There is a world-wide drive to attract more women into the software development industry to rectify the gender imbalance which currently exists.
Last year we ran a ‘girls-only’ club to introduce Year 7 and 8 girls to programming. The program comes under the umbrella of Code Club Aotearoa but our special focus at Middleton is on attracting girls into programming and computer science.
Less than 20% of programmers are female yet women represent at least 50% of all computer users. The worldwide shortage of women is of concern to all players in the industry and the underlying aim of the club is to encourage more girls to at least be aware of the opportunities which exist.
Rebekah McKinnon and Georgia Phillips, from the Year 13 Computer Science class, have teamed up with Ruthie Ward, Joy Li, and Ashley Freeman from the Year 12 class, to offer the program again this year.
In addition to learning some practical programming skills the girls are also exposed to material promoting Computer Science and programming career opportunities for women. The club is running on Friday lunch-times in G101 during Term 2. The girls bring their lunch.
