Help Close the Tech Gender Gap by Hosting a Girls Who Code Club at Your Library

Libraries are the perfect place to host Girls Who Code clubs.

Despite being a continually growing career field, the tech industry still has a concerning lack of girls, women, and nonbinary people. Thankfully, Girls Who Code (GWC) is combating the tech gender gap by providing free educational resources and hosting clubs for young people.

What Is Girls Who Code?

Founded by Reshma Saujani in 2012, Girls Who Code has been bridging the gender gap in technology. In 1995, women made up 37 percent of computer scientists. Over the years, the number has decreased to 24 percent. Under the current CEO, Dr. Tarika Barrett, GWC aims to address the lower number by providing free resources for people of all genders.

Today, the organization continues to break down barriers, focusing on AI and other emergent technologies. GWC launched two new AI programs and a data science course to teach young people to utilize AI for specialties like financial literacy and music production. Their goal is to reach two hundred thousand US students with their new educational resources.

GWC defines itself by its values of bravery, sisterhood, and activism. It uplifts diversity, equity, and inclusion, with 50 percent of its students coming from underrepresented groups. Alongside its mission to bridge the tech gap, GWC advocates for gender-informed legislation in state and federal government. Current statistics show that the organization has now served 670,000 girls, women, and nonbinary individuals globally.

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GWC Clubs

Clubs are among several educational resources provided by Girls Who Code. GWC clubs are free for any girl or nonbinary person interested in computer science. The goal is to join a sisterhood of supportive role models and peers to further bridge the gender gap in the career field. Clubs contain a flexible curriculum that can be adapted to meet every student’s needs.

GWC partners with libraries, school districts, and thousands of other community spaces across the nation to support clubs. These clubs can occur on weekends, after school, or during the summer and may be held in person or virtually. The curriculum for grades three to five includes reading and discussing one of the organization’s books and completing guided challenges. Grades six to twelve focus on enhancing tech skills and developing community by completing coding projects.

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How to Get Involved

Anyone can join a GWC club. The process is simple and user-friendly! Students in third to twelfth grade only need to find a club in their community and participate in coding activities run by the host. Becoming a facilitator and encouraging young people to engage in tech is also possible.

Facilitators are typically librarians, teachers, volunteers, and parents from diverse backgrounds and experiences. Anyone, even those without tech experience, is encouraged to get involved. Facilitators can learn to code alongside their club members, initiating community and teamwork.

In response to COVID-19, GWC expanded its services to support facilitators interested in hosting virtual clubs. People interested in hosting a club can visit their website and fill out an application.

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Libraries Bridge the Tech Gender Gap

What do libraries have to do with bridging the gender gap in tech? It might be surprising to find out that they are essential to the values shared by Girls Who Code. For one thing, libraries are typically centralized and accessible community centers. This makes it easier for people to get involved with coding and tools provided by GWC.

Librarians can also be club facilitators, enabling them to provide free programming for community members. Libraries include resources like free computers, wifi, office tools, and even makerspaces that encourage underrepresented coders to thrive. Volunteers and parents can also facilitate meetings in library community rooms, which are usually free to the public and can be reserved ahead of time for consistent gatherings.

GWC’s policy agenda also outlined steps for librarians and facilitators to initiate coding clubs. Librarians can track data based on computer science participation to see how they impact the gender gap. Librarians also have pre-existing tools to easily teach other facilitators inclusion training. Best of all, libraries directly meet the needs of underrepresented community members.

Libraries, with free educational resources provided by Girls Who Code, are perfect locations for community members interested in tech. Apply to start a GWC club in your area and talk to your local librarian about how they can help.

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