Digital Divas: Putting the Wow into Computing for Girls

There is ample literature detailing lack of interest girls particularly in their later teen years show in computing generally and the subsequent decline in the number of women entering the IT workforce. In 2007, to address this problem, we trialled a new and revolutionary program designed to excite girls’ interest in Information Technology (IT); we called our program ‘Digital Divas’. As far as we know there has only been one other longer term intervention program which was run in the United Kingdom, designed to change girls’ perceptions of IT. Our program was unique because it ran in schools as part of the school curriculum.

The underlying philosophy of Digital Divas was that if we provided educationally sound materials that tapped into the interest of girls, delivered in all-girl classes within the school curriculum we could change girls’ perceptions of IT careers. The pilot program was a success and this led us to design a larger project the outcomes of which are the subject of this book.