Etsy Hacker Grants Support Female Programmers

samazon writes "Online retail shop Etsy announced a living-expenses grant program for women interested in attending the free Hacker School 3-month programming course. The program is hosted in various New York locations (NYU and Spotify have both hosted sessions) and not only is Etsy offering $5,000 grants to ten women who are accepted into the program, they're also hosting the summer course, and have offered enough space to double the class size to 40 students."

Comments

Sexism

[AntiBasic]

Who cares what sex the code comes from? I want the best possible, not because it's from a woman.

But such is the way of "progressives"

Re:Sexism

[Anonymous Coward]

Having women in science/tech/engineering/math (STEM) programs is good for the women and their long-term job prospects and incomes, which currently suffer relative to men due partially to lower levels of interest and education in STEM fields. Believe it or not, not everything is about what's best for YOU.

Re:Sexism

[Anonymous Coward]

Everyone deserves equal access. A person should not apply for this grant and be denied because of the way they were born. It's revolting and I'm glad to see other people have the same opinion.

They will deny people access to this grant because of their sex. That is discrimination. Someone who meets every criterion they lay out for eligibility will be treated as unworthy because they haven't got the grantor's favorite chromosomes.

Re:Sexism

[thesupraman]

I suggest you put you knee back in its jerk, and consider for a moment how you would feel
if they were to offer a grant that was only available to men..

Reverse discrimination is no better than discrimination.

Make sense now?

Re:Sexism

[LordLucless]

So if it's good for them, why are they not flocking to those fields? Why is it you who gets to decide what's best for women (the tradeoff of higher salary, for working in a field you don't enjoy) instead of them making that decision for themselves? Or are you saying there's some sort of problem women have where they can't make rational choices, and need to be enticed towards them instead?

Re:Sexism

[HunsV]

I must argue strenuously against the idea of "Reverse discrimination." There is only one kind of discrimination. "Reverse discrimination" was invented by people who wanted to imply that some people are more worthy of discrimination than others, which itself is discriminatory. It is a perversion of the social outrage that rightly exists against discrimination.

Re:Sexism

[TubeSteak]

A person should not apply for this grant and be denied because of the way they were born. It's revolting and I'm glad to see other people have the same opinion.

You are an idiot.
There are thousands of grants that are amazingly specific in their requirements.
Some are based on country of origin or last name, others are for redheads, left handers, skateboarders, tall people,
short people, club affiliation, weight, religious affiliation, skin color, academic achievement, and so on.

They will deny people access to this grant because of their sex. That is discrimination.

Breaking News: Private citizens can choose who they want to give money to.
Ric Romero with more at 11.

Re:Sexism

[R3d M3rcury]

If 49% of the population is men, and men have an equal rate to become nurses as women, 49% of nurses should be men.

But we all know they're not.

Re:Sexism

[Z34107]

So what is the cause of the lower-than-expected rate of female programmers, and what can we do to fix it?

Needs "fixing" why? I see no evidence that women who want to become programmers are denied the opportunity.

Why is it that nobody gives a shit about the lack of male teachers?

Re:Sexism

[story645]

Women used to make up %40 of CS students in the 1980s (Camp 2001) and make up on average a little over %35 of Israeli undergrads in CS ( Vilner 2006) and vary all over the globe. This indicates that the current US rate of about %20 is due to culture because if there was something biological going on, then the rates around the world should be roughly the same.

Re:Sexism

[bjourne]

Actually, Sweden is even worse with only 12% female graduates in computer science related degrees. The situation is similar in all the Nordic countries. Those countries also happen to have the highest gender equality rating in the world (discounting some feminist crazies who believe the situation for women in Sweden is just as bad as in Afghanistan). It actually seems that the more freedom women get, the more inclined they are to choose gender stereotyped careers. Maybe on average more men prefer technology and more women prefer nursing? What's so inherently bad about that?

This is great

[Anonymous Coward]

If we accept the premise that gender is in no way related to programming abilities, the current gender distribution in the field means that we're missing out on a lot of great talents. So why is that, and what can we do about it? Sticking our heads into the sand and pretending that there is no problem sure as hell hasn't worked so far. I think we need to realize that there is a feedback loop going here. Getting more women into programming helps in creating role models and a less hostile environment.

It's gender discrimination !

[Taco Cowboy]

Why only the women are getting the benefits?

What about the men?

Etsy doesn't care about their male customer any longer, does it?

Re:It's gender discrimination !

[robwgibbons]

Men don't have female privelage.

Re:It's gender discrimination !

[LoudNoiseElitist]

Please explain to me the "male privilege", especially as related to education.

I remember my senior year of high school. Out of the the hundreds of college scholarships that were offered, only 10% of them were applicable to white males. We don't all come from families that owned land and people, mind you.

Re:It's gender discrimination !

[Anonymous Coward]

Funny how there are always two side to "Feminism".

One side says "Feminism isn't some extremist theory about patriarchy and male privilege: it's just the desire for equality, who could be opposed to that"?

But when you point out that some things go beyond formal equality, the other side says "Of course formal equality is not the point, since we have to deal with thousands of years of patriarchy and male privilege".

People make fun of the far left, but dig deep enough and they are the ones dictating most of our political discourse.

I Personally Like Seeing Women At Work

[zbobet2012]

1) Environments with a good mix of men and women are more productive

2) 20% of all long term relationships start at work. I am all for improving my odds and so should you be. Its not sexist or objectifying to actually want to interact with the opposite sex daily.

This is acceptable to me because, its not necessarily "affirmative action", but rather it is attempting to attract another demographic. Lets be clear here, this program is:

a) Free.

b) Not terribly competitive.

Re:Means != Ends

[samazon]

I wish you would all read the article. The reason they're offering this specifically to women is to INCREASE female applicants to the Hacker School - less than 5% of applicants in some rounds were from women, and GUESS WHAT - as a woman working in IT, I can tell you that I was NEVER encouraged to take computer classes and had several teachers discourage me from it. I was given pats on the head my whole life and because of my parents, it pissed me off enough to get to where I am today, but plenty of my peers didn't have amazing, supportive parents like mine and were never encouraged to excel in math, science or technology. Say what you want, but until you've grown up with a vagina and been told "that class isn't for you, dear" you need to really consider what you're saying about females in education. There IS a reason women are targeted for grants like this, and it's because when you get down to it, little girls are not encouraged to be scientists, programmers and physicists. A trip to the girl's toys section of walmart should be proof enough of that.