head with it, do your pneumatics system, and CAD the robot.

If you are not embarassed by your own comment, your entire team, including the boys, are probably embarassed enough for you. I suggest you do both yourself and your team a huge favor and delete your post, and rethink what you said.

[Billfred]

Show a girl how to use a wrench, and she'll put those skills to use for a lifetime. Hand it to her and tell her she's probably better off shopping, and she'll clonk you over the head with it, do your pneumatics system, and CAD the robot.
This is quite true on 1293...well, except that none of the girls as far as I know CAD, and we aren't planning on pneumatics...but other than that, it's quite true.

I can think of five girls on the team off the top of my head on 1293...one handles the more artistic parts of the team (our crate will be stylish this year!), one programs like mad, and the other three work on the robot itself.

And in their individual areas, more often than not, they can run circles around me. (This is partially why the robot is running as well as it has, and 1293's logo remains free of stick figures.)

[AmyPrib]

Imagine that, not many girls in a club where the work is either: play with computers, or build a robot. Hmm.

We should have a shopping subteam.

You know - it's ironic how off-topic, yet so on-topic this comment actually is.

First, the work and effort in this organization extends far beyond solely playing with computers and working on robots.

Second - It's mentality and attitude like this that can discourage girls - or anyone else for that matter - from getting involved. To benefit oneself, if one is going to be involved in this organization, one should get both those items in check.

Moving right along....

[5dimes]

My team has way more girls then guys :D , and our school has equal number of male:female. However, it does sometimes seems like the guys understand more about the engineering aspect, on my team anyways. I am not saying this in an insulting way, i am myself a girl and i am head my team's electrical group. I am just stating an observation that might be part of the answer for some.

[Erin Rapacki]

Here's an interesting article that somewhat related:
http://www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/science/02/14/gender.brain/index.html

----------------------------------------------------------------------
(CNN) -- It's an argument that's as old as it is contentious: that male and female brains work differently.

It's also spawned countless self-help books (think "Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus") and bland jokes about women being unable to read maps, or men never asking for directions.

It's a brave expert who'll chart a course through these controversial waters.

But that hasn't stopped Michael Gurian, psychologist and author of "What Could He Be Thinking?".

He believes there are about a hundred structural differences that have been identified between the male and female brain.

"Men, because we tend to compartmentalize our communication into a smaller part of the brain, we tend to be better at getting right to the issue," he said.

"The more female brain (will) gather a lot of material, gather a lot of information, feel a lot, hear a lot, sense a lot," he said.

Scientists say males have more activity in mechanical centers of the brain, whereas females show more activity in verbal and emotional centers.

The differences can be noticed from early childhood, Gurian said, such as when an adult gives a child a doll.

"That doll becomes life-like to that girl, but you give it to a two-year-old boy and you are more likely, not all the time, but you are more likely than not to see that boy try to take the head off the doll," he said.

"He thinks spatial-mechanical. He's using the doll as an object".

To find out why these differences exist, scientists have taken voyages deep inside the gray matter using MRI scans.

The scans show that in most women, the corpus callosum area, which handles communication between the brain's two "hemispheres", is larger.

In layman's terms, it means that the two sides of the female brain "talk" better to each other -- which could explain why studies show women tend to multi-task better.

On the other hand, the scans show men tend to move information more easily within each hemisphere.

It all boils down to genes, according to Dr. Marianne Legato Partnership for Gender Specific Medicine Columbia University.

Women are born with two X chromosomes, and men with an X and a Y.

"And on that Y chromosome are at least 21 unique genes unique to males which control many of the body's operations down to the level of the cells," Dr Legato said.

She also said those genetic differences explain other differences, like why men can drink more alcohol than women without becoming intoxicated.

"Women do not have the enzyme in their stomach that degrades alcohol which men have," she said.

Unfortunately it doesn't explain why some men leave the toilet seat up, or some women can't take out the garbage.

CNN's Elizabeth Cohen contributed to this report.

[Gundamx92000]

for the record, the last 2 years Team 166 has been prodominently made up of girls and with an average team size of 30 or so thats not bad. funny that by reputation we builg big tough powerhouse robots rather than elegant things though, interesting

[cdawzrd]

We need more girls on our team. Right now, we only have one, and she only joined because she is the sister of an older member who no longer attends. She does PR stuff. I would really like to see more female members, especially those interested in the technical stuff.

You girls out there: any suggestions as to how we could try to recruit more?

Jonathan

[MissInformation]

Imagine that, not many girls in a club where the work is either: play with computers, or build a robot. Hmm.

We should have a shopping subteam.

What a silly, silly comment, and I think I'm going to pretend you were trying to make a funny so that it doesn't leave me with a less than pleasant impression of you and your team. If you go to a co-ed school and your team has no girls than your team is not doing enough outreach to your school. If you have a team with girls but those girls are not contributing, than your team is not doing a good job inspiring them.

Unfortunately, stereotypes, like urban legends, come in to existence because there is some kind of truth behind them. And while I, myself, can't prove it, I do believe guys and gals brains work differently (but always with exceptions). Add that difference to how society treats each gender and it gets even messier. One girl on our team admits that math is not her strong suit, that she's much better in English. However, she loves to build things. When she joined our team last year she knew what a hammer was and a screwdriver, but not much else. Because we have mentors who are eager to encourage all students and patient enough to work with those who, despite a lack of knowledge, really want to learn, this girl made our Pit team on her rookie year. If your mentors (and to a large extent, veteran team members) are too busy and stressed to make time for students like this, your team will lose a lot of potential talent, both male and female.

Heidi

[psych0gambit]

I myself am a guy so I cant really answer this question. But yeah, maybe there should be more girls but then in the future,theres going to be more competition when you try to get a job. hehe :p

[Dan-o]

Here's a mechanical engineering student from RPI's perspective of women engineers. RPI is a prodominantly engineering school with 81% male occupancy. This has forever been an issue at the Institute, but has been battled by campaigns to bring more women to this fine school. As far as my team is concerned... Of 18 college mentors, 2 of them are women, and they are among the hardest working, and well versed members of our team. One of them, Erin is a TA at the student machine shop on campus and is always answering questions like "how the heck do i fit this blasted thing on the lathe" or "Is it bad if i'm drill pressing something without the proper clamp, and it picks the piece up starts spinning it in really fast circles?" The other, Lesli has been vital in designing AND fabricating of the gear boxes and telescoping arm system. Both of them are huge assets to the team. All jokes aside (even though i did laugh a little at the shopping sub team joke) The drawing board, and the machine shop can't tell the sex of the operator. I've never seen something that a woman has asked a man to do in any part of this project (except for short little Erin not being tall enough to reach the top of the vertical mill.... ). Women add a lot to our team, and we are happy to have them around.

[h0x4r]

was told there wasn't a lot of girls joining us do to our large amount of testosterone (i hope i spelt that right, maybe spell check....) cause some of the guys say stuff that end up scaring off the girls, plus the lower classmen get scared when we are arguing about stuff like designs, so they won't put their ideas out there, testosterone seems to be the root of problems, as i have been told :confused:

[phrontist]

Lucky for us, we have seen a 100% growth in girl members this year.

Not having any to having 100% more? ;)

[phrontist]

was told there wasn't a lot of girls joining us do to our large amount of testosterone (i hope i spelt that right, maybe spell check....) cause some of the guys say stuff that end up scaring off the girls, plus the lower classmen get scared when we are arguing about stuff like designs, so they won't put their ideas out there, testosterone seems to be the root of problems, as i have been told :confused:

Just the other day I was looking for my multimeter and the (darn) arrogant group of testerone molecules started hasslin' me. Sheesh... why can't they pick on someone there own size!

Don't blame your problems on chemicals. ;)

[phrontist]

for the record, the last 2 years Team 166 has been prodominently made up of girls and with an average team size of 30 or so thats not bad. funny that by reputation we builg big tough powerhouse robots rather than elegant things though, interesting

Elegance is powerful. You should see our robot this year, it looks like avant garde architecture mixed with a suspension bridge.

[Adelle]

Being a girl, I find that most girls don't join FIRST because they are afraid of what other people may say because they are a girl and advancing for the future, but their friends aren't, and the teen years are a few of the most influential years of a girls life, especailly when it comes to the social role they play in high school drama. But the same also goes for males. Our team has 6 females on it, not including mentors(which is about 3 more).

[Pielord]

I am serious about this. Why dont they? thats what id like to no

[Iain McLeod]

We have four girls on the team this year: an artist/typist and three design and construction people.

I think robotics is mostly made up of guys because of the whole conditioning thing someone was talking about earlier...
I know one of my teachers was telling me last year about how in our school there used to be a 'Mechanics and car maintenance' class for the guys, and 'Powder Puff mechanics' for the girls. The education system has a lot to do with it, encouraging girls to take different classes than guys... And as Bryan (my teammate) points out from behind me, there is no mechanics Barbie.


I really don't notice much difference between guys and girls in the robotics room. They all act nuts anyway.

[Mousepad]

We have four girls on the team this year: an artist/typist and three design and construction people.

I think robotics is mostly made up of guys because of the whole conditioning thing someone was talking about earlier...
I know one of my teachers was telling me last year about how in our school there used to be a 'Mechanics and car maintenance' class for the guys, and 'Powder Puff mechanics' for the girls. The education system has a lot to do with it, encouraging girls to take different classes than guys... And as Bryan (my teammate) points out from behind me, there is no mechanics Barbie.


I really don't notice much difference between guys and girls in the robotics room. They all act nuts anyway.
I dont see how this question is really relevant to Robotics as a whole. I see no other purpose for this other than to raise a useless issue. If there is lots of girls then great! if not then so what. Difference in sex shouldnt have anything to do with robotics, or engineering.

[elknise]

I don't know about your team, but our team's girls hold the team together. We have Ms. Saxton who is a mentor. Linda who does programming and electronics. Caitlin who is the captain of the electronics team. Philis who is the captain of our PR team and designed our awesome t-shirts and sweat shirts. Then we have Robin who works with the drive train and arm teams.

Idk what we would do without them.

[davelu]

We have 3 girls on our teaml, use to have lot more but we scared all of them away:p. it be really nice if our team had more girls....

[Squeje250]

well for our team we actually have about 25% girls on our team. they dont really build BUT they are on what we call our spirt team (or our cheerleaders) :D i dont know exactly why the girls dont like building but thats possibly because i am not a girl. :D

[hansTP2S]

It appears that I have too much negative reputation to edit/delete my post (-227). I apologize for what I said, I don't know why I said it. I should leave the house more.

[DarkJedi613]

As was said before - we have a few girls on our team, and they're treated the same as all the other members. No one cares that they're girls. I think an important point is that when they do seem interested in being in robotics, they must be treated the same as all other new members - teach them things they need to be taught, show them around the machine shop, etc. But don't treat them differently, either way that is - don't treat them poorly, or better, or as if they can only do certain things.

I'm not sure if it the girls that we have on our team or if its something else, but most of the girls don't have a problem speaking up about ideas, asking for help if they need it or just asking for one of the more experienced members on the team to explain it.

[davelu]

we don't treat our club girls the same, we treat them better than how we treat each other, beacuse the teacher gets mad if the girls leave and then he's gonna lecture us for a hour or 2 about how sexist the club is.

well, most of us blame it on the school for not having more girls, i'll say 90% of the school is guys the rest is girls. the worst thing is in almost all my classes there are barely any girls, most of the time its all guys class:(.

[- Raven -]

While I'll agree that girls are in the minority in this sort of field, I find it encouraging that there ARE more girls interested in engineering and other such subjects than there were say, a decade ago perhaps. Maths/Science subjects are stereotypically male-dominated. I pride myself on being an exception to the girly-girl rule-- stubbornly refused to wear dresses as a young child, was more interested in cars than dolls, and have been keen to get into the science sector for my career. Well, hopefully anyway. :) Plus, our team has it's female members. In fact, our current captain happens to be female. And she makes a great team captain, too.

[CourtneyB]

Alot of my friends that arent in robotics always wonder why i do it etc. like i try to explain it to them and they dont get it so then they think its a waste of time and stupid. So because of that i think alot of girls arent into robotics is because they dont understand what it is until they come to a competetion or come to a meeting or whatever.

[mandyo]

Our team has 13 girls this year, and most are faithful members. We were able to improve the recruitment of females because our coach (that's me) is a female and engineer. I think girls enjoy robotics, but need to feel connected to the team. I don't think boys need that as much as the girls do. BTW half of our girls LOVE to build. ;)

[FlipperGiggles]

I am serious about this. Why dont they?

I've wondered the same thing. I'm a girl and I LOVE robotics. We have about 4 girls on our team...and that's after several people quit. So far, I'm the only girl flying to nationals with 616. I wish more girls would get involved, but they just don't realize how great it really is. :rolleyes:

[half geek]

My dad and I were dropping off my 5 year old sister at her friend's house a couple weeks ago. My dad mentioned FIRST to the parents, and their reaction was "It's too bad I won't get that experience, since we only have daughters." I couldn't believe this conscious prolonging of a gender stereotype, so I hinted that there were plenty of girls in FIRST as well as engineering. The parents continued to be skeptical, as if it was unthinkable for a lady to be doing such a manly thing.

This is where the problem starts. We should do something about it!
Therefore, our actions should include both short and long-term goals:
-Convince girls that are old enough to be students that it is OK for them to be in robotics.
-Convince the parents of younger ones that that they should not stunt their children's potential for interests based on stereotypes.

[greencactus3]

actually that must be only your team. our single girl was one of the most important designer/builder on our team

[psych0gambit]

I am so retarded, I just found out that we have like three times more girls than guys on our team :ahh: . So nvm my earlier post about why there isnt that many girls that is into engineering and robotics. :D

[Liz C]

I wouldn't necessarily claim that upbringing has to do with it. By the time a person reaches high school age, they are most likely able to decide what clubs they want to join strictly based on what they like or what they are good at. And some guys can insecure/stereotypical about the whole robotics idea and its supposed "dorkiness" too. In the whole scheme of things, it wasn't that long ago until women started entering the field of science, let alone engineering, and I've noticed (even though its not entirely true) that robotics is associated with just engineering. Perhaps this assumed relationship has something to do with it...

[sabrina752]

All I can say is girl power! ;)

[angelc24]

When our team was first created the ratio of girls was 1/20 now it's 1/4. There is only one guy on the programming team and our drive train team leader is a girl. All of us contribute just as much as the guys to the actual robot.

[AngelShel29]

My sister, brother, and I were all involved with FIRST for multiple years. Go figure that my sister recieved a degree in Electrical Engineering... my brother is going to school for Criminal Justice... and I am in school for Mechanical Engineering... Hmm.. the 2 girls are in engineering, and the guy is is something else. Pretty interesting!

[Lil_moe]

I am serious about this. Why dont they?
our team has the same problem the girls hardly show up :ahh:

[aaronD341]

This is the question that has been pondered and pondered apon for sometime with no answer. I find it interesting thatI found this post the day when out local newspaper printed a story about our team avoiding the sterotype that girls don't do robotics. Our team doesn't really have a big problem with it. About 45% of our team is girls.

[santosh]

There defiently needs to be more girls in robotics at our school. We only have like 10 out of 84 people being girls in our club. Of Ptree, VCU and nationals, I think there was a higher percentage of girls at VCU.

[ymesays]

I am serious about this. Why dont they?
ok thats not true! Team 126 there are way more girls then guys...everywhere I look with our team there really isnt a place where you find a guy who isnt out numbered by girls...So i dont know how it is with your teams but thats how it is with Team 126!

:) :)

GO GAEL FORCE

[ymesays]

our team has the same problem the girls hardly show up :ahh:
wow i thought our guys were bad

[ymesays]

All I can say is girl power! ;)
agree with ya...not like we did to stick together...i think the guys sgould cause we out number them by so much...hahaha

[bombadier337]

We have girls on our team, but they do mostly PR work. Actually all three of them leadership positions, we only have one guy in a leadership position. (me, VP)

[Tammyanez]

You know, some girls say that they don't join robotics because it is a "male" kind of thing. To them I say, FIRST robotics is about more than just building a robot. If girls are not into machining or engineering, there are other things to do, like creative aspects such as designing shirts or scrapbooking. They can also participate in marketing. There are so many facets to a robotics team and teams need to publicize this. If people only knew what goes on, a lot more people, girls and boys would join robotics.

[Kris Mackinnon]

will being one of the girlie girls on my team I say the reason for the girls at 240 host spot doesn't join in cause none of them are really into building things that doesn't inculed their make-up secltion but also over half are to busy with their sports to join. 5 out of 7 girls at my school are inovole in some from of a sport. There is a totally of 3 girls on my team out of fifthteen people. But those on the team this year most of us are being allowed to do stuff without the men coming over and taking away your project.undefined

[Nhiem]

Robotics was such a success the first year that we entered that the next year [last year] we split it into TWO teams. 1219 [Boys] and 1309 [Girls]. It was unbelievably difficult to manage but we made it through =). However this year due to a lack of interest we shrunk down to just 1219 again but did probably even better. Thats probably because the "leaders" of both teams joined together hehe. FYI i'd say there were ~15-20 girls on team 1309.

[TheMuffinMan]

I think Kris had a good point, alot of girls are more involved in other things, apperances and sports than something along the lines of FIRST. I tried explaining what we did to my girlfriend and it went completely over her head :rolleyes: she wanted to see a C3P0 walking android thing, and didn't quite grasp what our goal was. Then you've got some people that think we're off to make a Battle Bot thing with flame throwers etc, then those people get dissapointed when they learn we're just playing with triangles haha. Like my friend said earlier, all of the girls on our team are mostly working on PR stuff, handouts, banner, etc AND they're our officers, so they may not be hands-on with the robot but they sure push us along (except for the one meeting they all watched The Notebook and cried alow :D )

[IA-Howitzer]

OK, we have only 2 girls on our team and our team is made from 2 different schools (Woodside and Carlmont). Since there is no one from Woodside the people I talk 2 dont want to go and be the only girl there. Any tips on how to get a lot of girls in at once. I was thinking maybe announce something over the intercom but that might be sorta weird.

P.S. Ill try mentioning that RCU thing, but any other help would b great.

O ya, and for the post above me, if they like battle bots, tell them we still can try 2 wreck other robots but that its called "Defense".

[Billfred]

if they like battle bots, tell them we still can try 2 wreck other robots but that its called "Defense".
However...

Strategies aimed solely at the destruction, damage, tipping over, or entanglement of ROBOTS are not in the spirit of the FIRST Robotics Competition and are not allowed.

[Lisa Perez]

Another thing to consider is that in their curriculum, a lot of girls gravitate toward the social studies and English subjects. I was talking to a bunch of my friends the other day, and it seemed that out of our whole group, I was pretty much the only one who favored math and science.

To add, most people think robotics is completely math and science, which it's not. That's why at my school, we've been working to break that stereotype and demonstrate that people who are indeed apt to like the social studies and English more can still get involved in a large capacity. :)

IA-Howitzer: The intercom thing really works. When 573 first brought girls into the team, that's how they got our interest. Usually if at least one person's interest is sparked, they will talk friends into coming with them (that's usually the case here).

[kathimm1]

In my own opinion as a girl i would say that they are too embarsed to join or think it wierd.i am the only girl on the team trying to get others to join is hard.i will take any ideas at all.

[Nin_estarSaerah]

well, I have several theories as to why there are less girls.

First of all would be that girls' brains do often work differently than guys' brains. their interests simply don't lie in engineering as much.. often, not always. but this is not as big a reason as other reasons.

girls care a lot about their popularity and reputation. they don't want to be stereotyped as a "nerd", unless, like me, they embrace their nerdiness.

also, guys on teams have a lot to do with it. sometimes they mentally see girls as cheerleaders and poster makers... or they see a girl as somebody just for them to hit on and flirt with, which may turn girls away from a team.

society's stereotypes also attribute to the lack of girls, and perhaps fuel these other reasons as well

[vic burg]

Any tips on how to get a lot of girls in at once. I was thinking maybe announce something over the intercom but that might be sorta weird.

Just so everyone knows, I do not mean to be rude or mean sounding in this post. I am just generalizing from what I know.

What you can try to do is just have everyone already involved tell all the girls (and boys) about robotics. Have a demonstration at lunch with a robot, or put up posters. Obviously, guys can still join but, one really huge plus to having girls on the team is that we have smaller hands (usually) and can get in those tight spaces where electrical wires have become unplugged or a screw fell in between pieces, etc. Also, (and I don't mean to demean the guys), but girls seem to have better hand-eye coordination, for like, the position of human player or maybe driver. I'm not saying that guys are terrible with it, but it's really about the brain chemistry. However, that's neither here nor there-- basically just try to appeal to girls. you don't have to paint your bodies pink (although im sure 233 wouldn't mind -- lol) but just advertise it, on the pa system, with posters, flyers, just talking, etc.

Just get across the idea that robotics isn't only for guys. Heck, this is my second year as mechanical manger! There may be some people who may not like the idea of girls on a FIRST team, but there are 2 FRC teams I know (knew) of that are made up of all girls.

Just tell them about it!;)

[midway78224]

457 has plenty of girls on our team 10 to be extact and they do everything from being our team leader to being a programming our team does not stop them for doing watever they want. we always encourage them to do wat they want

[Erin Rapacki]

I think it’s a combination of the attitudes of the mentors and current students on the team. A team who already has females on it may do better at attracting more, a team with only guys (but guys who encourage females to take a leadership role) may do well at recruiting, but a team with only guys where girls don't even register on their radar as being technically competent will not do well at attracting them. All teams should recognize girls as having the potential of being technically competent enough to have a leadership position. The team should also have a means of teaching those skills (through pre season projects, etc...). The robot education people here at UML have noticed that it takes more hand holding and a longer period of time to get the ball rolling on a girl's interest in robotics and sci/tech, but once they become interested, they go deeper into it, become very skilled, and remain interested (I witnessed this on an all-girls FIRST rookie team as well.)

[vivek16]

Its because the general Nerd population is mostly guys. yes there are girls but not nearly as many tech geek girls as tech geek guys.

-vivek

[ebarker]

I think it’s a combination of the attitudes of the mentors and current students on the team. A team who already has females on it may do better at attracting more, a team with only guys (but guys who encourage females to take a leadership role) may do well at recruiting, but a team with only guys where girls don't even register on their radar as being technically competent will not do well at attracting them. All teams should recognize girls as having the potential of being technically competent enough to have a leadership position. The team should also have a means of teaching those skills (through pre season projects, etc...). The robot education people here at UML have noticed that it takes more hand holding and a longer period of time to get the ball rolling on a girl's interest in robotics and sci/tech, but once they become interested, they go deeper into it, become very skilled, and remain interested (I witnessed this on an all-girls FIRST rookie team as well.)

Good stuff here. This is right on.

If you want young women on the team, you have to plan and prepare for it. They need to feel welcome and valued by mentors and current members. And they need to be allowed to get hands on so that they will gain the experience, skill, and confidence needed. The culture of the team has to encourage participation and make opportunities exist for this growth to occur.

[Sarah H]

Hey, Im on Team 33 the Killer Bees from Auburn Hills MI, and I have been on the team for 3 years. My rookie year and second year I made pit crew and as a senior, I am now the driver and my classmate, also a girl was the operator this year. We now have plenty of girls this year, granted that we are still outnumbered by the guys. a lot of our student leadership came from females, may teams I am close with also have a number of female student participants, teams like 111, 47, 1 , the pink Team, and many others. I think that FIRST is being discovered by more and more females each year. I think that a large reason that you may see few girls is because they do not know about the program

[Meredith Novak]

I did notice that the Bees had 2 girl operators :)

[David Brinza]

As I recall, Falcons Robotics (Team 842) had an all-girls drive team at the San Diego Regional in 2007.

The next year, Team 842 won the Chairman's Award in Atlanta.

That says a lot about FIRST's commitment to breaking the gender barrier in science and technology.

[katd30]

I think it's really mostly society and how we were brought up. Girls I think place more emphasis on being normal and doing robotics or anything technological is very not normal for girls. We were brought up trying to be the prettiest and fit in with everyone else that by the time you get to high school all your nerdishness has been supressed to the point where you can't get it back. To me thats an important part of FLL and Jr. FLL and why I've been bothering my school superintendent to set one up. If we get an 8 year old involved FIRST before she looses her geek side we've got her for life most likely.

Also a girl doing FLL will know more about tools and technology than someone who hasn't. Which is why all the girls on my team seem to quit every year. The guys know more and act like we can't do everything they can when all we need to get is a little help or a demonstration. I'm not blaming the guys but when a girl wants to get into something like this, encourage her cause she's most likely giving up a lot for it and its something sher really wants to do.

Eep... Long post... We just had this discussion with the guys on our team...

[kapolavery]

I somewhat agree...
on my team there are only 2 girls. But robotics is fairly new in my community therefore the low amount of interest,
but a lot of the girls in our school think its cool.. a lot of them actually came down to see our team at our regional in hawaii (after I begged them to come.. jk haha)and also I heard chicks dig nerds. Im just playing..I dont know that for a fact.

I think its just getting them to change what career path they want to go into. A lot of people dont know what engineers are or do.
There's a lot of opportunities for young women to be engineers like most things, there becomes an equlibrium..just give it time.
And personally, I think it's awesome when I ask a girl what shes gonna do after high school and they say they want to be an engineer.

I kind of dont like it though when the robotics competition though becomes more of a social/trading and getting numbers kinda thing than the actual competition part. Not that it's wrong or that I haven't done that. sometimes it gets out of hand and the whole team loses focus because so and so got this girls number and so on. haha.
it just takes away from the main goal of why were there.

[Andy L]

We've had 1-2 girls every year of our existence, this year we had 5 and from what I can tell all of them loved it. 3 seniors, 1 junior, 1 freshman. All 5 attended both of our regionals, all 5 attended nationals. Towards the end of build most of them were asking me if they could cut and drill more(My fault). We are probably going to push more girls to join in future years because of this year

[Akash Rastogi]

We try to have 4-5 girls at least on the team, sometimes it works out sometimes it doesn't. I wish more would take on mechanical roles though. It seems to be trend that girls who join tend to just want to do non technical activities. But of course, we make them do end effector and drive train as well as a requirement and some learn to love it. ::safety::

[Cooley744]

I love to see other girls on the drive team... like me :)

[Akash Rastogi]

I love to see other girls on the drive team... like me :)

316 had the coolest drive team ^_^ and 1868

[nevereverregret]

hehe... ::ouch:: new smileys!!!! I am the only girl on my team. At the beggining of this year there was me and another girl but she quit due to another team member and his sexism. Alot of girls I think are not joining because of the sexium in some of the teams, like me old team. I can see that most teams (over 90%) are not mainly sexist teams. But the few who are really turn women away from being part of the team. Its hard to fight for a place, you get tired of continualy fighitng for a place or say in the team. We started a new team due to one of these sexist teams, which really was only two or three people, but it ruined it for me. Along with being sexist there were many other peoples that just could not be fixed. But we made another team and are hoping to have more women join. I would love if I wasent the only girl, but it just dosent seem to work out... Just a reminder to some guys we can build as well keep an open mind. But to the 90% of guys who arent like that thank you sooooo much♥ ::safety::

[JaneYoung]

The more women we see coaching, the more girls we'll see participating.
The more women we see as lead engineers, the more girls we'll see committing to the team.
The more women we have as 'rock stars' in FIRST, the more girls we'll see celebrating math and science and the doors they can open.
The more women who serve as strong role models, the more girls we'll see applying for and obtaining scholarships in these areas.

Lead by example.
Go the distance.
Recruit mentors, team mates, parents, sponsors, and supporters that get this or will.

It's a journey - for some, it is a lifetime adventure in the form of a goal.

[kramarczyk]

The more women we see coaching, the more girls we'll see participating.
The more women we see as lead engineers, the more girls we'll see committing to the team.
The more women we have as 'rock stars' in FIRST, the more girls we'll see celebrating math and science and the doors they can open.
The more women who serve as strong role models, the more girls we'll see applying for and obtaining scholarships in these areas.

Lead by example.
Go the distance.
Recruit mentors, team mates, parents, sponsors, and supporters that get this or will.

It's a journey - for some, it is a lifetime adventure in the form of a goal.

You must spread some reputation around before giving it to JaneYoung again!

That whole post should be spotlighted.

[Karibou]

That whole post should be spotlighted.
Agreed XD

I think that one of the biggest problems with getting girls to join/stay on teams is the gender barrier. Before high school, girls and guys don't interact much, and if they do, it's typically more on a "OMGBOYFRIEND!!!!!!!!"-type basis. So for girls, gaining acceptance on a team that's mostly guys can be...hard. Lack of acceptance is what has scared a few of my girl friends away from the team, along with a general disinterest in robots.

So basically... (Retention of female participation)=acceptance+interest+/-(already existing friends on the team)

You must spread some reputation around before giving it to JaneYoung again!
You can give some to meeeeeeeeeee! [: :rolleyes:

[mhaake]

I joined FRC my senior year of high school (the second year of our team) and noticed something odd. I was on an all-girls team and we were very proud of where we had come in the year. We got to a younger competition and teams told us they were surprised to see an all girls team with a nice looking robot. They said straight to our faces they didn't know how well we would do tho, simply for the fact that we were all girls. After the first day of competition, we had teams coming up to us telling us it was simply luck that we were so good. As the driver of the team, I put up with countless drive teams telling me they were going to get the ball even tho they knew their robot was was less capable than ours. I listened for awhile, until I decided it was time to put the boys in their place. Saturday afternoon, we were second pick. By this time, we had teams coming up to us telling us how surprised they were that an all girls team could be so good. By the second or third match with our alliance, they knew we were the dominating robot and began to do the "Robette kiss" with us when their team was introduced (blow a wave at the camera/MC). We had all male drive teams blowing kisses.

This year I decided to be a college mentor and noticed little change. THis was noticed even after at the kickoff this year, team 2169's mentor made a speech about the season and made out team stand and told all the teams there to not underestimate the power of girls. Props to King TeC!

I think there has been some improvement on team's behalves of supporting girls; however, people will always have their stereotypes. When our team is faced with these boys, we stick it to them in the competition. However, we do it as a team. I would find it very intimidating to try to stick it to these same boys that underestimate our team if they were on my team and there were only 5 or so girls to be on my side (and im not an intimidated person - I have an older brother ....) On a slightly other note besides some boys not thinking girls can do what boys do, I've noticed some times boys think that girls are there only to flirt with. Our team gets hit on like no other when we show up at competitions and, although flirting can sometimes be a 2 way street, robotics simply isn't the place for it. Girls can feel pressured to flirt back simply to be nice to guys and I'm saying competition isn't right for that (but for more on that there is another thread about PDA that went on in Atlanta...)

One last side note that may not be 100% relevant. Our team applied for the Chairmans Award this year. We did not win and we understand why the other team that won was simply more involved. Do not get me wrong : I am not complaining that we did not win. The other team deserved it at the time more than we did. On our feedback, we were told we need more diversity and to bring more less priviledged people in the engineering world onto our team. We have 3 of 18 students that are of color on the team. Our school simply is all white (all girls Catholic school...). We were astonished to see that on our sheet since we bring 18 girls into the engineering world and if another team has 10 of the 40 girls they get extra points for having lots of girls . . . Just a side note that I thought was interesting that an all girls team was told that we were not bringing enough minorities into the engineering world (when most other groups aren't told that if they have girls on their teams.)

[Chris is me]

I have absolutely no idea why there aren't more girls in robotics, science, and engineering.

I've always been a part of teams with lots of girls on them. I was the only guy on my team for both of my years in FV/TC. Then I went and joined a team that had more guys but still several girls involved in every part of the team (so not just the "girl roles" or whatever stereotype exists that I'm nto aware of). It just seems like something that's never really been an issue for any of my teams.

I don't see what's so intristically different about science and engineering that girls would be predisposed not to do. Girls certainly aren't "worse" at robotics; I've encountered just as many good and bad all (mostly) guys teams as all girls teams. It just seems weird that there would be that stigma to begin with.

I don't really understand how specifically "all girls teams" are seen as great, however. Getting more girls into engineering is just as nice as getting more of anyone into engineering, probably even nicer as we kind of have to make up for hidden gender bias in things. I just don't see why restricting guys from joining a team accomplishes this goal any better than by just encouraging more girls to join. Why an all-girls team gets more media attention than a team that's gone above and beyond to reach a female majority has always puzzled me, since most all girls teams are from all girls schools.

I intend no disrespect to teams made up of all girls, especially teams from all girl's schools. I just think that if there exists an all girls team that turns down guys wanting to participate then they are "doing it wrong".

Oh, quick comment to the Robettes above: You guys had a really great robot in 10,000 Lakes, and you guys shouldn't have been available when you were in the picking process (you guys were in the 7th seed right? I would have pinned you guys as a 4 or 5 team). Perhaps there are more hidden biases at work?

[JaneYoung]

I don't really understand how specifically "all girls teams" are seen as great, however.

Chris,
You have made some good points and provided food for thought.
I've narrowed your quote down to this statement, not to argue with you or to dispute the thought, but to provide an opportunity for you to gain some insight from some girls' perspectives. The girls are current members and alumnae from Falcon Robotics, FRC 842.

The thread title is, We Left The Boys At Home. There is another thread called, We Left The Boys At Home II. I'll let you find that one if you are interested in reading it as well. In this thread that I'm introducing to the discussion, several pages were written regarding opinions about why 842 chose to do what they did. It was on the last page that the girls shared their views, perspectives, and opinions. It was not easy for them and they had to find the courage to do it. That is no small thing and should not be dissed or overlooked. Posting in ChiefDelphi can be very intimidating for anyone and going about the business of creating change and opportunity, knowing that it will open one to criticism and misunderstanding, can be difficult. I'd like to direct your attention to post 77 when Mabel begins writing. Then I would like to direct you to post 84. In post 84, several of the girls post their experiences and their thoughts. It would be my preference that you read the entire thread but 77 and 84 address the quote regarding wondering why all girls teams are seen as great. In my opinion, all girls teams are not great in themselves. It is their efforts, their commitment to the program/competition, and the team development - their journey - that can help them achieve greatness, if they work hard enough. But, I do understand and value the importance of the teams. Especially after spending some time looking through the lens that 842 has provided us in this thread (http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/showthread.php?t=56504).

[AcesJames]

I'm not sure if this is how it is at every high school, but at ours, there are a lot of reasons why girls don't go into robotics

1. Robotics is beaten down by EVERYONE at the two schools our team comes from. It is said to suck up resources, space, and money from the schools, which it does not. Everyone says sports are way more important than FIRST, and that our team is pointless and a waste of time. The only people in our school that even know we've won the championship, are already on the team.

2. Girls at our school can only be "popular" if they wear a certain style of clothing, act a certain way, and hang out with certain people. They have to either play soccer, basketball, lacrosse, or field hockey. They have to be attractive. At our school, joining the robotics team is "social suicide".

Overall, I think one of the problems is that girls are molded, at least in our society, to become nurses, house-wives, etc. Society as a whole looks down upon girls who want to be engineers. That's why FIRST is so important. It teaches kids that engineering is cool, and it is the future. FIRST is a sport to all of us, and it's fun. We just have to show girls, and people in general, that it isn't just for nerds. Robotics and engineering as a whole is for anyone who is interested in it.

[delsaner]

It could just be that some girls have no real interest in robotics. It could be that robotics and technology doesn't interest them. We could introduce girls to the side of robotics (the side the majority of teenagers don't know about), and maybe they will grow an interest in robotics. If they don't have an interest in robotics, we shouldn't force them to grow a liking. If they like it, they like it. If not, then that is their opinion, and I respect their opinion.

[Nica F.]

I'm going to keep this very short and sweet.

Why aren't there many girls in robotics? Simple, a lot just don't know that there is more to robots than going at pieces of aluminum all day. I think a lot of people miss the point that the great thing about FIRST and robotics is that it's just as important to realize that you don't want to do engineering as to realize that you do. All girls will have their reasons, and whether its "no i don't like getting dirty" to "i don't like math and science", there are also a boatload of reasons non-engineering related that show that they can do robotics as well.

[dragonrulr288]

Well.. as several other people mentioned, it's mostly the stereotype issue. I think a lot of it has to do with how girls in our generation grew up. Just about all of my girl friends grew up as "girly-girls" playing with Barbies because that's what people expected them to play with. Meanwhile, most boys played with Legos and trucks. A majority of these girls stick with the girly stereotype; only with a lot of encouragement and a bit of instruction do they break out of that shell and get involved in something like robotics :)

I think the other reason for the small amount of female FIRSTers is that they usually feel overshadowed.. because we usually grow up as "girly-girl"s, most of us don't have much experience and don't have the confidence to step in and ask for help.. especially when one of our male classmates is standing there acting like they know everything and you're stupid for not knowing it.. (high school and jr. high guys act like they know wayyyy more than they do :rolleyes: )


anywhooo.. I didn't really mean to make my post so long, I just got started and couldn't stop.. :rolleyes: Hopefully more girls will discover the joys of robotics and learn to jump in and get involved!! :D


wow.... i though i would have to type out my opinion, but you nailed mine to a T!!!!

Honestly though, on 216/288 Robodawgs teams, we have 4 girls [including me]. next year, we are losing one, then in two years, we lose 2.... I am trying to convince a friend of mine to join.... She isn't sure she wants to, because she has no prior knowledge. I have tried to tell her that i didn't either at the beginning of this year. If it weren't for one or two people on my team, I would know nearly nothing, and I may have quit... O_O not fun!

whats worse is when people ignore what you are saying because you are a girl... :( geez I hope that stops, and that no one else has to go through that. its frustrating... even though we are "done" with the season, I will say that some comments still happen... though I have learned to ignore them ^^

oh well, thats my $ .02.....


PS... If any of this came out wrong/ mean sounding, I'm sorry.. apparently I have a way of wording things badly..



EDIT

.....and also I heard chicks dig nerds.

oh yeah, nerds are the best people to talk to ^.^

[chocolateturtl]

Well, actually most girls who I talk to robotics about think that it's cool that I'm on a team.... I think though that they think 'wow cool, but I could never do that'. Maybe also they're just plain uninterested! I never actually worked on our robot (thought I would've loved to). I went to the meetings more to learn some 3ds Max stuff. I went to the BAE regional, but wasn't really sure why since I didn't know most of the kids on the team, but it turned out to be awesome! It doesn't hurt that we won :P haha.. we have about 5 girls on the team, give or take a couple (not sure of the exact count).

Since I'm a senior and will be going to school in Florida for computer animation, I'm hoping to become a mentor eventually! I love FIRST.

P.S. I have a thing for nerds :P :P :D

[BHS Bucs]

This year, we had 13 girls and 17 guys on the team. Many of our girls were not involved in build, which is something we are trying to change. We have one female mentor, 3 male mentors, 1 male teacher and 1 female teacher (me!). I'm definitely not a help with the technical side of things, but I do the other important jobs like making sure the robot is shipped. :)

I have high hopes for the future of the team - but would love to see more of our female students involved on the build side of the team!

[Mish Mooney]

I have no clue, I love robotics.

The only creepy part was when I found out that at our regional, 80% of the guys wanted to "talk" to me. Creeppyyyyyy.

[bobwrit]

I think that the main reason why girls aren't joining robotics is the society teaches them that they have to try to fit in with the steryotypical 'girly-girl'. It's a shame, because I've seen some engineering designs from girls and they are REALY good, but they wont go into engineering because they would become socialy outcast(to which I reply, You'll gain acceptance from the other side of society). Sigh....

[bandducky511]

I (as a girl) think that many other girls don't realize what they can do on a robotics team. On my team (122) we are "dominated" by girls apparently. We have 3 girls, just 3 out of the 15 boys we have.
I also think that many girls think that robotics is "just for boys" and that all the engineering stuff is "not fun". Yet, there are some teams (all girl) that come out and prove this all wrong and show just how many girls love robotics.

[CallieJ]

I am on an all-girls team and I enjoy it a lot. We do well and we have great dynamics. We are also lucky because we share a lab with an all-boys team so it turns out about equal. :)

We do a lot of activities with younger girls to try and keep them into science and technology. I (and many of my teammates) were lucky to go to a middle school that stressed science and technology for girls. It even had required CS and robotics courses.

But we find that a lot of girls who go to traditional middle schools stop paying attention to computers and robotics. They are given thousands of messages everyday from their classmates, the media and even their parents about what it means to be a girl, and to be "popular" and "pretty". It sometimes happens in elementary school but it's a lot rarer. We did a fundraiser where we taught 4th and 5th graders about 10 types of engineering. If they had been 6th and 7th graders we wouldn't have had anyone sign up. Instead we had nearly 80.

I think that this is something that we all need to work at. It's definitely improving in FIRST and a lot of girls I know are interested in technology, even if FIRST isn't necessarily their thing.

Also, I heard a rumor that there might be an all-girls regional this year, and I think that might be a good opportunity to see how other teams are doing at getting girls into robotics.

[pyr0b0y]

I remember when I first joined our high school robotics team, there were about 5-6 girls....and they were all on the PR team. During the next 2 years they started to move into other areas such as animation and construction. It was nice to see that over 10 girls were on the team and they were the ones that were working on the robot everyday.....what a change!

[falconmaster]

As I recall, Falcons Robotics (Team 842) had an all-girls drive team at the San Diego Regional in 2007.

The next year, Team 842 won the Chairman's Award in Atlanta.

That says a lot about FIRST's commitment to breaking the gender barrier in science and technology.

We have been taking data for two years and we are getting ready to write a report about our findings. We even had some other teams helping us take data this year at the Championships. Thanks you all!

[falconmaster]

The more women we see coaching, the more girls we'll see participating.
The more women we see as lead engineers, the more girls we'll see committing to the team.
The more women we have as 'rock stars' in FIRST, the more girls we'll see celebrating math and science and the doors they can open.
The more women who serve as strong role models, the more girls we'll see applying for and obtaining scholarships in these areas.

Lead by example.
Go the distance.
Recruit mentors, team mates, parents, sponsors, and supporters that get this or will.

It's a journey - for some, it is a lifetime adventure in the form of a goal.

Hey Jane you are almost leaking out the findings of our study! we have been taking data for two years and we are getting ready to write our report. I did not get to see you this year! I miss you!

[LilGrohnke2013]

The reason that I hear a lot is that I don't have the patience for that, or that's for nerds, and all kinds of that. I find it interesting that on our team we have 2 girls as captains, Bekah and myself. I am also the only girl on our build team (well my FTC team I'm a jr member on our FRC team, which that build team is 2/3 female freshman! woo girls!) I always try to get my friends into FIRST but I have only succeeded with one of my guy friends. It really disappoints me that there are so few girls. Truly it shows womens strength and will, really it proves that women are just as able as men to do things such as robotics. Sorry this is so long, but topics like this once I get going, I don't stop very quickly.:rolleyes: