
Etsy Hacker Grants: Supporting Women in Technology - kellanem
http://www.etsy.com/blog/news/2012/etsy-hacker-grants-supporting-women-in-technology/
======
peterwwillis
What about grants for black people? There's arguably even less black people in
technology than women. We don't seem to talk about that though, as women-in-
tech always seems easier to argue about ("are they being sexist?" is easier to
talk about than "are they being racist?" or "do low-income and/or poorly-
educated and/or resource-starved people deserve more help getting into the
field?")

 _"Last September, three out of 96 employees in Engineering and Operations at
Etsy were women, and none of them were managers"_

How many of the 96 employees were black, and how many of the employees were
black women? Should we be concerned if it was lower than the stats about women
in general? If not, why?

You talk about "gender balance" as if somehow there's an argument there that
is more valid than "race balance."

In terms of engaging specifically females into more tech subjects, i'll relate
something i've seen here in DC. I work with Knowledge Commons DC which offers
lots of free classes, some of which are tech related (Object Oriented
Programming with Java, for example). That class was 75% women last time. Why?
One reason might be that most of the volunteers/organizers are women, and
their social circles reach out to even larger groups of women. As people seek
out similar people it may make it easier for them to gravitate to subjects
which might normally be perceived as male-dominated or otherwise not as open
for women. Just a thought.

~~~
bitops
Definitely a valid point and deserving of an entirely separate thread of
discussion.

That said, I don't think talking about gender imbalance in software
development takes away from discussing racial imbalance in software
development.

And I do think underrepresentation is an issue on all sides. In my career so
far, I think I've met a total of 5 black programmers. The fact that I can
remember the exact number is a problem, because I definitely can't, and don't,
keep track of the number of asian/latin/etc. programmers. But meeting somebody
black in tech is so rare, it always stands out.

So yes, it is a concern. But they are all valid concerns. And talking about
women doesn't take away from talking about blacks. All are valid issues.

~~~
peterwwillis
Of course they're all valid issues. That doesn't answer anything i've asked,
though. I want to know why support is only being given to women and not people
who probably have a harder time getting into the field. This doesn't need a
separate thread, it speaks exactly to the topic which is Etsy giving grants to
only women.

------
rachelbythebay
"No feigning surprise" or anything of the sort can be important. Years ago, I
was in a college math class where the teacher used an analogy and mentioned
John Elway. Yes, this class was being held in Colorado.

Anyway, one of the other women in the class asked who that was -- she needed
context to better understand this guy's analogy. He was just flabbergasted,
and could not believe that anyone could not know who he was.

It didn't help that this particular student had only been in the state a short
time, was from New England, and probably knew nothing about football. This
prof couldn't make heads or tails of that and proceeded to tear into her as if
she was doing it on purpose.

There were many tears and a lot of bad feelings all around. I doubt she got
much out of that day in class. I know I sure didn't.

Stuff like this can make or break a system.

~~~
bitops
You bring up a good point which is not exclusive only to women. People moving
to the United States rarely know anything about football. (Not being born in
the US, I had to Google to find out who John Elway is, but I understood from
your comment that he was a football player).

It's a very common culture of exclusionism, but, I've observed both in the US
and Europe that it's pretty much only guys who participate in it. I've only
ever had a woman say "you don't know who X is?" to me in jest. And then she
would always explain afterwards.

------
guimarin
I think it's great to look into why your organization doesn't have more women
represented across its divisions. I even think outreach in the form of
awareness about this 'problem' is great. I dislike the implicit message being
sent by offering money specifically to women to go into engineering/computer
science. At best it says, we know you know that engineering is not a field
your interested in because your a woman which is why we're focusing on the
fact that you're a woman in our recruiting pitch, and so we're offering you a
'bonus' of $Xk. I was aghast when the NYT article ( dave-to-girl ratio )
linked mentioned that "Most women think, 'I'm going to be in a cubicle at
Microsoft typing next to some guys who smell funny." if they go into computer
science. Because clearly all women make decisions on whether to enter a field
based on some absurdly gross overgeneralization of that field. And even if
every engineer in the world smelled like a sewer rat, to list that as the
first/most important/first mentioned reason women don't want to become
engineers is disgusting in the first order.

Here's an idea. Why don't we do real research into what cultural factors
influence men and women into going into different fields, and then decide to
act on those cultural factors. Rather than say, I don't know, do what we do
now, which is tantamount to, here lets fix this symptom of a much wider
societal problem, and trample on the 'self-worth' and 'competency' of the very
minority we're trying to 'save' in the process.

/rant.

~~~
yummyfajitas
_Because clearly all women make decisions on whether to enter a field based on
some absurdly gross overgeneralization of that field._

There is at least some research suggesting this is the case.

Archived article:
[http://web.archive.org/web/20100106021904/http://scicom.ucsc...](http://web.archive.org/web/20100106021904/http://scicom.ucsc.edu/SciNotes/0901/pages/geeks/geeks.html)

HN Discussion: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=969646>

~~~
ktizo
There isn't any research that suggests that _all women make decisions on
whether to enter a field based on some absurdly gross overgeneralization of
that field_

Some people do run their careers like this, some don't. But to suggest that
this is the case for _all women_ and furthermore that the claim is backed up
by research, is more than a little bit foolish.

~~~
yummyfajitas
I mentally translated guimarin's exaggeration "all women" to a more reasonable
"many women" or "women more so than men".

You'll note that in the quote guimarin responded to, the word "all" was not
used.

~~~
ktizo
I sincerely apologise for responding to the point that you made, rather than
the one you meant to make. My psi abilities are weakest around the full moon.

reconsidering your two new points that you have made there,

(a) _many women make decisions on whether to enter a field based on some
absurdly gross overgeneralization of that field_

&

(b) _women more so than men make decisions on whether to enter a field based
on some absurdly gross overgeneralization of that field_

Well, I think that (a) is probably true, but is also true for men. And that if
(b) has any measurable truth to it I would strongly doubt it to have any
statistical significance.

However if you pick any way to divide a large group into two (size of ears,
for instance) and then measure something unconnected to that division, you
will almost always find a small, measurable, but insignificant difference.

By the way, would you like a shovel?

------
Frozenlock
If someone gives less money to women, -because they are women- it's sexism.

How giving money to women -because they are women- isn't sexism?

A more honest approach would be to hire the most qualified person, regardless
of your current male/female ratio.

~~~
Qz
It's compensative sexism.

~~~
olalonde
Not sure why you are being down voted. This scholarship discriminates based on
sex (which is _sexism_ by definition) presumably in an attempt to _compensate_
for the sexism targeted at women in tech.

Let's call a spade a spade.

------
kaylarose
Getting more women into tech* isn't just about the money __...

1.) Not encouraged in early years: If you are a tech-savvy female, "soft" tech
careers (Graphic Design etc.) are generally recommended as career paths.

2.) It's a Boy's Club: If you make it past the college classes (with a 20:1
M-to-F ratio), you enter the workforce with (mostly) the same ratio. This
means that unless you have thick skin & a good sense of humor, you'll never
make it.

3.) You're Wrong: Even if you are right. And no one will hesitate to tell you
why.

* Speaking for a professional career in Tech.

 __In my experience, a lot of these actually provoke you to strive to over-
achieve & prove yourself. But I can see how it can seem off-putting for a new-
comer.

~~~
coderdude
I'm surprised this is still an issue. The guys here can't seem to trip over
each other quickly enough to white knight imaginary women from any possible
sexism. Is there a tech crowd that isn't obsessed over this topic and is
making us all endure having to hear that Leisure Suit Larry is sexist and why?
Speaking as a guy who managed guys and gals alike (in tech) and never treated
them like children.

------
marquis
Again and again, criticism comes up against affirmative action to get more
women in computing. How can this possibly be unfair? How many of you know what
it is really like to be a woman in computing? Can you imagine what it is like
to go to a tech conference and be judged on your gender? To be approached as
if you must be someone's girlfriend because why else would you be here, or
otherwise be some freak of nature? To have to excel a thousand times over
among your peers because otherwise you feel you are not good enough? To not
want to use the computer room during your free time in highschool because if
you don't socialize with other girls at that age you'll be completely cut out
of the social-ladder loop?

Are you also feeling somehow ostracised because of your minority genetic
dispositions or lifestyle? Then welcome more women into the field, because
acceptance welcomes more acceptance. We rage about what happened to Turing,
but I wonder how many of us in that day and age, if we were his peers, would
have fought for him publicly. And yes, I put Ada Lovelace and Grace Hopper on
a pedestal. I put Ada's mother on a pedestal for pushing Ada into mathematics.
Without a role model, every person of minority must make the fight to be the
first, and why use that energy fighting to be the first when that energy is
better spent innovating in the field.

I ask you all please, look to a future 20-30 years from now, when there is
more of a balance, as it happened in the fields of medicine, law,
architecture.. There was a time when being a woman professional was
unimaginable and resisted. It took courage and fearlessness, and it happened.
It can happen in our field too, just don't keep blocking it (unwittingly or
no) with constant criticism, it's tiring.

I cannot wait until the day a post on HN about achieving a balance in our
technical fields has zero comments wondering why this could possibly be a good
thing.

~~~
gcb
All that happens with socially inept man, but they can't dismiss it on gender.

------
bermanoid
I am skeptical that there are few women in tech primarily due to sexism or any
bad behavior on the part of the men in the field. But regardless of the source
of the imbalance, I am also strongly in support of efforts to correct the
imbalance, as I think that women have a lot to offer the field that it
desperately needs. I firmly support "sexist" efforts to create artificial
incentives to lure women into the field, however unfair they may be to men,
since by my estimation there is real wealth that will be created by getting
them there.

Though I support that ideal, I question whether approaches like this are
effective ways to achieve it, or even push things towards it at all - Etsy is
basically throwing reasonably large amounts of money ($5k apiece) to get
people that have already expressed a strong interest in tech to...continue
expressing their strong interest in tech.

It's like the customer has already started entering their credit card number
as the final step of a purchase, and you're spending all your development time
optimizing the wording of your product description on that final page because
you _really_ want to make sure they finish entering that credit card number.
_You've already made the sale_ , spend your time worrying about something
else!

What I'd much rather see is a focus further up the funnel, where you can
actually affect people's behavior and choices in some meaningful way. Spend
that 50 grand by offering, at a select set of good schools, $100 apiece to the
first 500 freshman girls that enroll in a real CS course, and I'll cheer the
effort - $100 bucks is a small price to pay to know that a smart girl at a
good school is taking a programming class, but it just might be enough so that
you actually see an increase in enrollment. If it's not and nobody bites, bump
it to $200 the next semester, see if it changes. Keep the sample of schools
small enough, and you'll at the very least be collecting some interesting data
on how much money it actually takes to convince college girls to take CS
classes. [I suspect even a $100 incentive would be enough to get female
enrollment on par with male for intro classes, since at most schools an intro
CS class will satisfy some sort of distribution requirement anyways]

If we can get girls into first-year CS classes, we _will_ see more women enter
the field, I guarantee that. Not all of them, but some, and some of them will
be fantastic. It might be crass, but I have no problem with bribing them. I'd
happily contribute a few thousand to the effort if there was a sizable one set
up.

But if we're going to resort to bribery, let's at least make it cost
effective. Bribing a tiny set of people that are already going to do what you
want anyways is not a smart approach, not when there are so many more creative
options.

