You know we're in deep when "villainy" is considered an upgrade.
On Mon, Dec 12, 2011 at 3:41 PM, Damion Alexander <[email protected]>wrote:
> ----- Original Message -----
> > There's certainly other possibilities. As with all of these sorts of
> > "population-demographic comparisons", it's possible that they simply
> > aren't interested. That maybe a smaller percentage of
> > ${minority_vector} candidates have any interest at all, even exposed
> > to the option and opportunity, and maybe that explains the decreased
> > career adoption rate.
> >
>
>
> One of the biggest 'controllable' factors involved is that there is very
> poor exposure of the field.
>
> - How many "hollywood" portrayals of "people good with computers" show
> them in a positive light socially? Typically it's 'socially awkward'. At
> least Die hard 4 introduced villainy.
> - Is the field of IT or System Administration being introduced at the high
> school levels? Or are people left to discover it on their own?
> - Is there a definition of System Administration that can be explained to
> the grandmother that sounds more impressive than "I work with computers"?
>
> I'm not sure of the exact methods to introduce junior-high/high school
> students to the profession of System Administration but it doesn't seem
> impossible. I lucked out in that I was introduced to computers in second
> grade (TI-99), my mother listened when I offhandedly mentioned that I
> wanted a computer (Commodore 64) and my high-school was an engineering
> school that had it's own mainframe where we learned fortran.
>
> However the biggest stumbling block I see is that there is a cultural
> stigma to working with computers. Besides all of the negative connotations
> with being a 'geek', there is a growing concern where "If you know
> computers you're smart. If you're smart you're acting white". I'm old
> enough that that few times I've been given that statement ("you're the
> whitest boy I know") I ignore it. But for a teenager still trying to find
> their way in the world, it can be a huge road block.
>
> If SysAdmins want to encourage more ${minority_vector} students to take a
> look into the tech field we need to somehow expose younger students to the
> field. Let's not wait until college where the cast is mostly set.
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