Reposted from the Wall Street Journal:
Women CIOs speaking at a panel on education and leadership credited their skills at identifying and collaborating with their peers in the business with contributing to their professional advancement. But to grow the next generation of IT leaders, technology education must start as early as middle school, they said, adding that girls, especially, need to be kept engaged to help address today’s tech gender gap.
“The market is ripe to get kids engaged because they are interacting with technology all of the time,” said Michelle Garvey, CIO of retailer Ann Inc., on a panel discussion sponsored by Columbia University here Wednesday. “Everybody is in technology now.”
Perhaps, but the gender gap looms large in technology. Google Inc., Facebook Inc. and several other companies have weathered heavy fire following their release of “diversity reports” citing male-to-female employees ratios of 70% to 30%. There is no silver bullet to bridging the diversity gap, but the panel offered some advice on how to level up.
Actualization 
Truthfully, exposure should start earlier than that, as studies show girls starting to turn away from math and science by age eight. I believe much of this is due to the differences in toys and play that boys and girls are exposed to from birth on up. We’ve got to do better by our girls. Thanks for sharing! 🙂
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Erica I agree. Girls are ready in elementary school to be engaged and excited about science!
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