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Resources based on "Hidden Figures"

“Hidden Figures” brings to light the stories of Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan, and Mary Jackson — three Black women mathematicians who charted the course that launched Astronaut John Glenn into orbit during the Space Race in the 1950s.

Use NCWIT resources below to go beyond the screen, and encourage girls’ and young women’s interest in computing. And, visit ncwit.org/hiddenfigures for reasons why telling the countless, amazing stories of women in computing is so critical.

 

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How Can You Engage A Diverse Range of Girls in Technology?

Culturally Responsive Computing (CRC) programs help educators connect computing curriculum to the interests, prior experiences, and needs of students diverse in race, class, ability, and sexual orientation. One such promising program is COMPUGIRLS.

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Top 10 Ways to Engage Underrepresented Students in Computing

These tips will help you to engage students in your computing courses and retain them in the major. These ideas and examples are drawn from theory and research conducted by social scientists who study issues related to diversity and retention in computing. Methods range from encouraging words to inclusive classroom environments.

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Top 10 Ways Families Can Encourage Girls' Interest in Computing

Technology is a fast-growing, high-paying, creative field. Here are 10 ways that you, as a family member, can encourage the girls in your life to study, and have a career in, computer science and related technology fields.

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Why Should Young People Consider Careers in Information Technology?

Created for school counselors by Counselors for Computing (C4C), a project of the NCWIT K-12 Alliance made possible by the Merck Company Foundation, this card gives adults talking points and additional resources for a conversation with their students, children, and/or other young people. The main message is that IT offers meaningful work, security and high salaries with a bachelor’s degree, and flexibility and variety. Information is provided to address these specific questions: What should you tell a young person about a career in IT?
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How Can Encouragement Increase Persistence in Computing?

Encouragement increases self-efficacy, which is the belief in one’s ability to successfully perform a task. Because we are more likely to engage in tasks that we believe we can perform successfully, encouragement may be especially useful for attracting women to male-stereotyped fields such as computing.

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Unconscious Bias and Why It Matters For Women and Tech

Learn about some of the hidden barriers that often prevent technical organizations from hiring and retaining top talent. This video will take you through a series of engaging, interactive experiments that introduce the concept of unconscious bias and explain why this information is vital for technical companies to understand. The video will also point to free NCWIT resources you can use to address these hidden barriers in order to better attract and retain a diverse workforce that will drive future innovation.
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What are the Important Components of Targeted Recruiting?

Targeted recruiting means planning strategically: set quantifiable goals; identify large, capable audiences; personalize the content of your message; deliver that message in media that are relevant to your audience; and pay attention to people who influence your audience’s decision-making.

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How Do You Introduce Computing in an Engaging Way?

Engage students not already drawn to computing by creating academic and social environments where these students feel like they belong. Students respond positively to solving real-life problems that draw on their existing knowledge and interests and that involve collaboration in hands-on projects.

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Top 10 Ways of Recruiting High School Women into Your Computing Classes

Recruiting diverse students to computing requires that you spark their interest, build their confidence they can succeed, create a community where they feel like they belong, and help them see themselves as a "computing person." This Top 10 list offers practices that help you recruit high school girls to your computing courses.

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Top 10 Ways to Retain Students in Computing

Top 10 Ways You Can Retain Students in Computing

This brief, easy-to-share resource highlights the top ten evidence-based ways to retain undergraduate students in computing.

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Related resource:
  • EngageCSEdu: Foster diversity in your introductory computer science courses with quality content and engaging pedagogy.
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How Do You Retain Women Through Inclusive Pedagogy?

Women and minority students are not in computing courses under the same conditions as their white male classmates. Instructional practices offer opportunities to level the playing field and improve the retention of underrepresented students.

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How Does Engaging Curriculum Attract Students to Computing?

Making curricula more relevant to students, introducing collaborative learning into the classroom, and tailoring courses to different student experience levels benefit female as well as male students. 

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How can I prepare for a computing major?

How can I prepare for a computing major?

Produced with the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) and the Computer Science Teachers Association (CSTA), this card gives computing-specific advice for the steps to take on the path from high school to college.
Which computing pathway is right for me?

Which computing pathway is right for me?

This card, co-branded by the six founding PACE (Partnership for Advancing Computing Education) organizations, explains how computing interests and talents line up with different undergraduate courses of study and the careers that follow.

C4C Intersecting Pathways Poster (24"x36")

This large printable poster (24"x36") provides information about various paths students can take to get to a career in computing. The poster includes specific steps to follow beginning in high school, college, university and military service pathways that lead to various jobs.
Counselor Lesson Plan

Counselor Lesson Plan (PDF)

Counselors and others in an advising role can use this interactive lesson plan to introduce middle and high school students to computing and careers.
EngageCSEdu

EngageCSEdu (website)

EngageCSEdu is a website that encourages the development of more inclusive learning environments in introductory computer science (CS) courses by helping faculty to easily share their most effective retention practices. EngageCSEdu offers thousands of projects, homework assignments, and other course materials that are searchable by computer science knowledge area, programming language, and more. All course materials are developed by faculty members nationwide and evaluated for quality by an interdisciplinary team of computer scientists, learning scientists, and diversity experts.
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Top 10 Ways to Increase Girls' Participation in Computing Competitions

Are you interested in getting more girls involved in your computing competition? This Top 10 resource offers simple suggestions to make your competition appeal to a wider range of participants. Taking these steps will benefit all students and help make your event a success. 

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Girls in IT: The Facts (infographic)

Girls in IT: The Facts Infographic

This attention-getting infographic summarizes the key findings from the Girls in IT report. Use this piece to raise awareness about ways to increase girls' participation in computing.

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By the Numbers

By the Numbers

Check out the most compelling statistics on women's participation in computing on a single page.
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Critical Listening Guide: Just Because You Always Hear It, Doesn't Mean It's True

Use this guide to help identify common misunderstandings that surface when people talk about how to increase the participation of women.  Learn to spot "red flags" that indicate a particular discussion is headed in a direction that may not be research-based or effective.

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