Gender Issues in Studying CS - Balkan Perspective Mirjana Ivanović, Zoran Budimac, Zoran Putnik, Nikola Trkulja 10 th Workshop “Software Engineering Education and Reverse Engineering”, Ivanjica, September 2010

AGENDA  Goals of the research and motivation  Questionnaire – Structure, Participants  Questionnaire – Data Processing, Results  Further Plans and Activities  Conclusion

Goals of the research  Inspired by results presented at DAAD WS 2008  Exploring male/female undergraduate CS students -General success rate -Professional confidence, ambitions and interests -Level of satisfaction with the choice of studies -Attitudes and beliefs towards the gender issue

Motivation  Take into consideration and compare male/female opinion -Considerable lack of female students at universities worldwide, despite the different supporting acts made by academic community -Find reasons for inadequate involvement of women in IT industry and research in Balkan region by exploring both male and female opinions -Express key findings and give some useful suggestions in order to improve situation

AGENDA  Goals of the research and motivation  Questionnaire – Structure, Participants  Questionnaire – Data Processing, Results  Further Plans and Activities  Conclusion

Questionnaire – Structure  Questionnaire consisted of about hundred questions.  Divided into three main sections -General data -Motivation for enrollment -Ambitions regarding future career  There were two type of questions -Nominal scale questions (yes/no) -Ordinal scale questions (1 to 5 Lickert scale)

Questionnaire – General data section  Students were asked questions like: -Average mark? -Are you more comfortable with CS-related, than with math-related courses? -Do you feel worried about your future career in the field of CS? -Rate the quality of studies on various points? -During your studies, have you felt as part of academic community? -Rate your skills in each of the listed aspects? -Which grade did you achieve in the various courses?

Questionnaire – Motivation for enrollment  Students were asked questions like: -How did the following factors influence your decision to enroll this faculty? -Which of listed fields should be covered with more courses? -Role-models which inspired you to study CS? -Do you plan to continue you education with master studies?

Questionnaire – Ambitions regarding future career  Students were asked questions like: -On which job position from the list do you see yourself after completion of studies? -On which job position do you see yourself in 10 years? -Point out which fields of CS overall promise the most?

Questionnaire – Participants We want to thank to all our collegues who helped us with data collection in their countries State GenderFemaleMale Albania1113 Serbia4266 Macedonia58114 Bosnia and Herzegovina2031 Total131224

AGENDA  Goals of the research and motivation  Questionnaire – Structure, Participants  Questionnaire – Data Processing, Results  Further Plans and Activities  Conclusion

Questionnaire – Data Processing  All data processing was done using R environment for statistical computing and graphics.  Various non-parametric technics were applied: -Nominal scale data was analysed using Fisher exact test and Phi association coefficient. -Lickert scale data was analysed using Mann–Whitney– Wilcoxon test, and Freemans Theta coefficient.  Emphasis was put on finding associations between gender and some other question.

Questionnaire – Results  Do you expect to have a successful career in the field of CS?

Questionnaire – Results  Are you more comfortable with CS-related, than with math-related courses?  Female students prefer math related courses.

Questionnaire – Results  Do you think studies positively influence your intellectual development?  More male students think it did not.

Questionnaire – Results  Rate quality of CS courses?  p value = 0.81  What about Math courses?

Questionnaire – Results  Rate quality of Math courses?  p value =  Maybe not so clear from these charts, but female students rate Math courses higher.

Questionnaire – Results  How did interest in computers influence your decision to enroll this faculty ?

Questionnaire – Results  How did parents influence your decision to enroll this faculty ?

Questionnaire – Results  In order to prepare for successful career in CS, do you think there should be more electronics courses?

Questionnaire – Results  Please rate knowledge of informatics of female teachers?  p value = 10e-6

Questionnaire – Results  Please rate knowledge of informatics of male teachers?  p value = 0.005

Questionnaire – Results  Is Computer Science good field for women ?

Questionnaire – Results  Is Computer Science good field for men?

Questionnaire – Results  Do you consider there is a lack of women in CS ?  p value < 0.05

Questionnaire – Results  In CS, women tend to be more careful than men?  p value is almost 0.

AGENDA  Goals of the research and motivation  Questionnaire – Structure, Participants  Questionnaire – Data Processing, Results  Further Plans and Activities  Conclusion

Further Plans and Activities  Add more countries into the research  Conduct statistical tests for each country, and found out if there is significant differences beetwen countries.  Also find correlations beetwen answers on some pairs of lickert scale questions.  Interpret computed statistics and work towards writing a paper on this subject.

AGENDA  Goals of the research and motivation  Questionnaire – Structure, Participants  Questionnaire – Data Processing, Results  Further Plans and Activities  Conclusion

Conclusion  Present satisfaction with the choice of studies  Participants expressed serious and ambitious attitudes regarding their career objectives  Female students are little bit more ambitious, maybe because their male collegues do not fully recognize their hard work.  Some number of male students think that they can do pretty much anything better then females.

Thank you for your attention You are welcome to ask questions ?