You may seem like you been reading about diversity in tech, that is because there is still not enough diversity in tech! Companies such as HP, IBM, Facebook, and Apple have increased on their gender diversity. HP and IBM have been had a reasonable gender diversity. Both Facebook and Apple have increased 31 percent of their employees are women now. These companies say hiring a new head of diversity is a way to change things and are hiring more minority groups.

White men are still dominating the college computer science departments by a lot! White men dominate by at least 30K, where at black men are just be below 5k, and as for black women, it is around 2k. A reason for this may be how the way companies try to recruit talents. Since these are male-dominated industries these companies tend to be sexist when it comes to recruiting females, they typically want men and use masculine language that does not appeal to women. As a woman that is trying to get into the tech industry, I think it is ridiculous how men will think their “masculine language” does not appeal to women. Us women can do anything a man can do if we put our minds to it. For instance, IBM had its first female VP in the 1940s.

Today more women than men earn college degrees, even though the number of women that are studying computer science is falling. This has always been a problem since the 1970s, that when typing stopped being considered as a course for computer science and women were majoring in it because it was something, they were expected to be very good at. Nowadays there are more women that are studying STEM majors but not a lot are choosing computer science. Most women in STEM are making about $16,000 less than males and if you are a black or Hispanic you can be making $14,000 less than your white coworkers. The wage parity is very unfair especially if you are women of color or just women in general. It is awesome that companies are striving to diversify their workforces, let us hope they focus on wage parity as well.

It can tend to be hard to find yourself or what major you would like to do in college. A lot of college students tend to major in undecided until they figure out what they want to do. Whereas myself I jumped right into something I thought I’d like but did not have a passion for. I started off college as a respiratory care major, I thought this was something that I would enjoy but it was not my preferred cup of tea. So, I decided to change my major to something completely different which would be computer science, I had a passion for computers, social media, being creative in making different designs. I have found myself even though I knew nothing about coding which was a tad bit difficult for me, but I got tuff it. I know just like myself there are other women out there can relate to this YouTube video I found.

A young women name Tiffani Buck who graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science from Georgia State University. Tiffany just like myself she did have not had a clear set path in the beginning when she first started college. She first started her journey in college as a journalism major and switched her major twice before ending up as a Computer Science major. It was difficult for her to manage all the class requirements, so she took extra summer classes and ended up graduating in May of 2018. Being a woman of color in such a male-dominating field can be very hard, Tiffani has created a sense of community for many women in Computer Science by creating an organization at Georgia State University called Girls++.

If you cannot find yourself by changing your major the first time you should try taking a personality test which tests you on things you like or what you find interesting, you can even try talking to your current advisor or dean of your college. They can also help you point yourself into the right directing. Remember you can do and become a thing you put your heart and mind to, and you have people in your college community that would love to help you find the right you no matter how slow or fast it takes. Just take your time and be patent with yourself.