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How to close Canada's tech gender gap in a generation I The Star
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How to close Canada's tech gender
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gap in a genera
By RESHMA SAUJANI Opinion
Wed., Nov. 7, 2018
years,For even more so recently in the wakeomovements
tech community has committed to welcoming more women and closing its gender
gap. pursuing
education and careers in
STEM at rates equalto men?
Right now, Canadian `up onlya cent of a workforce,
despite making up nearly half of the overall workforce. They make up less than a
quarter of graduates with STEM degrees, but more than half of graduates overall.
According ` a r r e- * ender tech in Canada couldtake F
long as 140 years to close.
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11/7/2018
How to close Canada's tech gender gap in a generation I The Star
A Girls Who Code Club gather after school for reading and coding on May
17 in Jamaica, N.Y. (GIRLS WHO CODE)
In Canada, like in the U.S, it is not just access but culture and long-standing
stereotypes that prevent girls from pursuing computer science. In both nations,
ideas about who can and should be coding often stop girls from even expressing
interest in the fielfi.
Gates, Alexander Graham Bell, Mark Zuckerberg — white men with whom girls,
It's rare that we have the opportunity to solve a problem within a single generation
— but, though it may be difficult, closing the generation gap in tech is one of those
rare challenges. From Vancouver to Montreal to Toronto — the opportunity and
the will for real change exists and it is with support from partners like Morgan
Stanley that we are able to have an impact.
Last year, Toronto had a faster growing technology sector than Silicon Valley, with
28,900 tech jobs created, for a total of more than 241,000 workers — u)2 52 Uer cent
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11/7/2018
How to close Canada's tech gender gap in a generation I The Star
We can't hope to be competitive on the global stage if we leave half our population
behind. It's on all of us to prepare it for the fastest-growing and highest -paying
jobs not only because it makes economic sense, but because by preparing them for
these jobs we're also preparing them to develop solutions to our greatests cia
challenges.
Teach a girl to code, and she will change the world. I believe that because I've seen
it. Partners like Morgan Stanley have hosted Girls Who Code Summer Immersion
Programswhere girls have created apps to promote body- positivity, raise
awareness for global crises, and inform voters about upcoming elections. Other
alumni of Girls Who Code have gone on to create apps to address climate change,
support local refugees, prevent gun violence, and more.
And those are just a handful of apps from a handful of girls. Over the course of six
years, Girls Who Code has reached 90,000 girls in all 50 U.S. states. We've refined
gender -specific computer science programming.
We've focused on targeting those in middle school because we know, from our
research, that 70 per cent of the growth in the computing pipeline comes from
changing the path of the youngest girls. And we've developed curricula featuring
women in computer science — women like Ada Lovelace and Katherine Johnson
and Roberta Bondar — because we know that girls cannot be what the -
cannot see.
related fields at a rate 15 times the national average. And now, with a pipeline of
tens of thousands more girls entering college in the coming years, we are on track
to close the gender gap in tech in the ■U.S. by 2027.
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our first country outside the U.S. We hope that, by working with Morgan Stanley
and local organizations we can achieve our vision of equality of tech in Canada and
open up a world of opportunity for young women.
Reshma Saujani is the Founder and CEO of Girls Who Code, an international non-profit organization working to
close the gender gap in technology.
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11/7/2018
How to close Canada's tech gender gap in a generation I The Star
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