Girls learning technology is women's work, too

REDMOND -- Men outnumber women by a 3-1 ratio among Microsoft Corp.'s U.S. employees and by even more among its top executives. This week, the company brought in 73 high school girls to try to alter that balance.

They are attending "DigiGirlz," an annual, weeklong day camp at Microsoft's Redmond headquarters that seeks to address the scarcity of women in technology by getting more girls intrigued about the profession.

"I like computers -- maybe as a career, but probably not. I'm just sort of exploring. And some of the stuff is pretty crazy," said DigiGirlz camper Jessica Askew, 17, of Bellevue, referring with admiration to a demonstration of futuristic fingerprint-reading and facial-recognition technologies.

As possible career choices, Askew said she's particularly interested in theater and writing.

That illustrates one of the challenges technology companies face. Despite the industry's efforts to demonstrate infinite possibilities of software, the field often isn't viewed as a natural choice for women and girls who favor creative jobs.

"I was not encouraged to pick up technology. I was encouraged to pick up an art," said Jenny Lay-Flurrie, director of Microsoft's adCenter system, after speaking at DigiGirlz on Tuesday morning.

Some DigiGirlz campers have experienced the opposite. Tamara Pablo, 16, of Sells, Ariz., said she was strongly encouraged by her computer teacher to apply for the Microsoft camp. When pressed, Pablo acknowledged that she's pretty good at programming.

"I've taken every computer class that was offered at the school," she said during a break between DigiGirlz sessions. "That's why I came here -- to find out if there is a career for me."

Assuming there is, she would become an exception. Women represented fewer than 15 percent of people receiving bachelor's degrees in computer science and engineering in 2005 at major research universities in the United States and Canada, according to a Computing Research Association survey.

The proportion of female employees at Microsoft has fallen from 27 percent of the work force in 1998 to 25 percent this year, according to company data.

Apart from the general work force, women are even more underrepresented in the executive ranks of many technology companies. A review of Microsoft's executive listings shows that fewer than 15 percent of those at the level of corporate vice president or higher are women.

Two of the 21 executives currently listed on Microsoft's senior leadership team are women.

The numbers at Microsoft aren't out of the ordinary in the industry, said Carolyn Leighton, the founder of Women in Technology International, or WITI.

In advocating change, the group points to factors including the qualities of many women as leaders, and their major roles as consumers in buying decisions.

"There are tons of examples where companies are really losing at the bottom-line level by not incorporating women at the very top of the company," Leighton said. "From a purely business point of view, it makes no sense."

Microsoft says it's trying hard to improve the situation. The company has a slate of initiatives meant to help women rise through its ranks -- including executive development programs, an internal women's conference, an executive diversity working group, and mentoring to help women at the company move into executive positions.

DigiGirlz, in its sixth year, is another part of Microsoft's effort to boost the number of women in the industry. None of the camp alumni has gone on to work at the company yet, but two are interning there this summer.

The idea is show the girls that "technology is cool," said camp organizer Emily McKeon, Microsoft's diversity marketing manager. "We want them to consider that a career in technology is not as boring as they expected."

During a Tuesday morning session, adCenter director Lay-Flurrie spoke with the DigiGirlz campers about her life and career. Lay-Flurrie is an accomplished musician despite being functionally deaf. She learned to play piano and clarinet by feeling the vibration of the sound.

Lay-Flurrie also talked about how she uses technology to help overcome her disability.

And she explained how she developed a deep interest in technology almost accidentally, through a job at the London Daily Mirror's IT help desk.

"I fell into it," Lay-Flurrie told the girls. "But once I discovered it, I discovered I loved it."

Later in the morning, some of the girls displayed their intelligence -- and independence -- during a session led by Marissa Rocha, product manager for Microsoft's educational product group. After Rocha showed how to use the Microsoft Student program to solve complex equations, two of the girls impressed her by just doing them in their heads.

And rather than using the built-in Microsoft Encarta encyclopedia for research, another girl quietly used the Wikipedia site instead to finish the project.

Microsoft holds similar camps in North Carolina, North Dakota and Texas. The campers for this year's DigiGirlz in Redmond came from Arizona, California, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Arkansas and Washington state. Applications for the camp include 300-word essays.

Other organizations also encourage girls to pursue technology careers. For example, Inspiring Girls Now In Technology Evolution, or IGNITE, is a program coordinated by the Seattle School District's Cathi Rodgveller, that gets involvement from Microsoft, Boeing and others.

Such programs are critical, said Jenny Slade, communications director for the National Center for Women & Information Technology, an organization that Microsoft helps fund.

"It's imperative that girls be a part of creating technology," Slade said. The current situation in the industry is "too bad for society but it's also too bad for girls. I think they're missing out on some really great careers."

In addition to talks with Microsoft employees at DigiGirlz this week, campers are seeing product demonstrations, learning some basic programming, and touring high-tech labs on Microsoft's campus. Later in the week, they'll spend time shadowing employees.

But it's not just about technology. Karen Bryant, chief operating officer of the Seattle Storm basketball team, is among the speakers during the week.

And opening the Tuesday session, Microsoft senior diversity consultant Mylene Padolina checked to see which girls had been keeping track of the employees they had met. She promised prizes for the longest lists.

"It pays to network," she said. "Keep that in mind."

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