By bringing their talents to the male-dominated engineering field, women are sparking innovation. This is the link to the part of the Femme Den series from Smart Design.

The stereotypical founder of a silicon Valley giant is an insanely arrogant, pathologically driven, geekily brilliant 22-year-old guy. This boom looks different. For the first time in startup history, girl wonders actually have an edge over the boys (not that anyone has noticed). Can the new femme entrepreneurs seize their moment?

The report "Applying a Gender Lens to Science, Technology, and Innovation", was prepared as a contribution to the fifty-fifth session of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women. Based on an examination of women's roles in a number of sectors such as agriculture, water, energy, and transport, the report argues that science, technology, and innovation (STI) will not have the broadly positive effects sought in less-wealthy regions of the world if STI policies do not specifically take into account the needs and talents of half the global population.

"I’d never want a woman for a boss!" "Women are too competitive with each other!" Unfortunately, these are old workplace stereotypes that hopefully had finally been laid to rest. Nevertheless, they were cited in a panel of female technology and internet entrepreneurs at Makovsky + Company on November 9 as among the images that today’s women have grown up with that have held many back. Still – a glowing story was told in the outstanding track record that entrepreneurial women in technology and the internet have already achieved.

CC4G is a club designed for girls. Discover the exciting ways technology is used in music, sport, fashion and more through games and challenges.

From a dedicated Web site to mentoring programmes aimed at engaging women employees, HCL Technologies has been rolling out initiatives to recruit and retain women. Earlier this year, it organised a "women only" recruitment drive across Delhi NCR, Bangalore and Chennai and received an overwhelming response – over 2,500 walk-ins. Ms Robin Abrams, a board member at HCL Technologies and a champion of gender diversity, says the company has reached a tipping point. Almost a quarter of its workforce is now women – compared to 21 per cent two years ago.

At the Pittsburgh Public Schools' Science and Technology Academy the motto is "Dream, Discover, Design." "We need more schools like this in Pennsylvania and across the country," said U.S. Sen. Bob Casey, who found the Oakland school the perfect setting Tuesday to promote the Computer Science Education Act he introduced in the Senate two weeks ago. The bill, which Mr. Casey hopes will be folded into pending revisions of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, has as its goal strengthening K-12 computer science education to prepare students for high-paying computing jobs.

As U.S. firms struggle to find enough workers in STEM fields to fill job vacancies, many have turned to H-1B visas – a program that allows 65,000 highly talented foreign nationals per year to work in the United States for up to six years. While critics say that these immigrants are taking American jobs, some U.S. corporations are asking the Obama administration to raise the cap, which is usually hit early in the year.

The present research examined the impact of everyday romantic goal strivings on women’s attitudes toward science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). The results show that women, but not men, who viewed images or overheard conversations related to romantic goals reported less positive attitudes toward STEM and less preference for majoring in math/science compared to other disciplines.

A new study presented in the Washington Post points out that a meta-analysis (an integration of a large number of studies addressing the same question) carried out by researchers from Northwestern University shows that today's leadership continues to be viewed as culturally masculine. The study points out that "Women are still often viewed as less qualified or natural in most leadership roles, the research shows, and secondly, when women adopt culturally masculine behaviors often required by these roles, they may be viewed as inappropriate or presumptuous."