HELP: GIRLS AND ROBOTICS

[Freddy Schurr]

On last year team, we had 4 females. This year team, we had 2 females. Next year team, we may have no females. I want to know how to get more female involment in our robotics program? How does your team do it? What advice can you offer.

[Jeff Rodriguez]

These threads may be helpful:
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...emale+robotics
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...emale+robotics
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...emale+robotics

[lsmith243]

Originally Posted by Freddy204

On last year team, we had 4 females. This year team, we had 2 females. Next year team, we may have no females. I want to know how to get more female involment in our robotics program? How does your team do it? What advice can you offer.

There are a LOT of things a girl can bring to a FIRST team, and you just need to show them that. Try putting up posters around your school (if possible), or maybe hold an information/ open house night where you can attract some girls and show them how great being a part of your team is. Also, there's an organization called RCU (Robot Chicks Union), which was started to help girls adjust to and feel like a part of their team. You can try contacting Julia Magoolia for more information on that.

Good luck!

[karinka13]

Tell them its a great way to meet guys.

(Just kidding!)

Honestly, post flyers around school and whatnot that show that theres more to robotics than power tools. Ex: If they start out on a finance committee, theres a big chance they might get interested in building as well. This works pretty well for our team, and recruiting is hard in an all-girls school.

[Rabbit222]

Well Freddy, let me see if I can supply you with some info. The easiest way I think would get more females involved in robotics is to take the females you have this year and have then go around to underclassmen and have them spread the word of FIRST in a female's perspective. Have the girls target the girls and guys for....guys. Maybe have them go to your middle school and have them talk to the 8th graders. Now you can have guys along for the ride too for this is a good way for recruiting others. Another good way to get more participation is to hold workshops or demos. The biggest most important thing for you guys right now is to get the females to recruit. Anything you guys can think of to get more involvement will be a great start for the new year. Now I don't know how you team does it, but this is the same method that the Tigertrons use for recruiting. I hope I could give you some guidance on getting more females for your team. Good luck! and thanks for MCing the PARC. It was a great time!

[AmyPrib]

Originally Posted by Freddy204

On last year team, we had 4 females. This year team, we had 2 females. Next year team, we may have no females. I want to know how to get more female involment in our robotics program? How does your team do it? What advice can you offer.

Talk to your previous females and find out why they aren't continuing (unless they're seniors)..Have those females do some recruiting around school.. Hold recruitment meetings at school, like any other extracurricular meeting does. Advertise that along with building a robot (mech, elec, software, etc) that the team also includes marketing and communications, fundraising, jouranlism (depending on newsletter type things you do, or you could get started, etc), websites, animation. Make sure they're aware it's not just this geeky robot building session. Make sure you tell them fun travel is involved!

I'm sure people on your team have friends that are girls. Talk to them, encourage them, tell them to just swing by. Do you do things in the fall? Do you go to off-season competitions you can invite them to? What community activities do you have? The key is to get them hooked prior to build season. Build season will be busy enough, and it may be difficult to familiarize new students with everything then.

Send out recruitment postcards to all the high school parents that appeal to them and getting their student a potential career in technology, and especially scholarships!! That might entice the parents to bring a kid to the meeting. Make school announcements. Post flyers. DO DEMOS IN SCHOOL. Set up recruitment meetings in the fall and have material to discuss with the students and parents when they attend. Show them videos and pictures of competition, and make sure you get the excitment across in your presentation.

Once you do get some interest, I would suggest holding some "girls night" sessions in the fall to introduce them to equipment, tools, FIRST as a whole, etc early on. Have only girls and a few mentors (maybe even 1-2 student team leaders) attend. They may feel less intimidated than when 30 guys are standing around and jumping into the work. It worked well for our team. They could make mistakes without feeling embarassed, and they weren't intimidated and tried new things. When a couple girls are outnumbered by a lot of guys, it's not as easy for them to be aggressive. Make sure the guys on your team are inviting and encouraging and friendly.

And, do you have Lego League teams in the area? Target them before they enter high school and make sure they know about your team.

Recruitment can be tough - keep at it, be creative.

[DarkJedi613]

For our team the major way we get girls involved is through friends. Last year we had two girls (one of which graduated), but this year we had 5 or 6...(though they're all graduating - so I guess we have the same problem as you...). If one of their friends is involved and tells them what a great thing it is their more likely to listen to them than to read a poster hanging around the school or come to a meeting. Plus they'll know someone and feel more comfortable.

[santosh]

I personally think the best way is to get them to come in groups. Most girls (14ish) joined our club because they had a friend who was also a girl in our club. Girls attract other girls. Just ask girls you know personally to join.

They will become interested after watching a couple of old intense matches you have on tape somewhere. And if they say that it is too hard for them to do, let them know that it is a learning process and stuff gets easier with time.

[tiffany34990]

this is a big concern i see all the time on teams...there are many ways to reach out to girls..simply target them...the RCU i know would love to help in any way possible.. we have a few things being created to help existing girls and hopefully we'll be able to address this concern.

if you guys are friends with girls and know they would be interested talk to them...and let them understand that they can do things...one problem there is that guys go ahead and build the bot on many teams and the girls get stuck with the paper jobs. if they want to do that fine but encourage them that they can do anything.


PM if you want to know anything about the RCU. I'm captain of the Southern Florida Chapter.

[BandChick]

Talk to the girls on the team currently and find out what made them want to join. I know there are guys on the team that have at least ONE female friend. Drag them to a meeting. Just make sure you don't ONLY talk about video games. If building is not their forte or something they're interested in make sure you show them all the OTHER aspects of a FIRST team. I'd be more than willing to share my experiences on a FIRST team that started with just ONE girl (me), and now has 8 I believe.

[dubious elise]

Simply asking around in your classes (especially science, math, and tech ed) can generate an awful lot of interest. Remember, not every girl does downhill ski racing or basketball all winter long!
Also, as Amy and a few others mentioned, demonstrations are an excellent idea. I first heard about robotics when I was in 5th grade - being from a small parochial school, seeing a girl that had graduated a few years before, attended the public high school, and had become a leader on the robotics team was very exciting for both my friend Molly (our electrical captain) and myself.
Once you get girls on the team, tell them exactly what our only female mentor told me: "When something looks neat, just elbow the guys out of the way and give it a hand yourself." They need to know that, just because there may be way more guys than girls, they too can make a huge difference if they are persistent. It always seems intimidating at first, make sure that if you have a weekly team meeting, it is open to everyone and be sure to encourage the girls that do show up.
From what I recall, there have always been at least 3 girls on the team, this year, we were blessed to have 7, but that doesn't mean that there isn't any room for more!

[KathieK]

Keep in mind that as there are different learning styles, there are different communications styles as well. Although this is a generalization studies have shown that males respond to action, so a robot demo or video might capture their interest. Females tend to respond to verbal communication, so having a friendly, outgoing member of the team there to talk about the program might be the way to reach the female population.

[MiscEllania]

One of the issues my team has dealt with is being seen as "genius geeks," which scares a lot of people away. Let people know that you don't need to know how to weld, or pi to the thirtieth decimal, or five programming languages. And talk to people! If people don't know about where and when the team meets, they won't join - socializing is a huge part of recruitment. Last year, we had three girls; this year, we have seven (on a team of twenty or so).

[BigHeavenlyEyes]

Yes, it is a problem. I'm on 1138, and we have only about 3 "full time" girls on the team. Girls don't realize that there is so much they can do, other than actual mechanical stuff. They can be scouts, human players, programmers, or anything else. The best thing, i'd say is to recruit more freshmen. Freshmen are new to the school and they are looking for a place to belong in high school. What's a better place than robotics? They can learn stuff about robots and meet new ppl. Our team advertises at open houses, "club nades", and other school events that show incoming freshmen what the school is about. Girls are very good at raising money for the team too. They can be the treasurers, secretaries, or public relations. They can be the spirit leaders, and can think of ways to promote the team.

k, i hope more girls will be interested soon.

Good luck!

[OZ_341]

Our team usually runs about 40% female. We don't really campaign to get girls on the team. It happens naturally because of our setup. we do the following things.

1) We have a strong female role model as a coach. And a strong female college age mentor.
2) We always place females in leadership roles.
3) We have a zero tolerance policy for any sort of male/female stereotyping
4) We encourage new kids that aren't initially interested in construction to be on the build team.
5) We encourage both male and female students to recruit through a network of friends (our best resource)

All of these things combine to create an environment where girls feel safe and valued, with lots of potential for growth. They also have many female peers and mentor role models to aspire too.

or maybe..... its just our team name (Miss Daisy) that does it!