Whats turning women away?
The wireless industry turned to foreign women when it couldn’t fill its ranks in the United States, taking advantage of the controversial H-1B visa program. “A lot of people were available through the H-1B from Europe and some from Asia, where there hasn’t big an issue of getting women into engineering and computer science programs,” Casey said. “In the U.S., it continues to be an issue.”In fact, the issue has gotten worse. In 1985, 37 percent of computer science undergraduate degree recipients were women. In 2006, just 21 percent were. Simson said she suspects the decrease in women’s enrollment in high tech is due to the stigma associated with long hours in a very demanding field with lots of economic up and down cycles. “It is associated in the minds of people as not stable,” she said.The combination of instability and demanding hours also gives women an unpalatable choice between work and family, she noted. Men can more easily make the choice to work because women still typically ma
