Changing the Code: Why Tech Needs More Creativity

When people talk about getting more girls into tech, they usually say the same thing: give them more laptops or sign them up for more classes. But after a few years of teaching coding to elementary schoolers, I’ve realized that access isn't the real problem. The real barrier is how we introduce it.

If you sit an eight-year-old girl down, open up a black screen, and tell her to memorize code, she’s probably going to get bored. It feels like an extra math homework assignment. But if you ask her, "What do you want to build?" or "What problem do you want to fix in your neighborhood?" everything changes. Suddenly, languages like Scratch or Python aren't just frustrating syntax—they are tools to make something cool.

I’ve seen this happen firsthand while running weekly coding circles with Girls Who Code and teaching classes for Boolean Girls. For younger kids, having a mentor who is just a few years older than they are makes a huge difference. Tech stops looking like a career path meant for older adults in Silicon Valley and starts looking like something they can do right now. When I talk to my students about working on a robotics project with a professor or building mission designs for a NASA program, I don't focus on the complicated engineering. I talk about the glitches, the teamwork, and how cool it feels when you finally get a project to work.

We also need to teach kids how to fail better. In programming, your code breaks constantly. You have to look for the error, debug it, and try again. If we can teach girls to treat mistakes as just another piece of data—instead of a sign that they "aren't good at STEM"—we give them a type of resilience that helps them everywhere, not just behind a keyboard.

Getting more women into tech isn't just about fixing the percentages on a chart. The software and apps we use every day are shaping our entire world, and the people building them should reflect the people using them. If we want the next generation of girls to stick with tech, we have to stop treating it like a rigid lecture and start treating it like what it actually is: a way to create something new.