MB, have you read David Anderegg's Nerds: Who they are and why we need more of them?
I haven't - but I was just checking it out on Amazon. If I can't find it in a store, I may pick it up from them. Thanks for the heads up.
Back when I was in school, I took a look at programming a couple of times, but never actually took a course.
I've taught Computer Programming for over 20 years. Back when I was just starting out with it in '85, I taught it as a Post Secondary level - meaning a student had to have graduated from high school but they didn't necessarily have to have attended college. The vast majority of my students were women wanting to improve their skills or looking to get into the field. (Though nowadays that curriculum would be a joke because the three languages I taught were Basic, Cobol and RPG II/III, and they aren't even used anymore.
) I've long since moved to the college level - and today one really needs a college degree just to get an interview, much less a job. For quite a while it was pretty evenly split, but nowadays it's true that there must be 1 woman for every 6-8 men. Not as bad as the statistics in the linked article. But not nearly as balanced as it should be.