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To Solve the Diversity Drought in Software Engineering, Look to Community Colleges (vice.com)
An anonymous reader shares a report: Community college is not flashy and does not make promises about your future employability. You will also likely not learn current way-cool web development technologies like React and GraphQL. In terms of projects, you're more likely to build software for organizing a professor's DVD or textbook collection than you are responsive web apps. I would tell you that all of this is OK because in community college computer science classes you're learning fundamentals, broad concepts like data structures, algorithmic complexity, and object-oriented programming. You won't learn any of those things as deeply as you would in a full-on university computer science program, but you'll get pretty far. And community college is cheap, though that varies depending on where you are. Here in Portland, OR, the local community college network charges $104 per credit. Which means it's possible to get a solid few semesters of computer science coursework down for a couple of grand. Which is actually amazing. In a new piece published in the Communications of the ACM, Silicon Valley researchers Louise Ann Lyon and Jill Denner make the argument that community colleges have the potential to play a key role in increasing equity and inclusion in computer science education. If you haven't heard, software engineering has a diversity problem. Access to education is a huge contributor to that, and Denner and Lyon see community college as something of a solution in plain sight.
How about we start allowing ourselves to hire developers over 45 ?
There isn't a diversity problem. Diversity isn't related to any challenges in software engineering.
credits may not transfer and few offer 4 year degrees.
Even when credits do transfer some 4 year Colleges may force you to retake classes or say you may have X credits but only some of them counted to what you need to get the degree from us.
Certainly when it comes to politics...
Really good read imho, "The Empress Has No Clothes: The Dark Underbelly of Women Who Code and Google Women Techmakers"
https://medium.com/@marlene.ja...
If you haven't heard, software engineering has a diversity problem
There's unequal participation. That doesn't mean there's a problem.
Does diversity results in better code? Please provide citations.
In order to solve something, there must be a problem first. As long as no one consciously attempts to exclude a group, there is no issue. If women or Blacks or whoever feels uncomfortable, that's their problem to solve. It's not anyone's job to make someone else comfortable. If more women join, the atmosphere will change of its own. No one needs to force "diversity training" (unfortunately, it's a thing) on anyone.https://news.slashdot.org/story/17/12/04/1915224/to-solve-the-diversity-drought-in-software-engineering-look-to-community-colleges#
"You will also likely not learn current way-cool web development technologies like React and GraphQL. In terms of projects, you're more likely to build software for organizing a professor's DVD or textbook collection than you are responsive web apps."
Utter fucking BS
YES you will build web apps ... GraphQL (why the fuck would you use that POS syntax??? But if you must...)
YES you will use React, Angular and
Anyone that tells you that only University Graduates get to work on Web Technology is either OUT OF THEIR GODDAMNED MIND or is lying to you. Not that those are mutually exclusive
The problem is not getting enough men to go to college and graduate with these kinds of degrees.
"Forget the engineers." -Carly Fiorina, briber of MIT Technology Review.
This is why you should always make sure you're attending an accredited college. Also if you get an associates degree almost all universities will accept that as you lower general education.
Hold up, wait a minute, let me put some pimpin in it
At least in the minds of everyone but the Social Justice Warrior set.
Being a different skin color or sex doesn't improve coding ability. The year is 2017, not 1959; there are no legal structures keeping black people from studying programming or being hired by any company who choses to do so. Jim Crow is dead.
Stop pretending that the United States of America is the most racist nation in the world, when in actually it is probably the least racist country.
Just stop shoving this SJW bullshit down our throat, Slashdot. It isn't helping, and it isn't working.
credits may not transfer
In most states, credits from CCs are guaranteed to be transferable to the state's 4 year public universities. In California it is easier to transfer credits from a CC into the UC system that to transfer from the "Cal State" system. The CCs are explicitly set up as an affordable pipeline into the 4 year public universities.
and few offer 4 year degrees.
That is not what CCs are for.
I'm a big fan of Community Colleges for one reason, they're inexpensive. I think we can all agree that you don't need a degree to be a good software engineer, although a degree can increase the salary you can demand and the return on investment is worth it.
Given that, it makes sense to start in a Community College and then finish up at a local in-state university. If I look at Salt Lake Community College and Weber State University in Utah you could do this for under $20k with room to spare.
In the end, it's how well you can program, not what school you went to.
Thanks entirely to the Democratic ownership of the state legislature and the governorship, Oregon promises free community college for any legal state resident starting out college from highschool (or GED), who isn't a trust fund baby, and has at least a 2.5 GPA, via the Oregon Promise Grant. You do have to file out some forms, but then you're golden.
You must meet all of the following criteria:
There are plenty of web development classes as well.
I totally agree that community college can be a good base for studying computer science and software development, for much cheaper than a "real" university.
But honestly even that is not required at this point. There are so, so many online resources for learning software development now, I can't help but think that you really do not need a college at all.
The one area a real course helps with is defined goals and feedback. But there are places online like Udacity that can offer even that.
I am personally concerned with the opposite of diversity - happiness. I feel like there are probably a lot of people in the world (of all races and genders) who would love programming but never know because they never try it, and it would be good to get as many of those people developing software as possible so they can truly do something for a living they will enjoy... that is way more important than trying to shoehorn people who have no real interest in software development just because you are trying to meet some quota based on race or gender. I have seen people not cut out for software development (of all races and genders) really struggle and trust me, that is not a fate you would wish on anyone as it's frustrating for them and everyone around them.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I agree that looking to other sources for hiring programmers is a good thing. Not everyone is rich or brilliant enough to go to Stanford and get a CS degree, nor does every developer in your company need to be a Stanford grad. I'm in systems engineering with no formal university training...I got a degree in chemistry way back when. Since most of what I do is integration work getting developers' "masterpieces" working in production, it's very clear that a large percentage of developers have very little idea about how the machines their code runs on work.
Real computer science education starts pretty close to first principles and builds up. It doesn't start at a web framework or query language 478 levels of abstraction up the stack and work down. The big problem with "software engineering" is that people actually do need some of this first-principles understanding to be useful outside of the abstracted environments. Both community college and university education is often derided as being too theoretical because unlike coder bootcamps they don't start you off at a point where most problems are solved. But if inexperienced developers had some clue about how the magic box works beyond gluing together more magic libraries and frameworks on top, software quality might improve.
More Diversity = Fewer Asians?
What are they going to do to increase diversity?
Kick out the disproportionately overrepresented East & South Asians until their numbers in the industry correspond to the population at large?
Merely shaking trees at community colleges isn't going to resolve this.
What about all the kids in America's great soft white middle that don't go to college, community or otherwise?
These are certainly underrepresented as well...
If they only said "college" it might not transfer, but they said "Community College" so it usually does.
Did you even read the summary? That's what the article is all about.
Support Right To Repair Legislation.
If you attended an accredited college, the courses should count. Now, as part of the degree requirements at the community college you may need to take classes that are not required for the bachelor's degree at your next university, and won't transfer.
Look, some people are born with genes that make them fast runners and jumpers with lots of athletic ability such as Negros. These are people that wine the Superbowl and the Olympics.
Some people are born with genes that favor intellectual pursuits, such as Ashkenazi Jews. These are the people that win the Fields Medal and the Nobel Prize.
Some people were not meant to be software engineers, and all the wishing and hopey changey won't make it so. Different racial groups have different strengths. And that's OK.
If you haven't heard, software engineering has a diversity problem.
If you haven't heard, SJWs sound like smug, insufferable twats when they speak.
Qualifications, skill, and experience are what is going to get you hired in tech, male or female. If you do well in the technical interview, then you will probably get the offer. I feel I'm somewhat qualified to say this because I've often been the technical interviewer. Between my current gig, IBM, and Oracle (previous gigs), I just counted over 250 interviews for approximately 20 positions filled. I believe (strongly) that being female would have resulted in a *positive* bias, not negative (guys would have been thrilled to get a female co-worker). I say this because on the rare occasion a candidate was female, there was always at least one (or more) "I hope she's good" sincere comments from team members. They weren't saying because they were lying-in-wait sexual-harassers (at least I don't think so). It was because they were *really* hoping that the woman would be hire-able. In some cases it was simply because they needed help. As someone with a fair amount of hiring & interviewing experience, my advice to young women looking for a job in tech is "ignore the press, ignore well-meaning SJW men, and just press hard on technical skill." If you blow away the competition in the tech-screen and interview, you are *set*, being female won't hurt you and it's very likely to help you (yes, even if you aren't physically attractive). Men, as a group, tend to respect skill and it'll pay dividends in many ways. If you are average or below average do everyone else a favor and don't go whining that it was prejudice or misogyny. Just pick yourself up and study the topical material better for next time.
I am amazed that this was written by a woman! Props to Marlene, and if I ever have an app I want an iOS version of, Polyglot will be asked to provide a bid.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Oregon promises free community college for any legal state resident starting out college from highschool (or GED), who isn't a trust fund baby, and has at least a 2.5 GPA, via the Oregon Promise Grant
"For full-time students, awards range from $1,000 to $3,540 per year (in 2017-18)"
You've got some derp in your neckbeard.
We might not get the best of the best of the best of the best!!!
Not that college/University grads are that either, but it not "best practices"
Maybe it's because I haven't tried all the new and innovative stuff like GraphQL, but my compiler has never complained about my department not being diverse enough.
Are we absolutely sure this diversity thing is a problem for CS/IT? Or could it be that it's just a problem for women's studies and whatever other programs teach advanced SJW stuff?
Community colleges are like speedboats, able to navigate the twists and turns of business needs, while universities have been as steerable as the Titanic. For decades, community college classes have translated into usable skills.
Until recently, community colleges have led the charge in recent and relevant skills. Why? because they didn't have to get approval from God and the board of regents to create a class.
Thanks to funding being linked to accreditation, that will all change soon though. Community colleges have officially been mired with the paperwork that slows universities down. We are poised to witness the negative effect of the bean counters on local innovation.
is a good integrated, CHEAP university system in more cities and states. Take the NYC university system -- it has schools ranging from community colleges to 4 year universities to graduate schools. Pricing is either free or at most 6 to $8000 per year for in-state tuition. And credit tends to transfer easily between schools, so someone who does well at a community college can move into a 4 year school to finish a bachelor's degree.
But no, a lot of states and cities have a public university system that concentrates more on sports than academics.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
What so great about diversity? Buggy software? I would be far better for all of us to simply hire the best programmers.
Which would be an issue if the cost for community college in Oregon didn't hover around $100/credit. 12 credits a semester and you're looking at $2,400 for the year. If you click the link at the end of that sentence, you get this:
Oregon Promise will cover up to the average tuition charged by an Oregon community college ($3,540 in 2017-18). Some community colleges have a higher or lower tuition cost than this average. If the tuition cost is above the average, the student is responsible for the difference. If the tuition cost is below this average, Oregon Promise pays up to that college’s actual tuition cost.
So it does appear to be free community college tuition, despite the amounts looking shockingly low. But if your local branch is more expensive, you might have to commute to another one to get your education closer to free.
Velociraptor = Distiraptor / Timeraptor
I'm not making this up, but I wish that I were. I'm a computer science Ph.D. with a lot of teaching experience. Recently, a community college in California wanted to hire me to teach a computer literacy class as part of the Year Up program. I was emailed a 203-page pdf of hiring materials. There, buried on page 37, was a loyalty oath that I was required to sign as a condition of employment. It is reproduced below. I refused to sign it and was not hired. Is this the fascist left or the fascist right? California Uber Alles, y'all.
"I, (Print Name) Do solemnly swear, or affirm that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of California against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of California; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties upon which I am about to enter"
See subject.
Also you need to add books and other fees to that $2,400
Software engineering is a field that is still more art than craft. It will remain that for the foreseeable future. That has been known for a long, long time now. And for an art, you need an aptitude or you will never be any good. While we definitely should get anybody with that aptitude into it, we must get rid of all those without it, because their lack of skill is costing society extremely. Mediocre software engineers have negative productivity, sometimes massively so. "Diversity" will be a side-result of that. Not that "diversity" actually has any value when the individuals are all highly skilled. Highly skilled individuals in any STEM field are rare enough that all that can be found will have very good opportunities. Diversity only has a place in jobs most people can do because only there can you realistically discriminate.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Let's assume we have known populations A, B, C, D, and E. Each population is roughly equally divided between populations X and Y. We've done testing on intelligence and psychological tendencies on all these groups. We can say that A has the highest intelligence, B the lowest, C about average, D slightly above average, and E slightly below average. When grouped by X and Y we can see that, on average, Y scores higher in intelligence but X is lower. This is not generally disputed. People may argue if this is genetic, cultural, learned behavior, a result of nutrition (or lack thereof) between the populations, but generally this testing is not disputed.
Further we can see that group D might be generally average in intelligence taken as a whole they score higher in verbal skills. Group A scores highly in mathematical skills, but perhaps lower in verbal skill. Groups B and E may test poorly generally in intelligence but they score better than average on spacial comprehension. People in group C tend to be good planners, capable of abstract thought, long term planning, and an ability to multi-task. People in group X tend to be able to work better in groups, have a tendency for showing greater concern for others, and those in group Y tend to be more competitive and combative, and while able to work well in groups these people will want to shine above the rest.
Given all of this we'd expect these traits to show in their abilities within their chosen professions, and also the professions they choose. People in group A being analytical thinkers might choose things like law, engineering, and accounting. People in groups B and E might tend to be technicians, athletes, and mechanics. People in group C might tend to be managers, farmers/ranchers, and police/fire/first-responders. Those in group D might be sales, public relations, actors/authors/entertainers. When it comes to a specific field, take medicine for example, you might find group Y tend to be specialists and X generalists. In medicine you might also find X tending towards pediatric medicine, and Y tending towards adult medicine.
In an army you might find more foot soldiers and other front line troops fitting into groups Y, C, B, and E. The support troops are more likely to be X, A, and D. On a sports team, the team captains, coaches, and specialist are more likely to be A, C, and D. The other spots on the team will tend to be filled with groups B and E. Individual and aggressive sports will be favored by Y and X prefers sports demanding teamwork and dexterity.
So, in a business we might have the different groups tending to gravitate to the spots in the company where they feel comfortable, where they can excel. This is somehow a problem. So we must "force" this diversity into groups where they might not fit? Why must we do this? Oh, diversity. Because diversity is good. But if these groups bring different skills to the table then would not these different skills bring them to be in different positions within the company? If group A tends to be good at accounting then let them be in accounting. If C excels in engineering then let them be in engineering. If B and E do well as technicians then let them be technicians. If D excels in advertising and PR then let them do that. Forcing diversity for the sake of diversity means forcing people into positions where they may not excel, and that's not good for anyone.
Then we'll see people breaking this "diversity" down further into a third dimension of Q, R, S, and T. Now we're into defining diversity to where it might be considered absurd. If this is not considered going into the absurd then creating a fourth dimension of diversity might come into play, and if we don't consider these four dimensions of diversity in hiring then somehow we are just bad people.
How about we ignore these largely arbitrary classifications of people and hire those best suited for the job?
These demands for "diversity" have become more dangerous to society than the discrimination it's supposed to prevent. We're still discriminating but now that we're supposedly discriminating "equally" that's somehow okay.
Makes me think that some people are more equal that others.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
When you get all the applications sort them for the skills needed.
People that have listed that they have the skills for the job.
Hire a large company that can do background checking to look over the list of names who say they have the needed skills.
Did all the information in the resume match an actual educational history?
Get good grades at a good university that still gradates on merit, has tests and exams?
Did they get social advancement considerations to get into an average university?
Did they get social advancement considerations to get into university and all the time while at university?
Political activities on campus? Did the person study to pass exams? Study union organizing?
Social advancement considerations needed to graduate too?
Look over the social media thats still online. No social media? Was their social media removed? Hidden? Private? Why?
Some of the best and larger background checking services will have older social media on file. Pay to have them look over their past saved social media files?
Find what was been hidden by that person seeking employment?
Lots of social media? Who are they with? Track back over 2 hops of friends and people in the social media photos and videos.
Grow up with good academic people?
Surrounded by people enjoying a lifestyle that would cause problems for your company?
A person with no social media now and no past use of social media can be found with background checking?
That cost for real background checking can save a larger company form so many staff issues.
That person worked for the US gov? US mil? Law enforcement? But made no mention of that in their resume?
What did a person like that do for years? Is the gov trying to investigate your company? Tried to hide parts of a university education that can only really be used for US mil/law enforcement work?
Do they still work for US gov/mil?
A journalist doing an undercover story about working conditions in your company created years of fake social media but skilled background checking finally found one photo thought removed from social media years ago.
Look deep into the lifestyles and politics of people trying to get into your company.
They could be anyone. Police, media, a unionist? Some education policy in a city or state that gave everyone a passing grade for a decade.
Select your workers based on merit and education after looking over their past.
The small upfront costs of professional background checking can save your company from all kinds of social engineering attempts and all the people who lack the expected qualifications.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Your statement is not backed up by applicant demographics, irrespective of actual hires.
If you don't even apply for a job, you're not a candidate. Although I guess that's very fucking diverse.
Thanks entirely to the Democratic ownership of the state legislature and the governorship, Oregon promises free community college for any legal state resident starting out college from highschool (or GED)....
And the Republican legislature of Tennessee says "Welcome to the club, Oregon! What took you so long?".
The fact is, a lot of states are doing it. California offers one year of college. Rhode Island offers 2. New York even includes 4 year institutions. Last month the city of Dallas got in on the action..
Sadly, it's not quite as good as it sounds. They aren't simply dropping the cost of community college to zero. What these things are is a "last dollar" scholarship where they ensure you first get all the federal student aid you are eligible for and the scholarship fills in the rest.
Textbooks and Open Educational Resources
Just to note, what California has is VERY rare, if not unique. California has the master plan for higher education, which as far as I know, no other state has anything quite like it, where they clearly lay out the roles of each level (2 year, 4 year, post grad). The IGETC means credits doesn't even enter into the picture, not in a course by course way, when transferring from a CC. I went this route myself, California CC into UCI.
And yes, CC's are not meant for 4 year degrees at all, but the pipeline part does mean it integrate into a 4 year plan very easily.
12 * $100 * 3 = $3600. But if you're a full time student, you better also go summer term or you won't get student loans. If you're going to move out of your dwelling every year and spend summers with mom, then no problem.
The Oregon Promise Grant is a great program, but it is not very close to free education.
Jordan B Peterson Verified twitter account @jordanbpeterson
22h22 hours ago
"More differences in personality within groups (including race) than between groups. The same is true of the vast majority of such differences. Note that, identitarians, left and right alike. http://bit.ly/2nm0EJc "
330 replies 474 retweets 1,664 likes
Still waiting for the argument for "diversity" that isn't upended by a simple rebuttal. Western civilization has always been a meritocracy at it's core. There have always been class barriers, but where on earth has there not been? Ever?
Some one is trying to change that, some one is trying to destroy western civilization and plunder it. That doesn't necessarily mean these people are coming from outside of it.
"Diversity" is a literal and true conspiracy. It's a malicious lie being enforced from the top down through the schools, universities, and media. It's an orchestrated narrative being perpetuated by an extreme minority of wealthy individuals to break down society and enforce unprecedented slavery on us all.
This is a simple model of displacement. This is simple physics. If a space is occupied by a body, it cannot be occupied by another body without pressure and displacement. So where is this pressure coming from exactly? We're supposed to believe that the bodies have changed properties, that they suddenly do not want to occupy the space that nourishes them. A more mentally sane point of view would be that the entering body is being forced in.
If you do the math, which isn't very complicated, it's aimed at putting down white people.
When you prioritize other people for employment based on their race and gender, rather than their achievement and skill, it's a negative action, not a positive one. It's not 'affirmative' at all. And it's not "all relative". The effect of the action either way you look at it is always that white men are excluded disproportionately to their achievement and qualification.
Any way you look at the equation, there's a negative attached to the "white male" unit.
It's impossible to make minority employment 'affirmative' by quotas. That is not the variable you can manipulate if justice and positive affirmation is your goal.
In order for the action to be positive, all aspects of it have to be VOLUNTARY and explicitly consented to. When did we have a vote in which white people decided they wanted to be discriminated against?
Notice how I said this was about putting white PEOPLE down, not just white MEN. Well when you exclude white men from the work place, who are the white women going to socialize with? The probability becomes ever greater that they will socialize with nonwhite men, therefore becoming more likely to become involved romantically with nonwhite men, therefore becoming more likely to end the identity of their genetic line as being white.
And this is all happening in the middle class, in the high-paying job sectors. White people are meant to be relegated to lower classes where they are much less likely to marry and/or have children.
The white identity is being systematically destroyed.
"Diversity" is not a slippery slope, it's a vertical abyss. You are being targeted, you are being attacked, fight back while you can.
My karma was manually wiped by site staff https://slashdot.org/~slshdtisctrldbysjws 18 mod up, 10 mod down = bad karma
"Community college is not flashy and does not make promises about your future employability. You will also likely not learn current way-cool web development technologies like React and GraphQL. In terms of projects, you're more likely to build software for organizing a professor's DVD or textbook collection than you are responsive web apps. I would tell you that all of this is OK because in community college computer science classes you're learning fundamentals, broad concepts like data structures, algorithmic complexity, and object-oriented programming. You won't learn any of those things as deeply as you would in a full-on university computer science program, but you'll get pretty far."
This is an insultingly stupid summary of community college computer science classes.
I learned React at a local community college, and, well, web apps aren't even the point of computer science. You want to learn how to write web apps, go take a 6 week bootcamp or something.
Our local community college teaches C++17 and has better homework assignments than Berkeley. I know this, since I have looked at the homework for Hilfinger's CS61A. They're surprisingly dull and uninteresting. (Look at them yourself: https://cs61a.org/) Students at our local computer science class learned about arrays by writing photoshop filters (of their own design and artistic sensibilities) on an array of RGB data.
Community college CS classes typically cap at around 40 students, and allow you to interact with the professor and ask for help. Most UCs, Berkeley included, have introductory CS classes in stadium classrooms with hundreds of students in it, where you can't ask a question if you're confused, and half the class doesn't even bother showing up.
Frankly, students get a better education at a community college, overall.
I agree wholeheartedly. Authoritarian hell holes like Scandinavia, Western Europe have far more unequal participation of men vs women in software development than egalitarian utopias like India and China.
Men are identical to women, period. Genetics and chromosomes are two hoaxes on the flat earth made by God in 6 days 6000 years ago. Free will, my ass!
Bingo Dictionary - Pragmatist, n. A myopic idealist.
If you haven't heard, software engineering has a diversity problem
There's unequal participation. That doesn't mean there's a problem.
What if I told you that in addition to unequal participation, there is also discrimination (racial, age and gender based)? I know because I was a target of it once (and that shit cost me money). And I've actually witnessed in other cases.
Somehow it seems to be that because there is a problem of unequal participation - which is also due to (partially, not totally) to systemic discrimination - that it is logically mandatory to conclude there is no discrimination against the members of those cohorts that happened to participate.
It also seems (and this is not addressed to you, but to other posters) that because there is age discrimination (which statistically happens to affect white folks the most) that this somehow precludes or denies the more pervasive racial and gender discrimination cases that do exist elsewhere (or sometimes in tandem.)
How about just acknowledge that there is discrimination, that it is multi-factorial, that it aggravates participation in several cohorts (and that therefore has an economic impact on individuals, and ergo, to the nation's social capital as a whole)?
I mean, for fuck's sake, it's not a fucking zero-sum game. It's just a matter of being decent and hire and respect people for the capabilities and professional personalities only.
I'm expecting to see some great non-biased, apolitical responses to this post.
In Virginia you can Audit (no credit) classes for free as a senior citizen over 60.
AND, if you're a senior citizen with an income of less than $21K, you can take the courses for regular credit.
(Books are not free however.)
Tracy Johnson
Old fashioned text games hosted below:
http://empire.openmpe.com/
BT