Year 9 students attended a conference at Teesside University designed to help them understand both the creative and technical skills involved in computing.
Although teenage girls are now using computers and the internet at rates similar to their male peers, they are still five times less likely to consider a technology related career. There has also been a drop in the number of students taking computing- based subjects at degree level and historically women have been under-represented in this field - though there is no clear evidence why.
With these statistics in mind, Teesside University held a 'Girls and Gadgets' conference on 8th January which was attended by 25 of our female Year 9 students. They were accompanied by Mr. Soochit and Miss Wilson from the ICT Department. The aim of the day was to get girls excited about using computers and destroy the myth that computers are for boys.
The day consisted of a number of workshops such as:
- Cover Girl- in which the student learnt how supermodels are airbrushed before appearing on magazine covers.
- Get Connected; - which involved students setting up their own mini network so that the girls could communicate with each other via the computers.
- Web Workshop - which asked students to create their very own web based calendar.
- My Web Workshop - in which students created their own mini website.