A Community College Approach To Increasing Women
In Technological Fields
About GHSP
 First cohort gathered in 2003 on Essex
Campus
 Currently 74 women have passed through the
program
 Now on all three CCBC campuses
 Funded through an NSF-ATE grant
Uniqueness of GHSP
 Initial Project Team
 Mathematics/Computer Science/IMMT
 Women’s Studies
 CCBC’s first attempt at targeting specifically women
for technological career paths
 Not much research on women and technology within
the Community College
Recruitment
 In class recruitment for all CLM classes
 Mailings
 Faculty Referrals
 Accuplacer test scores
Application Process
 Streamlined over the years
 One letter of recommendation required
 An essay about their strengths and why they want to be
part of the program
 Signed participant contract
 Demographic information
About our Scholars
 Ages from teens to 40’s
 Multicultural
 Single, Married, Divorced
 Some have children and grandchildren
 Both full-time and part-time students
Mentoring
 Each student is assigned a mentor
 Mentor/Mentee pairings based on career paths or common interest.
 Each mentor has training through Maryland State
Mentoring Resource Center
 Mentor Directory available to all scholars
 Contact MUST occur at least twice a semester
Tutoring
 Schedules of scholars and multi-campus format required
alternate forms of tutoring
 Online tutoring available in ALL math courses related to
degrees and certificates in technology
 Faculty tutor higher level courses
 Faculty NOT paid, but it is part of their “Service to College”
Winter Bridge Program
 Learn History of Web
 HTML
 Create web pages about themselves and their mentors
 After first bridge, scholars monitored discussion board
 Due to scholars experience, no longer a requirement.
Summer Bridge Program
 Changes each summer
 Technology related project
 Learning Styles Assessment
 Interviewing Workshops
 Resume Writing Workshop
More Summer Fun
 Lunch with mentors
 Roundtable sessions from industry professionals
 Meet Math and IT faculty at CCBC
Results
 We didn’t increase the overall numbers of women in
Technological majors of study
 Undecided majors at CCBC tend to major in Nursing,
Pharmacology and Business
 Approximately 10% of students went to any given planned
social activity
 Accuplacer test scores not successful for recruitment
More Positive Results
 Decline in enrollment went from 52% in 2003 to only
7% in 2006
 Support structure in place for women that were
interested in technological careers
 34% transfer to four-year schools (approx. 10% higher
than the CCBC average)
Life after CCBC
 "The University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC)
encourages Grace Hopper Scholars to consider transferring
to UMBC, as they actively represent the best qualities of
academic excellence. In particular, the Center for Women
and Information Technology (CWIT) at UMBC welcomes
women who have demonstrated leadership in the Grace
Hopper Scholars program. Through CWIT, Scholars can
access additional doorways that lead to internships, study
groups, and leadership opportunities at UMBC.”

 (C. Morrell, Executive Director of CWIT at UMBC)
What a Girl Wants …
 A peer group they can belong to
 Social Interaction
 Information on success of former scholars
 Money
Things We Learned
 Faculty within the Sciences greatly helped in
recruitment
 Connecting with CSEMS program also helped
 More scholarship money is needed for part-time
students
Thank you to NSF
 This material is based upon work supported in part by
the National Science Foundation under DUE-0302845.
Opinions expressed are those of the authors and do
not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF.
Thank You!
 Donna Tupper
 dtupper@ccbcmd.edu
 Barbara Leitherer
 bleitherer@ccbcmd.edu