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ACM-W
Contact: Denise Gurer IMMEDIATE in Past Decade at the Bachelor's Level January 16, 1998, New York ...The Association for Computing Machinery's Committee on Women in Computing (ACM-W) announced today that it applauds the United States government's recent concern about the low numbers of computer scientists. The increasing number of unfilled job positions in today's computer industry makes the situation all the more urgent. The ACM-W is urging the government to devote significant resources to attracting more students to computer science, especially underrepresented groups such as women. Women offer a great resource and an excellent pool of potential future computer scientists. Over the last ten years, the number of women graduating with Bachelor's degrees in computer science from United States universities has dramatically decreased and is continuing to do so. Data from the US Department of Education shows that the percentage of computer science graduates who were women dropped from a peak of 37.1% in 1984 to 28.4% in 1995, at the Bachelor's level. Tracy Camp, an assistant professor of computer science at the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa and ACM-W member, notes that "The decreasing percentages of female computer science graduates is especially discouraging when other science and engineering fields are considered. By contrast other sciences have all seen increasing percentages of women." ACM-W wants to counteract the many factors that contribute to the declining numbers of women in computer science. The middle school years are particularly critical to the education process, a time when many girls drop out of math and science. "Girls' first exposure to computers is through "shoot-them-up" games which they find boring and repetitive", says Denise Gurer, chair of ACM-W and computer scientist at SRI International. "In addition, girls don't see scientists as people having lives outside of their work and they don't see science as having a significant impact on society." ACM-W has been working to increase the numbers of women in computer science by mentoring girls through programs, providing role models, exploring women's contributions to the history of computing, and studying the trends and issues related to women in computing. ACM-W looks forward to working with the government and other concerned groups to correct the serious problem of the shortage of women in computing.
About ACM's Committee on Women in Computing The mission of ACM-W is to engage in activities and projects that aim to improve the working and learning environments for women in computing. This includes promoting activities that result in more equal representation of women in computer science (CS) such as mentoring or role modeling, monitoring the status of women in industrial and academic computing through the gathering of statistics, providing historical information about women's accomplishments and roles in CS, and serving as a repository of information about programs, documents and policies of concern to women in CS. Contact: Denise Gurer, chair ACM-W, gurer@erg.sri.com, (650) 859-5911; research computer scientist at SRI International. ACM-W Website:http://www.acm.org/women/ About The Association for Computing Machinery ACM is a major force in advancing the skills of information technology (IT) professionals and students. ACM serves its global membership by delivering cutting-edge information and transferring ideas from theory to practice. ACM, with its world-class journals and magazines, dynamic special interest groups, numerous conferences, workshops and forums, is a primary resource to the IT field. For additional information on ACM, visit the web site at http://www.acm.org.
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