Stefanie Zbinden: “Thanks to the EGOI, some of the countries have now launched a national programme for promoting the advancement of women in informatics.”

This June, you were actively involved in running the first EGOI. What was this event all about?

The European Girls’ Olympiad in Informatics, or EGOI for short, brings together schoolgirls from all over Europe for a week where the focus is on informatics. During this week, there are two days of contests when the schoolgirls have to solve informatics problems. These contest days are the highlight of the event. There is also plenty of time for the girls to chat and get to know one another. Because of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, the first EGOI had to take place online.

The International Olympiad Informatics (IOI), which both girls and boys can attend, served as the basis for the external page EGOI. This year, a record number of women attended the IOI: a whole 4.8 percent of all participants were female.
But we don't want to stop at that. We are convinced that there are many more girls who become interested in informatics when they are at school and would like to take part in an informatics contest.
We want to offer girls who are interested in informatics the opportunity to attend such an event and unleash their potential. I myself attended the EGMO (European Girls’ Mathematical Olympiad) when I was still at school. In fact, it was the EGMO which encouraged me to initiate the EGOI. Taking part in the EGMO had a huge impact on me and I find that women interested in informatics also tend to have positive experiences of such events.
 

You took part in the Mathematical Olympiad when you were at secondary school. What motivated you to get involved?

My teacher asked the brother of one of my friends if he would be interested in attending the Swiss Mathematical Olympiad. But he was not able to solve the mathematical problems he was given by his teacher. My friend found this so funny that she told me about it and showed me them. I thought they were great and so wanted to attend the national Olympiad myself. I did so and was successful.
The thing I found most upsetting was that the brother of my friend and I had the same maths teacher. Her brother was asked to attend but did not get anywhere, I was not asked and I did get somewhere. We are losing out on a lot of female participants if they are not even being asked by their teachers.

Why do you believe that the EGOI is important?

It is not unusual for schoolgirls to only hear about such contests from someone other than their teachers and for them to ultimately perform better than the male pupils put forward by teachers.
The informatics environment in particular often appears to be very much male-dominated. It is totally understandable that some girls do not then feel comfortable in such environments. An event like the EGOI allows them to unleash their potential amongst girls of a similar age. This allows them to gain in confidence and to engage with informatics when other opportunities present themselves.

I also believe that it is important to raise awareness in society as a whole and in particular amongst teachers that girls too can get involved in informatics. The ultimate goal is for schoolgirls to feel just as comfortable as their male counterparts at a “mixed sex” Olympiad. Achieving both is not an easy thing to do. But it is certainly useful having female leaders and contacts at such events who can then also be deployed at key points.
The EGOI therefore exists firstly to encourage more female participants in such events. And secondly, the EGOI hopes to establish a social setting for women interested in informatics so that ultimately we can create an international network and increase the percentage of women in informatics.

How would you sum up the first event?

We have had lots of positive feedback even though an in-person event would certainly have made more of an impression on the participants. However, we tried really hard to incorporate plenty of social events and interactions. The participants appreciated this. So we are very satisfied with the first EGOI.
At the outset, we expected far fewer countries because in many parts of the world it is very hard to encourage sufficiently interested women to get involved with informatics. We ended up with the fantastic figure of 43 countries taking part in the EGOI. The level of interest was much higher than we had anticipated. This far exceeded our expectations.
Thanks to the EGOI, some of the countries have now launched a national programme for promoting the advancement of women in informatics. This is great news. I am looking forward to 2022 when the EGOI will hopefully be able to take place in Turkey.

You studied for a Bachelor's and Master’s in Mathematics at ETH. Why did you decide on this course?

It was actually after I had attended the Mathematical Olympiad at the age of 14 that I decided I wanted to study mathematics at ETH. A lot of people think that the maths you do at school is boring. And I would agree. But there is so much more to mathematics: it is all about solving problems and puzzles. A lot of people like doing these things but there is often no such crossover at school. I was able to see this much more at university.
 

What was the breakdown of students by sex on your course?

On my Bachelor’s course, we were roughly 30 percent female and 70 percent male. Initially, that might not sound like a low percentage of women. But when you work in small groups of six as part of the course, then on average there will only ever be two women in a group. So as a woman, you only ever see one other woman in your group. Perhaps that seems like a lot of women to the men but for you as a woman, this only allows you to come into contact with a very small number of women. Personally, I never had an issue with this during the course. In our small groups, it was clear pretty quickly who was good at solving our mathematical problems.

Unfortunately, however women attending international contests often first have to gain a certain amount of respect. They first have to prove that they are good. It worked well for me because at one point I produced a medal table. But you shouldn’t have to go to those lengths. I think that this uncertainty could be another reason for perhaps why more women drop out of mathematics courses than men.

What advice would you give students?

Do not be dissuaded from doing things that you enjoy. Stick with them even if it may sometimes seem hard. Even if you have to put in a lot of work, you will get there and it will be worth it.