Rethinking Student Needs

1
Rethinking Student Needs

• How International and U.S. Women Students in IT
  Educational Programs Compare
• Christine Ogan and Debbie Goh

Gender and IT Education Conference, Indiana
University, 2007
2
Methodology

• Used web-based survey and data from the
  face-to-face interviews
• Focused on European and Asian students
• 63 Europeans and 253 Asians--self identified as
  being raised in a country in the region.
• Of Asians, 91 were women.

3
Little Attention in Literature

• Little data on conditions for women in IT fields
  in other countries
• Also little data on how they fare in U.S.
  academic programs
• CS students numbers kept by IIE
• Margolis/Fisher found international women CS
  students persist because they privilege hard work
  over ability.
• Cohoon published rare article on international
  and U.S. women in CS
• Found international women looking for high
  salary, prestigious job and team work
  opportunity. Also like competitive academic
  environment.
• U.S. women interested in geographic location.

4
Does Gender Equality Exist at Home?

• Still face discrimination in many countries
• Women make up 21 of workforce in India in 2007.
• Women in India limited in job placement because
  of household responsibilities.
• 35 of high-level IT jobs in S. Korea go to
  women.
• China has larger percentage of women in IT
  workforce--but no numbers available
• Hafkin says little data collection on this issue
  internationally.

5
Overall Conditions for International Students

• U.S. and international students report similar
  number of close friends and feelings of belonging
  in programs.
• International students value friends/belonging
  more highly.
• 27 vs. 56 of Europeans and 46 of Asians.
• Belonging can come from finding others from home.
  
• That might lead to perception of bias by other
  students.
• Also causes U.S. students to feel excluded.

6
Climate Issues

• Strong or somewhat strong Support for other
  ethnic minorities?
• 49.2 of Americans say yes
• 36.8 of Europeans say yes
• 30.9 of Asians say yes
• Unit support for Asian-Americans?
• 44.6 of Americans say yes
• 28.5 of Asians say yes
• In interviews, some American students expressed
  concern for programs that favored particular
  groups.

7
Other Differences

• International women learn computing even later in
  life than U.S. women
• More U.S. women interested in helping others
  than international women.
• Similar feelings about personal computer
  competence/comfort
• U.S. women lowest of three groups in expressing
  computing ability compared with others and
  overall ease of learning.
• Half of Europeans and more than half of Asians
  say they get good grades in programming--only 45
  of American women said that.

8
Asian-U.S. Women Differences

• Earlier decision to major in an IT field by Asian
  women.
• Fewer Asian women than U.S. women played computer
  games as children.
• More Asian women plan to enter academia in this
  survey.
• Interview data show Asian women have difficulty
  adjusting to U.S. academic culture.
• Working in teams helps Asian women adjust to new
  culture earlier while U.S. women understand they
  have it easier in this regard.

9
How to Manage the Differences

• Organizations designed to address womens needs
  help both U.S. and international women--even if
  needs are different.
• Care must be taken to avoid perception of
  unfairness to some and privilege to others.
• Assumption that all women suffer from the same
  problems related to computer efficacy warrants
  examination.