SLIS professor Susan Herring is co-author of chapters recently published in three books about gender and information technology.
For the Encyclopedia of Gender and Information Technology, Gender and the Culture of Computing in Applied IT Education examines the "gender computing gap," focusing on "the possibility that applied IT fields may provide more women-friendly cultures, while still focused on technology" (chapter introduction).
For Women and Information Technology: Research on the Reasons for Under-Representation, Gender Differences among Students in Computer Science and Applied Information Technology compares "the demographics, attitudes, and computing-related behaviors of undergraduate and graduate students majoring in computer science with those majoring in other information technology disciplines" (chapter introduction).
For IT Workers: Human Capital Issues in a Knowledge-Based Environment, Gender and Career Choice Determinants in Information Systems Professionals: A Comparison with Computer Science explores the factors that lead people to choose IT careers, especially in Information Systems, and the implications of gender disparities for the IT professions.
These chapters report recent findings from a National Science Foundation Information Technology Workforce grant entitled, "Toward Gender Equitable Outcomes in IT Higher Education: Beyond Computer Science." Herring is a principal investigator on the three-year, $686,000 grant, which investigates tertiary education programs in information science, information systems, instructional systems technology and informatics, with computer science as a baseline comparison, in major IT degree-granting institutions across the U.S. in order to determine which are most successful at recruiting and retaining female students, and what factors favor success over time.
Herring teaches L565 Computer-Mediated Communication, L567 Gender and Computerization, L597 Content Analysis for the World Wide Web, and L655 Computer-Mediated Discourse Analysis.
Herring, S.C., Ogan, C., Ahuja, M., and Robinson, J.C. (2006). Gender and the culture of computing in applied IT education. In E. M. Trauth (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Gender and Information Technology. Hershey, PA: Information Science Publishing.
Ahuja, M., Ogan, C., Herring, S.C., and Robinson, J.C. (2006). Gender and career choice determinants in information systems professionals: A comparison with computer science. In F. Niederman and T. Farrat (Eds.), IT Workers: Human Capital Issues in a Knowledge-Based Environment (pp. 279-304). Greenwich, CT: Information Age Publishing.
Ogan, C., Robinson, J.C., Ahuja, M., and Herring, S.C. (2006). Gender differences among students in computer science and applied information technology. In: W. Aspray and J. McGrath Cohoon (Eds.), Women and Information Technology: Research on the Reasons for Under-Representation (pp. 279-300). Cambridge: MIT Press.
Posted June 09, 2006