Discussion on All-Girl events

[Collin Fultz]

Originally Posted by The Swaggy P

I do have a sister, and she wants to earn her way through life on her own merits and hard work, and does not expect, nor want, special treatment from society.

That's great! I would love to think that I have achieved everything that I have because of my own merit and hard work.

Of course, if I'm being honest, I recognize and admit that I have received special treatment from society because of my race, gender, and socio-economic status.

It's because of this that I am so looking forward to this event and hope to learn much from it.

[Katie_UPS]

Originally Posted by Strider-dan

A little while back, I had posted some thoughts in response to the graph put up by Karthik. I had included examples of experiences that my daughter and sons have had growing up to show that there is intentional bias in favor of girls in many activities today and that it is not helpful to the healthy development of our society.

I'm glad you're worried about bias, as bias is typically bad. But the thing about initiatives like affirmative action and "intentional bias in favor of girls" is that the goal is to negate bias elsewhere that puts people -like girls- at a disadvantage.

Originally Posted by The Swaggy P

I do have a sister, and she wants to earn her way through life on her own merits and hard work, and does not expect, nor want, special treatment from society.

I too enjoy earning my way, because nothing is more frustrating than being told my achievements were only attained because I'm a girl and not because of hard work and long hours that I put into them.

But you know what would suck? If your sister was denied something she had earned because her resume said "Rebecca" instead of "Robert". We still live in a world where a girl's name is perceived as less competent than a boy's name on an identical resume (click the blue and read the study if you don't believe me). So I wouldn't see it as "special treatment" but instead as "making up for a deck stacked against them."

---

However, this competition has nothing to do with special treatment and more to do with building girls' confidence in STEM, an idea I've explained before (summarized/modified for this conversation):

To explain why all-girls events/teams are not bad, we have to understand that -whether we like it or not- girls are conditioned as they grow up to be submissive and quiet while boys are taught to be loud and "take charge". Consequently, in many situations boys will take on leadership roles/talk more/dominate the space - especially domains like STEM where men are perceived to succeed at higher rates than women. This is not because boys are inherently evil, its just a side-effect of our social environment.

All-girl events are beneficial to girls because without boys automatically claiming the space, they now are able to. This builds confidence, which allows them to be successful when they are in co-ed environments. This is one of the underlying principles behind single-sex education for women. Girls aren’t dumb, they know that they will someday be in a co-ed environment. Having a single-sex environment for developing skills is not a detriment, special treatment, or making them “soft.” It’s just giving them a safe space to grow their confidence and skill set.

For a longer explanation and links to relevant studies, see the whole post.

[Monochron]

Originally Posted by The Swaggy P

I do have a sister, and she wants to earn her way through life on her own merits and hard work, and does not expect, nor want, special treatment from society.

Presumably both you and her agree that she already does get negative special treatment because she is a girl correct? Separate from the idea of "girls-only-events" do you agree that society does not give women the same treatment as men in STEM fields? If so, are you in favor of that changing so that we are all treated equally?

I have a feeling that you and the rest of us have some base assumptions that differ and we should probably clear that up before anything else.

[Dibit1010]

Girls only events are not going to help our cause at all. The best we can is to support our women and girls in STEM- exclusion (of all parties) leads to nothing. Maybe have a few seminars about being a lady FIRST-er but don't be exclusive. Then we are just as bad as the people who are excluding us


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Cothron Theiss]

I am loathe to jump into this discussion, but I don't think this is the appropriate location to debate the merits of All-Female Competitions/Seminars/Whatevers. I'm not suggesting make a thread for it, though if you feel there's a need for it, that's your prerogative. I just think that the volunteers and mentors and students (both male and female) that are putting a large amount of time and effort into organizing this event would like for their thread not to be derailed by a debate in which, most likely, no one's preconceived opinions would be changed anyway.

It looks to be a wonderful event that is a step in the right direction, and this thread is one way they're advertising it. It'd be a shame if the event was forgotten in the wake of a good ol' CD discussion.

[Madison]

Originally Posted by Strider-dan

A little while back, I had posted some thoughts in response to the graph put up by Karthik. I had included examples of experiences that my daughter and sons have had growing up to show that there is intentional bias in favor of girls in many activities today and that it is not helpful to the healthy development of our society. It seems that any ideas not exactly in line with the biases of this group are not welcome because my post has been deleted as has the post by The Swaggy P that was the source of much of the discussion. An echo chamber is not healthy for this group either but it seems the forum moderators prefer to keep you in one. Good luck with this game plan.

Again, Team 234 is to be highly commended for putting in the time and energy to organize and host an after season competition. But making it a Girls Only event is not similarly worthy.

I've reinstated your post. I'd appreciate it if you'd move discussion of the merit of these sorts of events into a new thread (or one of the many existing ones) so as to keep the focus here on the event itself.

These discussions repeat here frequently and are tedious. Apologies.

[Koko Ed]

Originally Posted by Strider-dan

This graph says nothing except that females seem to gravitate to certain professions and males to other professions. This graph also reflects past preferences and not what students are doing today. It would take a couple generations to change the demographics, say in mechanical engineering, even if only women were allowed to study mechanical engineering starting today. And most women do not want to be mechanical engineers, although those who do apply to engineering programs are pretty much guaranteed a spot. In my experience as a parent of one girl and two boys, I did not see any institutional barriers but lots of encouragement for my daughter to do whatever she chose to do but I saw and continue to see a lot of overt messages against my sons. In high school my sons and other boys were not included in "technology career visits" to local industries while girls, even those who had no interest, were encouraged to join the visit and find out. Now one son is in college and the information boards on campus are plastered with "girls can do anything" type lectures and "all young men are sexual offenders and need to get sensitivity training" type lectures. And of course there are more girls than boys on campus.

It is amazing to me that no one seems to see the problem that "The Swaggy P" is bringing to your attention so I will pose it in a different way. What would you think if the announcement were as follows:

The 2016 SundayRAGE (Robotics All BOYS Event) is set!

Sunday October 2
Jerry Meridian High School
Minneapolis, MN

24 Teams

<$100 entry fee due to excellent sponsor support!

Stronghold Game - All MALE drive team required (including coach).

Focus on MALE volunteers in all roles.

Two Lunch time panel discussions -
* Male Focused - Career, Opportunity, Education, Challenges in STEM
* Female Focused - Intentional Bias and Actions and The Impact on Diversity

More details, registration and volunteer sign up in August / September.

You think this message might be hurtful to Girls on the teams that want to participate? If so, can't you see that the opposite message is just as hurtful to Boys? Why does the encouragement of Girls have to be at the expense of Boys and vice versa? Instituting new biases that favor girls and harm boys from kindergarten all the way through college and into careers does not make any sense for any society.

As an incubator of future leaders in our society, FIRST has great responsibility to not further these types of biases and instead to encourage all of our children to achieve their full potential in any career they choose to pursue. Team coaches and mentors (including parent mentors like me) have the personal responsibility to uplift all our young people, boys and girls alike.

Team 234 is to be highly commended for putting in the time and energy to organize and host an after season competition. But making it a Girls Only event is not similarly worthy.

Why does this have a very #Alllivesmatter feel to it?

[asid61]

Originally Posted by smitikshah

"The Swaggy P" - I understand you may think that the event is favoring girls and pushing them in STEM, but as some people have brought up, engineering fields are predominantly male. I thought for a while that this was because females just didn't like engineering, but from my personal experiences, I can assure that from my point of view that is certainly not the case.

Quick Storytime:
For this summer, I was accepted into a materials science engineering/bioengineering lab to pursue an idea I had for the future of materials engineering. I was so excited to go into the lab and start working! Within the past week, however, I was a bit turned down by the atmosphere. I am the only female in the lab (of about 15 people), and I feel like there is a lot of unintentional bias going on. For example. just today, all the "bros" (as they like to call themselves) made plans to go out for a lab team lunch, and I was the only one that wasn't invited. I'm sure you will say that this might be due to a variety of other factors - but based on the way they act, I'm sure it's out of unintentional bias. There are a plethora of other examples that would take too long to write out, so if you need more PM me. Again, I'm sure what they are doing is unintentional, and I know that in a professional environment, I shouldn't need to be best friends with everyone I work with, but that environment does make me feel upset and lonely at times. However, since I really believe in my idea, I plan on finishing my work in this lab and trying to fulfill my dream of having the idea published - but I probably won't work at said lab again.

Rambling story aside: Some males might not realize they do it because of the predominant influence of males in the field, but this unintentional bias can lead some of us girls to not feel welcome.

I am thrilled that this event is taking place and hopefully the panel discussions can help better the STEM/Engineering Environment for all of us!

I won't be attending, unfortunately (IN is a bit too far...) but I would like to say that this post effected me a lot more than any single talk or speech that I've heard. If I was attending the seminar about unintentional bias I would look forward to stories or examples like these.

The thread is only at 2 pages yet. If people stop arguing, regardless of stances or views, than legitimate questions can be asked and answered about the event.

[Gdeaver]

Discrimination is discrimination. To exclude a group based upon their sex, sexual orientation, culture or religion is discrimination. This is a sexist discriminating event. Further, it may actually be negative in the goal the organizers are trying to address. This is my point of view.

The girls have to learn how to play with the boys and the boys have to learn how to play with the girls. After over a decade of working with diverse FRC team I can say this is very very hard. Every one is focusing on the girls. We need to also focus on the boys. They need to learn how to play nicely with the girls and take this forward in to the work place in the future. The girls also have to learn how to integrate into a team with boys on it. It all starts with respect. Respect, respect, respect.

Our team will not participate in a sexist event.


Go ahead and Flame me. I have my flame resistant suit on.

[Jon Stratis]

Originally Posted by Gdeaver

Discrimination is discrimination. To exclude a group based upon their sex, sexual orientation, culture or religion is discrimination. This is a sexist discriminating event. Further, it may actually be negative in the goal the organizers are trying to address. This is my point of view.

The girls have to learn how to play with the boys and the boys have to learn how to play with the girls. After over a decade of working with diverse FRC team I can say this is very very hard. Every one is focusing on the girls. We need to also focus on the boys. They need to learn how to play nicely with the girls and take this forward in to the work place in the future. The girls also have to learn how to integrate into a team with boys on it. It all starts with respect. Respect, respect, respect.

Our team will not participate in a sexist event.


Go ahead and Flame me. I have my flame resistant suit on.

If you've ever walked the pits at an event, you wouldn't say boys are discriminated against in FRc, and any single off-season event isn't going to change that. That's like saying adults are discriminated against at movie theaters because Seniors and children get cheaper tickets.

For me, this sort of discussion keeps coming back to something one of my former students wrote: http://makezine.com/2015/05/01/build...d-better-team/

Is there a solution? Surely, females must be confident in their ability to perform, and they must display that confidence — or they will never receive respect. As stated by Madeleine Logeais, 2014 FIRST Dean’s List Winner, “Expectation translates to invitation.” When a girl enters a situation guarded, others will perceive it as a lack of confidence in her own ability. (Similarly, boys can be overconfident in their ability, yet it can be driven also by the same underlying insecurity.)

Events like this help to build girls confidence, allowing them to go into a mix gendered situation during the season with that confidence and asserting themselves. Otherwise (and as a 10-year mentor for an all girls team, i've seen it way too often) the girls don't assert themselves in those situations, and so the guys run right over them in their confidence. It's nothing intentional by either group most of the time, but rather a result of typical gender stereotyping we all grew up with - since engineering is a "guy thing", girls generally enter it less confident, regardless of their ability, and that lack of confidence causes a lot of the issues. So bring on events like this, help girls build their confidence so they can assert themselves in other situations.

[Chris is me]

I'm going to put aside directly responding to the ignorant and sexist comments coming exclusively from males who oppose this event in this thread to make a different point for a second. This doesn't mean I agree with them.

But consider this - even if you do think that this event is worthless, a great option is available to you and your team. For the low, low price of $0, you can choose not to attend this event and move on with your lives. That way you won't have to ever consider whether this event is sexist or hurts your team or anything like that. And if it's not your team and it's not your event, it's not your business, right? We say "live and let live" in threads about mentor built robots, but we can't in threads about having women attend a single day of competition without men? Just don't go to the event if it bothers you. Do you really think this event is catering to people who deny sexism against women exists?

This is a one day local off-season tournament for teams that want to give the full FRC competitive experience to women, without men intentionally or otherwise getting in the way of the students' experiences. Women who otherwise wouldn't get to be on the drive team, pit crew, scouting, volunteering, will get to at this event. Whether or not you think this is caused by intentional sexism, unintentional sexism, or you just think it's a giant crazy coincidence that the majority of key roles on FRC teams and key volunteers just happen to be male, in all of those cases women will get an opportunity they may not otherwise have by attending this event. For one day. At an off-season.

If you think this is sexist and unnecessary, I would encourage you to give this event a try, and if you really have to, just sign up for some other offseason and only let the boys go to that one (so it's "fair" to you, whatever). I bet if you compare and contrast the experiences your team gets at those two vastly different events, you'll learn quite a lot about gender dynamics and you'll learn more about subconscious bias.

[Pauline Tasci]

It's really sad to see an event thread get bombarded with ethics questions about females and males in our field.

I would really appreciate moving this discussion to another thread, anyone looking for the thread about an event now has to sit and read through all of this? This is not the place.

[GaryVoshol]

Originally Posted by Pauline Tasci

It's really sad to see an event thread get bombarded with ethics questions about females and males in our field.

I would really appreciate moving this discussion to another thread, anyone looking for the thread about an event now has to sit and read through all of this? This is not the place.

Your request is our command.

Please keep the conversation here civil - mods are keeping track.

[s_forbes]

Originally Posted by GaryVoshol

Your request is our command.

Please keep the conversation here civil - mods are keeping track.

I'm not following all of this discussion, but it looks like this was split off of another thread? Please find a way to put a disclaimer at the beginning of the thread when this is done. It's very confusing to people who see the thread for the first time and gives the appearance that the OP (or not, I can't tell!) is starting drama.

[Liam Fay]

Originally Posted by Gdeaver

Discrimination is discrimination. To exclude a group based upon their sex, sexual orientation, culture or religion is discrimination. This is a sexist discriminating event. Further, it may actually be negative in the goal the organizers are trying to address. This is my point of view.

The girls have to learn how to play with the boys and the boys have to learn how to play with the girls. After over a decade of working with diverse FRC team I can say this is very very hard. Every one is focusing on the girls. We need to also focus on the boys. They need to learn how to play nicely with the girls and take this forward in to the work place in the future. The girls also have to learn how to integrate into a team with boys on it. It all starts with respect. Respect, respect, respect.

Our team will not participate in a sexist event.


Go ahead and Flame me. I have my flame resistant suit on.

I think you're missing the point here.

This is not about discriminating against young men to put young women on some sort of pedestal. This is not about pushing young men down, it's about raising young women up.

When it comes to these sort of discussions regarding differing treatment towards people of different ethnicity, gender identity, or anything else, we really need to see this as an "issue" (it really shouldn't be an issue) of equity, not equality. This means that this event isn't about giving everyone the same opportunity; it's about giving opportunity to those who have had it taken away from them by virtue of their own gender. Women face many challenges in the STEM fields, and while I'm sure there are some that only men face, the problems that face women are discouraging at the very least and quite often debilitating. This event give these young scientists an opportunity to experience STEM without those hurdles.

Finally, I would like to step off my soapbox for a minute and apologize for speaking on behalf of any women who may feel differently.