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WOMEN IN TECH

WOMEN
IN TECH

Understanding female professionals’ perspective on I.T. led to shaping a participatory educational experience for kids.

Photo by Jason Goodman on Unsplash

LONG STORY SHORT

TIME

3 months

ROLE(s)

Designer

Researcher

METHODs

Ethnography

Interviews

Focus Groups

Workshop

TOOLs

Illustrator

GSuite

personal interest for the topic

If we take a look at STEM subjects, and, specifically, at the ones somehow related to tech, the fact that it’s a male-dominated field is no news. Why is that? And, even more interestingly, what have women who are in this field seen in I.T. that had them fall in love with it?

This project started with a qualitative UX research at the University of Trento, where some colleagues and I decided to investigate women studying and working in tech-related fields. In particular, we focused on why women should choose a career in I.T. and how one could motivate more of them to pursue such a career.

Through virtual ethnography, interviews and a focus group, we tried to dive deeper into the topic, hearing from both men and (mostly) women in the I.T. realm.

Having a background in Computer Science myself, getting to know women’s side of the story, their experiences of discrimination and passion was incredibly insightful and fascinating and led to our design solutions to address the gender gap and society’s bias towards females in tech.

RESEARCH FINDINGS

A very short version of them

We identified two key ideas:

Equal judgement: the lack of women in tech should not be particularly stressed or advertised.
Equal opportunities. Girls find out about I.T. and tech much later than boys do.

SOLUTION

We proposed four fun and engaging hands-on activities for young boys and girls, aged 10-13. We designed a set of materials to help and support school teachers in introducing I.T. concepts and computational thinking to all their students. We created a handbook (image below) and an online repository for easy access.

Why? Getting to know a subject or a whole field together and in earlier education settings may help reduce the gender gap and bias: if everyone experiences the same introductory activities, male and female participants alike, they’ll soon get used to a varied and rich field, where everybody is welcome and can contribute with their own skills.

Why? Getting to know a subject or a whole field together and in earlier education settings may help reduce the gender gap and bias: if everyone experiences the same introductory activities, male and female participants alike, they’ll soon get used to a varied and rich field, where everybody is welcome and can contribute with their own skills.

The four activities proposed were tested and evaluated by I.T. university students through a participatory workshop.

together to promote inclusion and equality

Handbook pdf

Project materials

Full report

THE PROCESS

Virtual Ethnography

Interviews

Focus Group

Ideate

Workshop

Final Prototype

ETHNOGRAPHY

click and take a closer look

At the beginning of our qualitative research, we started by observing women studying and working in tech-related fields, trying to understand how they ended up choosing I.T. We performed a virtual ethnography in different online environments.

Youtube

Social Media

Communities

GirlsInTech, …

Newspapers and online Magazines

After coding all the information, we organised our findings in macro and micro topics.

Refined map of the coding.

INTERVIEWS

We interviewed 8 women: 5 of them were currently studying Computer Science or related subjects; 3 were working in the tech field.

Starting from the data gathered thanks to the ethnography, we outlined some guidelines to perform semi-structured interviews.

A snapshot of the interview guidelines.

Talking to them about their experience with Computer Science was incredibly insightful and we learned that:

women get to know Computer Science or I.T. very late in their career compared to men and they wished they had known them sooner
The challenges they face usually are not gender related
I.T. is not always women’s first choice

Talking to them about their experience with Computer Science was incredibly insightful and we learned that:

women get to know Computer Science or I.T. very late in their career compared to men and they wished they had known them sooner
The challenges they face usually are not gender related
I.T. is not always women’s first choice

FOCUS GROUP

We then moderated a focus group of 2 men and 5 women studying I.T.-related subjects at University.

Focus group participants setting.

The focus group was enlightening and really helped us broaden our perspective on the matter.

The main ideas discussed:

Women don’t want this topic to be so stressed
The topic should be presented in a different way: often the subtext is “You can do it too”.
It’s not about the number of women in class, It’s about how men perceive and act towards women.
Family plays a really important role

The main ideas discussed:

Women don’t want this topic to be so stressed
The topic should be presented in a different way: often the subtext is “You can do it too”.
It’s not about the number of women in class, It’s about how men perceive and act towards women.
Family plays a really important role

Change of focus

IDEATE

Drawing from the research conclusions and the issues addressed, the team decided to shift focus. Initially, the topic was “Women in I.T.”. After a careful examination, my team and I changed the target of the project to “Tech is for everyone. I.T. and Computational Thinking for children”.

The project aims to outline guidelines to design and propose activities for young boys and girls, aged 10-13, to provide them with the same opportunities and information, especially when it comes to I.T.-related subjects. This way, everybody will have the chance to make informed choices for their future.

The main idea behind this shift is to target not only the female part, but everybody, together, to promote inclusion, and to stress equality.

In addition, as research suggested, it is important to start from a young age, and that’s why the team focused on children, specifically middle school students.

The project objective is to help and support school teachers in introducing I.T. concepts and computational thinking to their students, through some fun and engaging hands-on activities.

So, before testing the activities with children, we decided to start with teachers and educators to evaluate and work on our idea.

Unfortunately, due to time constraints, the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions and to our University dynamics, we did not manage to involve actual teachers in the assessment. In the end, the activities were evaluated by University students.

WORKSHOP

In order to test the 4 proposed activities, we involved University students in a 2-hours workshop, observing, asking for feedbacks and opinions.

The activities are thought for children or middle school students. Check the Handbook pdf or the project report for details.

After every activity, we asked the participants to evaluate them, by providing a questionnaire. After asking for an overall rate of the activity (1-5), we collected information such as:

what they found interesting about the activity
how the activity could be made more effective for kids
how much they appreciated the activity
how much time it would take for children to complete the activity

After every activity, we asked the participants to evaluate them, by providing a questionnaire. After asking for an overall rate of the activity (1-5), we collected information such as:

what they found interesting about the activity
how the activity could be made more effective for kids
how much they appreciated the activity
how much time it would take for children to complete the activity

Marshmallow tower

Lego Activity

No Instructions game

Treasure Hunt

Pictures from the workshop activities

Example of post-task questionnaire.

FINAL PROTOTYPE

We carefully analysed the data, the feedback and the suggestions collected during the workshop. Starting from the results, we better outlined the activities and refined the materials.

We created a handbook for teachers to support them in organising workshops on computational thinking and problem solving for their students.

We carefully analysed the data, the feedback and the suggestions collected during the workshop. Starting from the results, we better outlined the activities and refined the materials.

We created a handbook for teachers to support them in organising workshops on computational thinking and problem solving for their students.