Gender and Computers

Abstract It is salutary to note just how low the figures are for women taking computing at university level. In the UK in 1992/93 the proportion of women taking computing was as low as 12.2 per cent and there is evidence that since that date this figure has dropped even lower. According to one survey in 1991 (LFS 1991) approximately two in ten higher status computing jobs were held by women. There is little doubt that if the proportion of men dropped this low, people would get very upset indeed and there would be much activity to redress the imbalance. And yet very little is done about the low numbers of women in higher education and in prestigious computing jobs—by women or men. Why is it that only lip-service is paid to recognition of this as a fundamental problem? It involves not only a denial of justice which feminists, of course, object to but also represents a massive loss to the economy in that over half its potential talent is overlooked.