fester@math.berkeley.edu (07/06/88)
In article <11535@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> dana@ernie.Berkeley.EDU (Dana Bergen) writes: >I had the good fortune to discover the Computer Science Reentry Program >at U.C. Berkeley. The program is open to women and "underrepresented >minorities" who want to go to graduate school in Computer Science but >have an undergraduate degree in something other than C.S. Through it, >I was able to take undergraduate C.S. courses at Berkeley without being >enrolled in a degree program (this is normally not allowed). On the I am curious about the success rate programs like these have. I know of a vaguely similar one in Engineering at Boston University. Of course, one needs to define "success": I'm interested in the completion rate of women who enter such programs. It's an odd thing, many of these affirmative action programs. The ones I have heard of are mostly admissions of some sort (i.e. quotas, special programs, etc.) The premise behind them is that women (or minorities, but I'm dealing strictly with the women issue at the moment) have been disadvantaged educationally and as a consequence are underrepresented in certain fields. True enough. But being educationally disadvantaged means that not only are these women incapable (probably) of being *admitted* to do certain kinds of degree work, but that they are then equally likely to not be initially capable of performing at the same level as their peers. So that a program which merely *admits* women and then says, essentially, "you are entirely on your own" is not neccessarily doing much good. Does the Computer Science Re-entry Program have resources available for such women (e.g. tutoring, early advising if advising is nonstandard in the CS department, etc.) ? What are other women's experiences with coming into computer science (or other technical fields) through such programs ? Lea Fester fester@math.berkeley.edu
dana@necntc.nec.com (Dana Albert) (07/06/88)
I was in the Late Entry Accelerated Program for women at Boston University. The financial aid was pitiful, and resulted in my not finishing the program. That was the main reason people left the program, not failing out, etc. We did have a few women leave due to pregnancy. Those who did leave I heard returned to complete their degrees. The program was difficult - essentially, the first year consisted of undergraduate EE courses taken out of sequence. We competed directly with the undergrads in their classes. If we did not achieve a least a B in each course, we could be summarily removed from the program. The stress was almost unbearable. Most of us were motivated enough by visions of more interesting and high salaried employ that we wanted to complete the program. Unfortunately, the money was not there to support those of us who had left full time jobs to go to school full time. Almost all of us worked 20 hours a week to get money to live on, which affected some of the grades.... The women accepted into the program had at least a 3.0 average in their previous Bachelor's program - and that degree had to be in math or science. Liberal arts majors (not math or sciences) had to prove eligibility by taking some math courses prior to starting the actual program. All of the women I met were of high caliber. I went in 1982 - 1983. In Jan 1983, men were accepted into the program as well. As musch as people might complain about BU, its the only engineering school I know of that has 50% women in its programs - obviously women came not only from the LEAP, but from the regular undergrad program. Just thought I'd share - Dana visions of more interesting and higher salaried employ to
dana@ernie.Berkeley.EDU (Dana Bergen) (07/12/88)
In article <11689@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> fester@math.berkeley.edu writes: > >So that a program which merely *admits* women >and then says, essentially, "you are entirely on your own" is not >neccessarily doing much good. Does the Computer Science Re-entry >Program have resources available for such women (e.g. tutoring, early >advising if advising is nonstandard in the CS department, etc.) ? I agree 100% that admission to programs is not enough. Absolutely, the most important aspect for me about the Re-entry Program was the support provided to the students. The program provided lists of people to call (and introductions) for all types of advice (e.g. faculty members, graduate students, other reentry students, graduates who were out working at jobs, administrators, etc.); arranged free tutoring (with women tutors whenever possible); organized lunches to make it easy for us to connect with one another; and generally helped us not to get "lost" in a very large and intimidating department. There is a network of reentry program alums and other people currently or formerly associated with the program in some way, most of whom are very willing to help out current students. This is one of the best benefits of this type of program. Dana dana@ernie.berkeley.edu ucbvax!ernie!dana