A Detailed Analysis of Gender Differences in the Course of CS-Studies

Abstract

At least in the western hemisphere, women in tech still are a minority instead of the matter of course that they should be. This holds true for the domain of Computer Science as well. Comparatively few women enter into CS-related courses of study, and even fewer of them finish these programs successfully. Thus, both the work force and society lose a large amount of the women’s potential, which would be desperately needed to ensure that the technical innovation we need to cope with the pressing problems of our age are designed appropriately to address the needs of a wide range of people.To ensure that both women and men have comparable chances of successfully graduating in CS-related courses of study, we need to gain a closer insight into the hurdles that especially women are facing during their study process. For this means, we apply data analysis to the student data of our student administrative system, in order to identify major differences between the study progress of women and men, and to better understand where our female students struggle the most. Only if we understand this properly, we are able to improve our teaching purposefully in a gender sensitive way, and to introduce any structural changes that might help to increase and strengthen the women in our student body.