Girls are still undermined?

[sheltie234]

The boy to girl ratio on Cyber Blue this year is 6:5!!! I'm so happy that more girls at our school see that robotics is amazing!! And, we helped start an all girls team this summer!!

[Nathan]

Why are all these threads about girls being treated unfairly cropping up now?

[JaneYoung]

Originally Posted by Nathan

Why are all these threads about girls being treated unfairly cropping up now?

I have a couple of thoughts about it. Nothing more than an opinion though.
School is back in session or getting back in session and that kind of triggers the begin cycle - enter, check in CD, see what's going on - and sometimes maybe often, if you are experiencing a problem or asking questions in your team about different aspects, you will search in CD and see if any threads have addressed the topic.

Girls on robotics teams is something that is discussed and sometimes it can be difficult to be a lone girl or a very small group of girls - so they search and find threads, post a thought and it goes from there. Maybe someone has a new thought they add or a new poster has never seen the thread and adds. This happens in all topics but sometimes at the beginning of school and the beginning of build season you will see some of these threads crop up. It isn't a bad thing, it is a good thing. For example, I get very excited when I see programming discussions. Programmers on many teams don't often have much time to get done what they want or need to so it is always good to see how teams address programming and what their thoughts are. It doesn't take away from the other aspects of the robot, just as the discussion of girls doesn't take away from the other members or aspects of the team. Discussion, communication, exploring topics is always good when done well and handled appropriately.

Just a thought.
Jane

[Arefin Bari]

It will be a miracle the day this world looks at Girls and guys on the same level in the "Engineering World."

Now my personal opinion (This maybe a little harsh and I will try to be as nice as possible about this topic):

Guys, women think a lot different than we do. If they have their mind set on something, they will keep working on it until they get it right or until they get it done the way they want it. If a girl wants to build the robot... let them. In my experience, I have mentored teams where the group consisted guys and girls and honestly, the girls I have worked with are heck of a lot dedicated than the guys I have worked with. I personally hate it when I see a girl get pushed away just because she is a "girl." I refuse to pass any knowledge onto any guy who refuses to work with a girl.

Solution? We can come up with as many as we want, but in this society of engineering where male are dominating, it's hard. It depends on individuals how they treat a woman.

[ebarker]

#1) I agree with Jane about traffic into CD rising at the beginning of school. I don't have access to the site analytics but personal observation sez things have upticked a good bit here with the beginning of school. And this is an long running thread.

#2) In my lifetime women have made dramatic inroads into law and medicine (and other fields). In the old days women didn't enter many fields because they essentially couldn't. Today, we are struggling to bring women participation in engineering and science on par with law and medicine.

I'm going to make a statement that would not have been 'PC' 35 years ago with the womens movement, but the normative woman and normative man are different and respond to a little different motivational career stimulus. Wow. It is important to understand the differences.

Last year we were 2/3 young women, and as of now the new team is almost perfectly 50/50. Using a combination of recommendations from something called the EWEP, our 'guest program', social networking, and working to make sure everyone gets a cookie things have managed to work out. So far, so good.

Nothing against the young men on our team, but without the young women we would not have achieved what we did last year. These young women have the focus and the drive to keep things on track and get done what needs to get done. It was truly a team effort.

[GaryVoshol]

Two years ago at Atlanta, our team was asked if they were from an all-girls school. No ...

And then it dawned on them. The drive team, the most visible portion of a team, was all female, including a female engineer coach. The male driver we had used all year was ineligible to travel because of grades, and another girl was the best choice to fill out the team.