Inspiring and Cultivating Female Innovators through Mobile App Development

Globally there is an increasing focus on science, technology, and innovation (STI) throughout all industries and government sectors leading to demands for a larger, more diverse workforce. However, such demand is hardly filled by the supply. The overall goal of this study is to present a strategy to attract incoming freshmen, especially female students, to the STI fields and to increase the retention rate of current female students by offering a mobile app development class. The paper first provides a brief overview of different factors hindering women from participating or staying in the STI fields. The role of gender in innovation and its implications in education is next discussed. Three guiding course design principles used to inspire and cultivate student innovations are summarized. We compare three mobile app projects proposed by boys and three projects by girls and discuss findings to determine differences in learning styles. Finally, future research directions are presented.