According to Walter Isaacson, author of “The Innovators”, some early women influencers in computing included Ada Lovelace, and Grace Hopper (Isaacson, 2014). She observed while working with Charles Babbages on his calculating machine, that it beyond just calculating numbers, it could support anything symbolically, including music, and word processing. Ms. Lovelace (1815-1852) was a gifted computer programmer and mathematician that was considered to have written instructions for the first computer program in the mid-1800’s (Biography.com, 2017).
Grace Hopper (1906-1992) worked with Howard Aiken in developing the Mark I computer at Harvard. She observed that providing the computer an instruction set, that would teach the computer what to do, was a critical aspect of computing. Herself, and a team of women, were credited with the first business programming, known as COBOL. She was also credited with the term ‘debugging a machine’, as she successfully troubleshooted an issue with the Mark 1 machine, having the root cause of a moth found inside the unit (Isaacson, 2014). …show more content…
Further research into diversity, or the lack thereof, in the IT industry, reveals that as of 2007, only 24.7 percent of computer programmers, and 20.8 percent of software engineers are women. Since the mid-1980’s, women choosing IT has declined from 37 percent to just over 20 percent. The documented rationale for women not entering technology and computer fields include their incorrect perception that these professionals are “nerdy”, and would mean sitting in front of a computer all day with little social interaction. Women see the culture as mostly male, and believe it difficult to balance family and work responsibilities (Harris, Cushman, Kruck & Anderson,
Grace Hopper (1906-1992) worked with Howard Aiken in developing the Mark I computer at Harvard. She observed that providing the computer an instruction set, that would teach the computer what to do, was a critical aspect of computing. Herself, and a team of women, were credited with the first business programming, known as COBOL. She was also credited with the term ‘debugging a machine’, as she successfully troubleshooted an issue with the Mark 1 machine, having the root cause of a moth found inside the unit (Isaacson, 2014). …show more content…
Further research into diversity, or the lack thereof, in the IT industry, reveals that as of 2007, only 24.7 percent of computer programmers, and 20.8 percent of software engineers are women. Since the mid-1980’s, women choosing IT has declined from 37 percent to just over 20 percent. The documented rationale for women not entering technology and computer fields include their incorrect perception that these professionals are “nerdy”, and would mean sitting in front of a computer all day with little social interaction. Women see the culture as mostly male, and believe it difficult to balance family and work responsibilities (Harris, Cushman, Kruck & Anderson,