Why Female Students Are Dropping out of CS Programs

Worldwide, women are underrepresented in computer science. The differences between the numbers of male and female graduates from computer science programs are undeniable. This study examines how several previously reported factors of students' secondary school years relate to beginning CS students' intention to continue their studies. Among others, we investigated secondary school computer science education, role models, and extra-curricular activities and conducted a survey (N=424) in the first semester of CS in four universities from four different federal states of Germany. Our data shows that there is a significant relation between female students' intention to continue with their studies and their secondary school computer science education, with participating in an extra-curricular programming activity, and also negatively with the discouragement they had during their education - which is not the same for male or non-binary students. According to additional qualitative data, families play an essential role in both encouraging and discouraging predominantly female students in their continuity of computer science education.