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Google Is Offering Free Coding Lessons To Women and Minorities
redletterdave writes: According to a blog post from Gregg Pollack, CEO of the Code School, Google is paying for three free months for any women and minorities interested in tech to expand their skills. The offer is part of Google's $50 million "Made With Code" initiative, which aims to help close the gender gap in tech. While Google is also offering the same vouchers to the women in attendance at its annual I/O developers conference this week, the search giant has released an online application that's available to women everywhere. Google says its available vouchers for women number in the "thousands."
So basically everyone who is not an Asian?
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
I'd still like someone to rationally explain to me how giving such free benefits to women and the ever-so-indistinct category of "minority," specifically because of their gender and/or "race," (and for which those not in those categories are excluded) is not sexism and racism.
But I'm a white male. I have nothing Google wants. :(
"Here Lies Philip J. Fry, named for his uncle, to carry on his spirit"
I feel like a minority
I know in Canada any tiny percent native american is enough for status. Any idea what percentage you need for the minority tag?
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
So, how exactly does Google know if an applicant is a woman or not? Are they going to do background checks?
The form that is linked doesn't even contain a declaration that somebody is a woman or minority in the first place, or a definition of what constitutes either.
iirc, a friend of mine got a native american scholarship (forgot if it was federal or state) for being 1/8, which was the cutoff. in his case it was total bullshit, but it's a fair cop i suppose.
"They were pure niggers." – Noam Chomsky
I get what they're trying to do, but this seems like the wrong approach. You don't fix discrimination with more discrimination, even if it's in the opposite direction.
Seems like it would be better to find out why the industry is so racial/gender imbalanced, and try to solve that problem (whatever it turns out to be) rather than covering up the symptoms.
On a global scale, whites are a minority. Isn't Google a global company?
Because everyone knows the only way to beat discrimination is by discriminating.
I didn't realize that the gender and minority gaps in the software development industry was simply due to availability of lessons! It's proper, and not at all ironic that we can fix this entirely obvious case of discrimination by making sure to treat certain groups differently than others based on those differences they have no control over, as opposed to merit-based evaluations that judge the worth of an individual regardless of their gender or skin color.
Boy, whew, is that good news though.
I mean, if it was something like self-selective behavior that arose largely from fundamental differences in behavior and temperament due to genetic predisposition, coupled with cultural bias a would-be/could-be programmer brings with them, it'd be really hard to overcome. That'd be a real problem, no doubt. How to make certain groups want to be a programmer, outside of all the opportunities they already have, literally thousands of hours of videos and lectures, hundreds of thousands of tutorials, and millions of step-by-step examples available from libraries, public schools, and for free on the internet - that's a very tough job. It'd be like trying to get kids to like broccoli and lima beans.
But gosh, wow, thankfully we really figured it out this time.
This will certainly solve everything, and we'll make sure that we have nearly-matching statistical matches between the greater population and these careers, just like every other career path or employment opportunity out there, from the military, to civic service, from elementary education to nursing and construction workers, we'll have finally caught up with the other trades.
Thank goodness too, that this didn't morph a naturally arising statistical evaluation into a minority rights issue, where even discussion of the problem is verboten to the perceived majority, and failure to blindly throw money at it while artificially inflating your employee base through heavy handed discrimination would single one out as racist, sexist, or simply an unethical organization.
We really dodged a bullet there, and I can only applaud this important step towards real equality.
"We'll give you free stuff if you're of the appropriate race and/or gender" If someone offered something like that for white males only, they'd be sued out of the world. I don't see why this is different.
Honestly folks. I learned to program because I wanted to. Years and years ago. I continue to code and learn to code because I wanted to get better. I was still interested. When Microsoft came out with Windows 3.0 and 3.1, I tried to learn to code using Windows' API but it was annoying and I really didn't have an interest. I was interested in OS/2 but at $2,000 for the API, I was out of luck.
I code because I like it and want to. I muck with computers because it's interesting and challenging at times. I admin systems because there's a bit of coding involved, challenging tasks, and troubleshooting. It's fun.
In this case, Google is simply trying to jump-start the interest in women and minorities. I got interested because of Dungeons and Dragons and Car Wars. In other words, I had an idea and needed to learn to program to implement the idea, and I did. And it was cool.
People complain that they're keeping guys from coding. Hell, there are guys who code and nothing can stop them.
We (humans) have access to a world of information at our fingertips. If you want to code, freaking code. Don't wait for some corporation or person to give you incentive to code. To me, that feels like cheating. I personally don't want to say "Google gave me money and free lessons to learn how to code". Heck, I would be embarrassed to say that in an interview. Someone had to interest me into coding so without that, I wouldn't have been interested in the first place? Doesn't sound much like motivation to me. If I were interviewing someone for a coding job, I might knock a point or two off for that. My girlfriend says she has done some programming but can't think of anything to code up to help her learn. Someone in a forum said pretty much the same thing. They wanted to be a DBA but didn't have any ideas on how to start.
Write a simple inventory program. Start off with the idea that you want to identify and store all the stuff in your room, apartment, or house. Write one to manage your music collection. Then expand it to add stars or figure out how to normalize the database. Sure, there are lots of programs out there that'll help you inventory your gear. Heck, there are programs that'll read in your UPC bar code and give you all the details you'd ever want.
But you don't learn to code by using someone else's program.
[John]
Shit better not happen!
If you are woman or minority that got into tech through Codeschool and the like, you won't be working in my shop. We only hire people with real CS and engineering degrees that have done their time learning more than the web language|framework flavor or the month.
Just tuck it under and tape it there. If it's good enough for Buffalo Bill, it's good enough for you. Just try not to demand people to put lotion in a basket...
Captcha: presence
1/8th, i think think that's the cutoff.
Sexism and racism are perfectly acceptable if you're against men and whites.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
Instead of condemning this, I will apply online. Are they going to come to my house and conduct a vagina check?
OK, I'm a white male, but I might be able to qualify because I belong to several minority groups. I'm a veteran. Not only that, I'm a 'Nam vet. Not only that, I have a (minor) service-connected disability. And, of course, I'm a senior citizen. Add all of those together, and Google might be willing to hire me simply because I can be counted as part of four different minority groups. There's only one problem: I'm retired and have no interest in working for them.
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making only available to special groups of people is discriminatory in this case against Whites and Asians. Then you are surprised that you get a negative response when an unfair system is being set up?
You disgust me thoroughly.
Is part of the reason why there aren't more women and minorities in tech. Only a few comments in, and it turns into a circlejerk about how women and minorities are genetically inferior, and white males are so horribly oppressed by this move which takes nothing from them. As a minority, if this is what the tech community is like, I want no part of it.
[TLDR: Bravo Google, but I think we're attacking the issue on the wrong side]
offering a free pass into code school for underrepresented groups is touching the problem too late.
If Google were genuinely interested in generating a more diverse, technically sharp population, they'd be looking at elementary, middle, and high schools (notice the AND). Education is an iterative process, adults that love to code and code well are either savants, or have had a decent education growing up. This doesn't mean we need One Laptop Per Kindergartener, but it would help if there were learning materials and dedicated staff in elementary schools. It would help if there were rudimentary computer labs in middle schools that did more than surf a subset of the internet. It would help if math was as celebrated as sports in high schools.
Many of the people who will be taking these coding classes will not have had the background in math that strengthens critical, algorithmic thinking - it doesn't mean they can't develop that thinking, but so long as their background is limited to the 'last step' (learning to code), they will continue to be hired on as quota-fillers.
I do applaud Google for doing something. Giving these underrepresented groups easier access to some kind of technical education should have a positive effect on the observed hiring-disparities. However, addressing the issue at this 'last step' level will not be nearly as powerful as improving the limping-machine that is our public education system.
I do think we are overly concerned with the racial make-up of [company x]. Most companies are going to hire the candidate that will help them make the most money. The lack of diversity in [company x] is likely reflecting the lack of a skillset in population subsets y and z. The lack of diversity is a symptom, not the problem. It's just easier to point an angry finger at [big faceless corporation] than at our own communities.
An internal system operation returned the error "The operation completed successfully.".
what I want to know is, are the courses any good?
Hey, I know this is off topic, but why is it that you social justice warriors tend to be some of the nastiest posters around? And in particular why so free with insults related to reproductive parts, such as "dick" and "twat", the sorts of things you'd find horribly offensive from the rest of us? Are you just utter hypocrites, or is there some twisted sort of point you're trying to make?
my question is are the google courses any good?
What else is a small minority at Google?
Programmers over 45 years old.
Funny, they aren't getting free classes. I guess youth privilege is still golden.
I've been in the industry for over a decade now and I'm at a loss as to where all this claimed sexism and race discrimination is occurring? Not once in my career have I seen candidates rejected due to race, religion or gender?
What I HAVE heard fairly consistently from both management and as passing comments around the office is that the devs teams would love to have more women in the office. So...once again, where's the discrimination happening? I can't recall a single team I've worked in that's had less than 4 different nationalities from all walks of life, every person self-taught because they found programming interesting and every person excited/curious when we find out there's a new joiner starting from a different background (race, gender, religion, industry etc).
These "bribe women to program" ideas have been done countless times before in many different industries and they've never achieved the desired outcome. They just serve to create resentment in those already in the field that dedicated their life to hard-work and continual improvement (as proven by ALOT of the comments on this article).
I imagine it can also make some women/minorities feel less inclined to join the field due to feeling like they are being targeted/scrutinized (overly encourage an introvert and watch as they bolt for the closest dark corner so they can escape the unwanted attention and general feeling of awkwardness).
Asian women still count as women though, presumably.
That's a minority now, right? Where does this all end up when we have an approximate plurality in this country of White/Hispanic/Black/Mixed or Other?
If Google were really so hot, they'd offer free coding to POOR PEOPLE, since by definition they can't afford to pay for it. I don't see much justice in some young Black dude whose father makes $100k getting in ahead of a White girl who comes from a foster care background and is currently flipping burgers and couch surfing.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
When do we take our foot off the accelerator and stop stepping on the younger males (of all races)?
I agree- men are doing FINE in the board room. But it's really starting to suck everywhere down from there.
I was formally trained that if all things were equal - we should hire the "most diverse" candidate first.
Even tho Caucasian males were under represented at the bottom three tiers of the company, they were trying to balance against the lily white top two tiers (1 white female vp- the rest all 55+ year old white males). Middle management was about 60% female and they were blatantly discriminating against men and you knew the EEOC wasn't going to step in.
Don't get me wrong. I'm out. Retired. I'm speaking as a mostly disinterested party.
It just seems like society is continuing to beat up on young males (and esp white young males) and promote and give free stuff to everyone else.
When are you going to stop? What's the criteria for stopping? How far past 58% does it have to go before you can say things are addressed?
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
A buddy of mine is a white male and dirt poor. He has a real drive to learn how to code, he's wanted to make video games since he was a little kid. But there is no way he'll ever be able to gather enough money to attend any sort of 'programming school.'
I'm tempted to tell him about this initiative and tell him to lie on the application by feminizing his first name. He doesn't need a certificate or anything, just the mentorship to help him with the learning.
Thoughts?
define Minority ? you (google) should offer this without the gender and racist remarks... then just fail the people who don't live up to your criteria. -or better yet, just delete the user data of your "majority" whoever that is...
happy trials
google sucks at the 'human' part of the human/machine system
it's true just look at their products from the start...'google.com' had better results and no clutter....their success in visual design was to by default **not have any** because sites like 'yahoo.com' are so full of visual garbage...it's just the standards have always been so low in computing that a blank screen w/ search bar is the 'best'
look at how their executives talk about privacy
so, to the problem of 'women in coding' it's rational to expect they'd try to thread a needle with a forklift
for me, i lament two things:
1. quality control...who is teaching these poor women and what kind of "coding" are they teaching them? we all know you could spend a year learning a coding language and still be almost like a newbie in a job situation not using that code...they'd still lose the job to a self-taught adaptable man
2. alternate uses for $50 MILLION DOLLARS
it's good that women are learning 'code' despite my two laments...but still...aaarrrgghh!!!
Thank you Dave Raggett
You make some excellent points.
I hope I didn't come across smug. I started reading the comments, and after the tenth little jibe I got kind of pissed and disgusted... and posted emotionally. :D
The world could be such a nice place if people didn't treat each other like garbage... Helping out women and minorities is not a bad thing, and no threat to anyone. It enriches us all.
We try posting rationally, but get disgusted by the ugly comments. Then we post emotionally. We're human.
I don't know if I'm a social justice warrior, although I know you meant that facetiously, but it's really disheartening to see people act so callously toward other people that are at a disadvantage. Help a brother or sister out, instead of slapping them down or dismissing their struggle.
If so, that's age discrimination, something that's forbidden by law.
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This is a racist policy. Let's be very clear about the language here! By "minority" they mean: NOT WHITE. Right? Or am I wrong?
So this is a policy which discriminates against whites. Well we are a poor white family. Why can't my family benefit from this? Oh, because we are white. But hey, that is not discrimination, right? We have not been discriminated against! Right? Because we are white and there are some rich whites (look at Al gore, he is very rich). So because we are a poor white family, we must be rich and advantaged, right?
This is f*cking outrageous that any organisation can on the one hand be sued for discriminating against "minorities" but on the other is lauded for discriminating against whites!
Do they have the same policy in Google Israel? Supporting training in Israel for people who are not Jewish?
Said one Anonymous Coward to another!
Demanding institutionalized discrimination to correct anything is a bad thing, and a threat to everyone. Much like one political party whining that the other political party used the same tactics in reverse against them, discrimination does not develop changes in attitudes, it reinforces them.
So, since we are into discrimination and punishing...
In my city, European Americans *are* the minority (to African Americans; there are very few of any other race). So would THEY be eligible for free preferential treatment from Google?
Or does "minority" just mean anyone who is not European American?
just because i was born with a penis does not make me a man, at least thats what the people on xojane keep trying to tell us
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
I want 3 months of lessons to expand my skills and I've been in this industry for 20 years.
If you're a man, just claim you have one "disabled" chromosome. You're golden.
Hey, I know this is off topic, but why is it that you social justice warriors tend to be some of the nastiest posters around?
I consider the term "social justice warrior" perjorative. Shouldn't we all be striving for social justice that betters us all? And when I talk about social justice it's something I believe in. I've identified strongly as a feminist since about 1991. I consider myself "Third wave" by the way.
The overuse of that term (and others like "White knight") over the past few months of the various minorities in computing discussions on Slashdot has made me rather angry at what I perceive as the overly privileged locker room mentality here. Normally I'm rather easy going and don't participate in the women in IT discussions in part because I find the misogyny in them disgusting....but I've had enough of what I think of as overly selfish jerks on Slashdot. It's 2014, it's time for those people to get with the program. I'm tired of being "nice".
And in particular why so free with insults related to reproductive parts, such as "dick" and "twat", the sorts of things you'd find horribly offensive from the rest of us?
The thing is, I'm usually not so free with them. I'm just getting tired of the "dickishness" from people who claim to be so smart and superior that they should be running things. Meaning the average politician-bashing "sheeple-bashing" slashdotter
But basically my response is the same as whistlingtony's
We try posting rationally, but get disgusted by the ugly comments. Then we post emotionally. We're human.
Take it any way you want it; if it's pejorative, you've earned more than a few pejoratives thrown your way.
Ah, but you're not; you're striving for social justice that puts the heterosexual white man down. I'm aware you think that's because we have unearned advantage that you'd like to take away, but even if that's so, it's still not bettering us all.
You know the term "white knight" comes from modern feminism, right? And it's pejorative there. It's about the only thing in these discussions nearly all parties agree on (except the white knights) -- nobody likes a white knight.
As for your anger at a perceived "locker room mentality" (which is pretty ridiculous, considering the traditional divide between geeks and jocks), getting angry at those who disagree with you might work in an environment like the workplace where you have authority to back up your anger and claims that disagreement counts as oppression; it isn't going to work here.
Ah, but that's just the thing; you have neither consensus on what "the program" is nor the power to impose it on those who don't agree. You're skipping the step of demonstrating that your "program" is in fact the right thing, and getting angry when everyone won't just fall into line.
One set of fake boobs, a razor, and a wig should do it.
Seriously though this undermines the women in IT who actually worked to get there instead of getting unfair advantages. As far as I know schemes like this have never worked in the past. You just can't solve discrimination with more discrimination.
Your self-respect, that's all.
Well there is always reddit.
So what Google is saying is that women and minorities need their hands held so they can take their first little baby steps into programming, because their little brains can't handle it on their own like a big white man's brain can. Cut the bullshit. Getting starting in programming isn't hard - there is literally a glut of free resources. If you can't get started in programming, the problem isn't your vagina.
Unfair or not, I think a bigger problem is it's not going to work. Because it's based on the idea that the reason women aren't going into programming in large numbers is due to relative lack of opportunity, which simply isn't so.
what's fair, what's unfair? when i was a kid there was a scholarship for left-handed people; is that unfair? yes, but who cares? people can do what they want.
people are really, really, overestimating the effect of this ridiculous code school just because Google itself attached to it in an effort to counterspin some negative PR they got.
"They were pure niggers." – Noam Chomsky
Well is it really good for their bottom line? What if bunch of white people, ooops sorry, didn't mean to be racist, I mean "Ethnic Majorities" get together to sue Jewgle for discrimination? Oh, don't worry, they are too busy watching reruns of Friends to worry about defending their people against the White Genocide.
Let Google hire exclusively "Ethnic Minorities" and let's sit back and watch the innovations continue and the share price continue to rise. Will they be serving weed in the canteen? [/sarc]
50-51% female birth rate, with actual population skewed a bit more towards women because they live longer (on average).
Ken
Take it any way you want it; if it's pejorative, you've earned more than a few pejoratives thrown your way.
And how long has there been misogny in women in IT discussion on slashdot? How long have guys like you been throwing around "social justice warrior" as an epithet? And I'm the bad guy for throwing a few curses around?
Ah, but you're not; you're striving for social justice that puts the heterosexual white man down.
No, I'm not.
I'm aware you think that's because we have unearned advantage that you'd like to take away,
Is taking away something from you that you stole and giving it back stealing? No, because you didn't earn it in the first place. You might think you did, but you didn't.
but even if that's so, it's still not bettering us all.
In the long term it is. Because then you will HAVE to earn what you get fairly against real competition without "cheating"
Let me use a gaming example? Isn't it more rewarding to beat a game without cheats, than with? Beat it on "Normal" and not "easy"?
You know the term "white knight" comes from modern feminism, right?
I don't think so, I've not seen any feminist use it, but I sure have seen a lot of anti-feminist men do so here on Slashdot.
As for your anger at a perceived "locker room mentality" (which is pretty ridiculous, considering the traditional divide between geeks and jocks),
Modern Slashdotters in their 20's have more in common with jocks than old style geeks/nerds. You've seen the term "brogrammer" bandied around. They may be a programmer, but they watch ESPN and drink brewskis with the bros rather than put on spock ears, go to a con and play Battletech. Besides, being a geek doesn't mean you can't engage in "locker room style" misogyny even if you're a geek.
Ah, but that's just the thing; you have neither consensus on what "the program" is nor the power to impose it on those who don't agree. You're skipping the step of demonstrating that your "program" is in fact the right thing, and getting angry when everyone won't just fall into line.
The "program" is simple, it's: "Don't be a misogynist/racist/etc, and we need to remedy past and present discrimination" What part of that is controversial? We learned the value of that years ago.
Damned if I know; check the archives. Long time, certainly.
Oh, rather more recently I suspect.
Throwing them around as indiscriminately as you (and others I would tag "social justice warriors") do certainly doesn't make you a good guy. It isn't just the words, it's the demonizing; I mean, we know we're not demons, at least, most of us do. Maybe your vitriol will convince a few insecure straight white males that they don't deserve what they have; maybe it'll find root in a few who actually had the easy time of it that you claim we all did. But for most of us, it's just a false accusation and indeed marks you as the bad guy.
In the long term, we're all dead. Discriminating against me because of the actions of some straight white males in the past (or even some other straight white males in the present) doesn't better me, so it certainly doesn't better "us all". As for "cheating", no, I haven't cheated. Even the narrative of privilege doesn't claim those benefiting from privilege are actually cheating.
According to Scalzi, I don't have a choice what level I play on. But I reject the idea that I'm cheating or even playing on "easy".
Check various feminism websites.
ROTFL. You know this how? I can't speak for slashdotters, but I work with a lot of younger software engineers, and they're still geeks, not jocks.
Brogramming was a hoax; a joke, based on the juxtaposition of two opposite stereotypes, the geek/nerd and the "bro". Now it serves the purpose of demonstrating that those taken in by it have no idea what they're talking about.
Well, first of all, the definitions of the terms keep changing. Used to be that not being a racist meant not discriminating based on race, and similarly for sexist. We were fine with that. Now we're being told it's OK to discriminate based on race and sex, as long as it's against white people and males.... whoa, whoa, whoa, that's moving the goalpost, and it's definitely not OK. The term "misogyny", similarly, has been widened, even so far as to include completely non-discriminatory behavior that is supposedly characteristic of men and disproportionately affects women.
Further, the idea that remedying past discrimination is desirable is controversial in itself. It quickly gets into a muddle of just who discriminated against who and who benefited and was hurt. The idea that "white people benefited from discrimination against black people, so to remedy that we should discriminate against different white people to benefit different black people" is quite controversial.
The same goes for present discrimination to a lesser extent; remedying specific instances of discrimination is uncontroversial, but adding a general counterbalance to present discrimination against one group by discriminating for that group is controversial.
Today, no one is blocking or impeding women or "minorities" -- whatever that means -- from getting into programming. Lots of online tutorials, places to try writing a few lines of code, and of course, tons of downloads you can make to get started. All you need is an Internet connection. What Google is doing will fail miserably. The reason why certain cultural groups are "underrepresented" in our programming culture are many, and deep-seated. I do find it amusing that women are "underrepresented", given the enormous kickoffs of 2 women, Ada Lovelace and Grace Hopper. What could be more inviting? As long as it remains free for anyone who cares to jump in can, I don't see a problem.