GENDER PAY EQUALITY - PART 2
What is wrong with this picture?
First this: The Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts that Computer Science jobs will continue to be one of the fastest-growing fields. Yet, only 18% of the Computer Science graduates are women.
Then this: a typical job ad for an entry-level (i.e. no prior work experience needed) will read something like below:
You should have:
Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science or related field
Experience with HTML5, Javascript, and/or SQL skills
Exceptional communication skills and the ability to manage multiple tasks efficiently
This is systematic inequality at work (pun intended!). The Companies hiring say that they are gender blind, and it is the colleges that are producing this inequality. The colleges blame the schools, and this just goes on. By the time we sort this out, another generation of women will have missed the opportunity.
I suggest a new mindset from Companies instead.
Companies can be Technology Schools too!
Don’t make an IT degree a requirement for IT jobs at entry-level. Hire the best talent regardless of major. And provide them the IT skills they need to do their jobs. In fact, you can focus the training on only those aspects of IT that your Company needs. In a field like IT, many of the things they teach in college are obsolete anyway in a few years. Companies can start doing this right away; without waiting for colleges, and schools before them, achieve gender balance. Equality can be then a few years away, not decades.
Photo credit
[https://social.hays.com/2018/03/07/men-apply-jobs-mars-women-venus/]