Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!mcnc!ecsvax!uunet.UU.NET
From: mfci!colwell@uunet.UU.NET (Robert Colwell)
Newsgroups: comp.society.women
Subject: Re: Women on the Net
Message-ID: <6561@ecsvax.UUCP>
Date: 23 Feb 89 03:37:07 GMT
References: <6377@ecsvax.UUCP> <6394@ecsvax.UUCP> <6405@ecsvax.UUCP>
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Organization: Multiflow Computer Inc., Branford Ct. 06405
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Comments-to: comp-women-request@cs.purdue.edu
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In article <6405@ecsvax.UUCP> brs@lzfme.att.com (B.SCHWARTZ) writes:
==In article <6394@ecsvax.UUCP= ron@ron.rutgers.edu (Ron Natalie) writes:
=
==There's an article on the front page of the Times today that reports
==the results of a study into why there is such a gender gap in the
==computer industry.  It about boils down to the thesis that men get
==a big jump on woman because they were computer nerds in high school
==and college (hanging around playing with computers at all hours rather
==than having any real friends).
=
=Most successful women in the computer field have
=parents, or other mentors who work in the field and
=introduced them to computing (with encouraagement) at an early
=age. 

Betsy and Ron, I've been in this industry for about 14 years and I've
never noticed a correlation between successful engineers (or any other
kind) and role models, male or female.  Why do you think this?  In
fact, I'm hard pressed to think of *any* cases where the parents were
engineers or technical role models.  Not to say that it wouldn't be
nice, and that it might help improve the contributions of women to
the technical fields, but I can't see the correlation you're asserting.

Bob Colwell               ..!uunet!mfci!colwell
Multiflow Computer     or colwell@multiflow.com
175 N. Main St.
Branford, CT 06405     203-488-6090