The Times-Tribune – KATHLEEN BOLUS
” The girls meeting in the dimly lit University of Scranton computer lab aren’t trying to hack into secret files or “break the Internet.” The only thing the members of the Scranton chapter of Girls Who Code are hoping to crack is the gender gap. “In the future there’s going to be a greater need for people who know how to do this stuff everywhere so there’s no reason why boys should only know how to do it,” said Alana Simrell, an eighth- grader from All Saints Academy, who is the group’s vice president. Girls Who Code is a national group that encourages girls to close the gender gap in computer science. Sponsored by Bill Miller, a local parent, the chapter of 14 girls in grades eight to 12 from different area schools met every Thursday for 20 weeks to learn to write computer code used in websites, cellphone apps and computer programs, and be introduced to career possibilities in a male-dominated field.”(more)