Gender Equality: A Work in Progress

[Katie_UPS]

Originally Posted by planetbrilliant

Okay, I am by no means targeting you and your team specifically and i might have misunderstood your statement, but I feel like lots of people kind of automatically assume that the girls aren't into engineering. ... but instead they are pushed toward scouting, attendance, design, chairman's etc.

This is pretty much what I was going to say. I joined my high school team and started by writing because I wanted to write. I'm very glad I was offered the opportunity/pushed to learn some shop skills. I don't think I'd be where I am now (near completion of my engineering degree) if that hadn't happened.

Originally Posted by Sperkowsky

Our of our female members there is only one who is seriously interested in engineering. The rest do jobs like marketing, music development, cleaning, and sometimes nothing. This is their choice though. I wish some of the female members did more egineering but honestly if they have no desire then why push them.

We should push everybody (not just girls), because getting everyone to try everything is important. Its hard to tell if the lack of desire is genuine or from already being pushed out. Most exposure to engineering outside of FIRST-like activities are science classes and math classes, which typically are rather dull and a recent study* showed that unintentional bias gave girls lower scores in these fields (further discouraging them from STEM). Not to mention the idea of gendered toys** teaching girls to cook and nurture, while boys are taught to build and design.

*I have not read this study in its entirety, so there may be gaping holes that I am unaware of. I would love to find out this study is flawed and teachers are not unintentionally biased against girls.

**Yes, I am aware this is a comic and not a study

Originally Posted by Shrub

Microagressions-little statements/actions that are common in speech/life and "accidentally" hurtful-are common in normal life, and there is no difference for people in FRC. (an example is assuming female-presenting members aren't on build, hardy har har.) Just being aware of microagressions can change a lot on a team's culture. Communication is also really important when confronting stuff like that.

A lot of people are really unaware of how "little things" are actually not little things. A mentor mis-attributing an accomplishment of a female to a male, getting hit on while scouting, someone saying "she's pretty good at X, and she's a girl!", an oversight of a female students abilities... are all "little" things that can be discouraging (there are not my most subtle examples).

and yes, these are all real examples

Originally Posted by 346CADmen

As a male mentor, maybe my appreciation of this thread may differ. I don't know what "girls" are up against, having not been in that place.
That said, our team had a female CEO last year, two young ladies this year provided most of our precision machining work. it also looks as if next years CAD lead will be female. I can't imagine what is holding ladies back in FIRST, except maybe themselves.

Emphasis mine.

Chris ODonnell already made some awesome points about this. I'm going to add some of my own incite:
I was lucky enough to be pushed enough and stubborn enough to get into the shop on my team. There was another girl older than me who was less pushed/stubborn and didn't get to work in the shop despite wanting to. For a period of time, I thought that everyone should be as headstrong (and lucky) as me if they wanted to work in the shop and it was their fault if they weren't.

I was wrong. I had an older brother on the team who was a large part of that push. I was more outgoing, therefor more likely to ask for jobs. I had just the right set of factors that got me where I was, and many of them were not things in my control.

Believe it or not, girls are taught to be meek and quiet. We are called "stubborn" or "bossy" when boys would be called "headstrong" and "leaders" for the same actions. We are taught to be one way and insulted when we act against it, but its still our fault if what we were taught prevents us from doing something, such as the engineering side of things.

Your team is not every team, and honestly it sounds like your team is an awesome place to be a girl. Its great to hear about a place where girls are thriving and the environment is not hostile/toxic. I'm interested in what your team is doing because you appear to be doing it right.

To respond to OP:

In my experience, it is the whole team's job to ensure that every aspect of the team is a welcoming environment for everyone. Girls should be encouraged to try welding, boys should be encouraged to try photography. Its highly unlikely that students on a team know what is involved in/have tried all the various aspects of a robotics team and so would be unqualified to know what they do and don't like. For this reason, I encourage the use on hands-on experience with pre-season workshops or during the season.