She++ fellowships aim to spread the gospel that coding is cool
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The latest effort to get more kids interested in technology comes from a group of Stanford University students who’ve known for a long time that coding is cool.
She++, a campus-based organization that works to empower women in technology, is launching a fellowship today that is meant to encourage high school students to design programs that promote tech education.
The #include Fellowships will connect high school students with college-student mentors and give kids the chance to attend an all-expense-paid tech learning and networking summit on campus in the spring.
The fellows will be expected to somehow bring technology education to their schools or communities. Though the organization’s thrust has primarily been around computer science, the projects don’t necessarily need to be computer-science oriented.
“Any tech field is fine,” says Priya Ganesan, who’s doing publicity for she++.  ”Start a robotics club, get AP computer science taught in your school, create a coding club, increase student interest in computer science.”
No question the country has a big problem when it comes to women in technical fields. There just aren’t many, as Pinterest engineer Tracy Chou pointed out last week. Here’s her spreadsheet.
The problem has been a stubborn one, though recently there has been what seems to be a flood of ideas to move the needle, particularly in computer science.
Beyond she++, which produced a powerful documentary encouraging girls to give computer science a try, including Girls Who Code, Black Girls Code, Technovation and Code.org, which is pushing coding for kids in general, but which understands that such a program is bound to increase girls’ participation.
Here’s the she++ video:
The #include Fellowship will offer kids mentors to help them design and push their programs and help them master technical skills in the process. The program is open to both young men and young women in high school.
Those interested can apply on the fellowship section of the  she++ website, which is scheduled to go live today.
(Photo by Joanne HoYoung Lee)