How to get more women (in programming)

I gave a 7 minute lightning talk at the Lone Star Ruby Conference on "How to Get More Women (in programming)" after a back of the room comment generated a lot of hallway conversations. Here's what I said:

In addition to being female and a programmer, my 2nd major in college was "The Study of Women and Gender" -- I did studies and papers on why I was one of the only women in my computer science classes -- navel gazing 101! I wanted to share two terms that give a framework to understand the issues, since I find that defining terms and giving things words have power.

The first is "Imposter Syndrome." This is the feeling you can get when you are lost during a technical presentation, are "faking" expertise when talking, when you raise your hand/agree with a "how many of you have done X" even if you don't, quite. I think everyone feels it; members of minority groups tend to think it's just "them", hence they are "imposters."

When I was in the first handful of my programming classes in college, there was always the guy in the front row who asked really convoluted, involved technical questions that I didn't "get". I assumed it was just me. Eventually I was lucky enough to have this behavior named: The Voice of Unquestionable Authority. (Useful if you are doing support, by the way.) Naming it made me realize it was an affectation; grading this same person's lab work two years later made me realize he wasn't as smart as he sounded.

This one is actually something you (as an active member of a programming community, male or female) can do something about:

• Token things, like women's t-shirts (LSRC has done this since day 1), make you feel like you were expected and you belong.
• Avoid the VOUA. Bring problems to your discussions, not just achievements. The old fashioned word for this is humility.
  
• Be nice. Be welcoming. Explain "hard stuff" without talking down about it.

This is all fine and good, but it doesn't do any good if women don't show up. There's a name for this too: it's a pipeline problem.

The idea here is that you start with girls as ~50% of students; by the time you get to a conference like LSRC it's 12%. In between, the pipeline shrinks: in middle school girls decide they "don't like" math; in highschool they don't sign up for calculus; in first year programming classes they get overwhelmed and feel like imposters and drop out; etc. A lot of work has been done over the last 20 years to increase retention in the pipeline; it doesn't seem to be helping (The New York Times recently had an article on this).

So what to do? One idea is a "2nd pipeline." There are women all over who are very technical or even code; getting them into (more) programming now that they are "grown up" separates the self identity issues out of the career decisions. There are a couple groups that seem "natural" fits for a 2nd pipeline:

• Librarians. My "digital humanities" acquaintances pick up programming on top of their MLS degrees to be able to do a lot of data and textual analysis.
  
• Testers & Technical Support. Lots of women here, with plenty of technical expertise. Some mentoring and training, and I suspect many could be good programmers.
• Administrative Assistants. Dana Gray pointed this out; it had never occurred to me, but it turns out that AAs these days do a lot of "data munging" and report generation. If they are writing scripts in Excel to handle data, why not transfer those skills to a more formal programming language?

Finally, I think the part of the pipeline that you have the most influence over as an established programmer is your daughters and your wives.

I didn't have time to go beyond this in the talk, but here are my final thoughts on the "How" of that last provactive challenge as pertains to daughters. It's hard, and the potential subject of another talk or article, but here are three pieces of advice:

• "start early" -- blocks and trains when they are age 1
  
• "meet them where they are" -- there's nothing wrong with pink legos or building castles, you will still learn skills that help you think in 3D abstractions
  
• "raise them Makers" -- in the O'Reilly since of the word, people who build things and create things, where scratching your own itch is part of your makeup.

This is what worked for me -- plus a lot of pushing to go into math or science. I have no idea if they will work, but it will be interesting to see if enlightened, programmer parents can successfully raise girls who program.

We have a bathroom at Renan!

For those of you who have ever seen pictures or videos or have had a real life tour of the family farmhouse we have in Virginia, you may be as surprised and impressed as I am with this picture of our new bathroom! Ben's Uncle Wayne has been working on it and I think it's pretty spectacular looking. Have I mentioned it involves running water and sewer?!?

p.s. Design notes: Everything is off the shelf Lowe's options -- the tiles were the cheapest they had, but I think they have a lot of style for the price. The sink is a bit too small for the scale, but we were really worried about how much space we had. (And with a sink this small, I think we'll be able to get a set of shelves between it and the toilet, which we'll need if we're sharing one bathroom with the houseguests we envision -- yes that would be you -- once we get the house livable.)

On Hosting Hurricane Evacuees

My in-laws are in town after fleeing Hurricane Ike. Two weeks ago, they evacuated for Gustav, luckily a short evacuation without any actual damage. Three years ago they stayed off and on for six weeks during Rita and the recovery thereof. In sum, Ben and I have just a wee bit of experience with hosting evacuees. Here's what we've learned that might be useful to others hosting evacuees from Ike.

1. Give them their own space. While you might get a good visit in, this isn't a social visit. It may drag on longer than any of you expect. The best way to avoid questions like "Can I do this? Where can I set up my computer?" or the "Why is all this stuff here?" sorts of issues, designate some parts of the house for their use for the duration. In our house, it's the front of the house -- the guest bedroom, the formal dining room for an office, and the smaller sitting area. They can spread out as much as they want there, without asking permission. We occasionally "visit" those parts of the house, but for the most part we leave them alone. The flip side -- when my father-in-law's newspapers start encroaching on my living room, a glower or a reminder from my mother-in-law sends them back to their half of the house. Along the same lines, I've cleared a shelf in the bathroom for their toiletries so they don't have to carry them back and forth. If you have a lot of evacuees, you might consider dedicating a shelf of the refrigerator for their snacks.
2. Food. Since this isn't a social visit, you don't need to go out of your way to impress your guests. Your guests, however, are a bit out of sorts, stressed out, and needing the comfort of routine. We find sitting down to dinner is a a nice gracious bit of normality in a definitely-not-normal experience. Now's the time to stock up with preprepared food from HEB or Costco, or serve sandwiches or canned soups. Nothing fancy, but comforting, easy to prepare foods. Don't forget to give your house guests tasks to help get dinner on the table -- either take turns with preparation, or give someone the salad and someone else the job of setting the table or getting drinks. Remember -- this may last longer than you expected, so don't take on all the work yourself.
3. Drinks. They're stressed because their home may be blown away or underwater. You're stressed because you have unexpected houseguests. I recommend wine -- our prosaic tastes lead us to a big box of riesling in the fridge, but anything with alcohol would do.
4. Parking. Consider parking your cars on the street and giving your guests the garage or driveway. They probably have most of their prized posessions in their cars, and securing them better or making it easier to fetch things in is a small way to lighten their load.
5. Naps. Your guests may have been up all night packing or driving, which in addition to the stress of a hurricane and evacuation is exhausting. A "quiet time" -- with naps encouraged -- will put everyone in a better mood and better able to handle anything that comes.
6. Get out. Take advantage of additional help around the house for built in babysitters, or plan dinner out with friends in town to give both of you time away from each other. This is especially true once you get past the first 3 or so days.
7. Communications and information. Make sure your guests have access to whatever information sources they need to keep up with the weather and it's aftermath. For us, it's internet access -- and sending them down the street to Waterloo ice house when TV is needed. Also realize that they'll be on the phone a lot, checking on and commiserating with their neighbors and friends.
   

One of my evacuees read over this and gave it her nod of approval from the evacuee instead of host perspective. I'm sure other people have more ideas, if you want to chime in in the comments.

In case you haven't seen us lately...

Other people's accomplishments

Wow, my sister had one of her flickr photos used on one of the NY Times blogs.

Cool, huh?

Maquinas Tortilladoras

It's often funny what Google ads will think to display, given particular content, but after commenting about tortillas on Kim's Addicted to Costco blog I got this:



Maquinas tortilladoras, anyone?

No Stir Crockpot Risotto

Mamacita asked for some good crockpot recipes, and I had been meaning to write this up for Catherine's LiveMom site, so I couldn't resist. (I rock Crockpot cooking so much I've thrown a only slightly competitive dinner party using only recipes prepared in the crockpot. Duck Confit and Bread Pudding were the highlights. Firecracker Pork was also a hit.) My favorite Crockpot recipe, however, is risotto. Risotto is one of those things I *never* make, because it requires constant stirring over a long period of time. No fun. When I found this recipe in Lora Brody's Slow Cooker Cooking** book, I knew I had to try it.

This isn't one of those "cook all day while you're at work" recipes. It only takes 2 hours, so I'll do it on a weekend afternoon or on a day I'm working from home.

So here's my easy Slow Cooker Risotto recipe, adapted from Brody's.

1/4 cup olive oil
1 1/4 cups raw arborio rice
4 cups chicken stock (original recipe replaces 1/4 c of the broth with white wine) (the more flavor it has the better the risotto will be)
1/2 - 2/3 cup shredded parmesan

Toss the rice & oil in the insert to coat. Stir in the stock. Cook on HIGH for 2-3 hours (mine usually takes 2 1/2 hours). Right before serving stir in the parmesan cheese.

I doctor this up to make a main dish by stirring in frozen peas, chopped up ham leftovers, a link of fancy sausage sauteed into chunks, or anything else I read about in fancy risotto recipes.

note: Brody's recipe also has you sauteeing 2 shallots in the oil before tossing the rice in it. Great idea, but I'm too lazy....

**Lora Brody's book is the absolutely best crockpot cookbook out there, and I've tried a lot. Most are as boring and bland as the midwestern 1950s households they were developed in. This one actually has food with flavor.