It's the 21st century, and a woman doctor, lawyer, astronaut or CEO isn't news -- it's almost passe.

But a woman computer geek? It's downright unusual.

Compared to other white-collar professions, the number of women working in information technology pales in comparison to their male counterparts.

Everybody loses. American companies have to look overseas to fill their IT openings, while American women miss out on a growing and, let's be honest, potentially well-paying career.

It's getting worse. The Information Technology Association of America says the country needs more IT workers than ever, and it expects the trend to continue.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics says that the only fields growing faster than software engineering are medical assistants and home health aides. In fact, the BLS reports that eight of the ten fastest-growing occupations between 2000 and 2010 will be in information technology.

Women are missing out.

Organizations desperate for the right IT workers are either outsourcing to other countries (a practice that gets a lot of press, but has in fact been on the decline), or bringing foreign workers here on H-1B visas, which allow for employment in the U.S. for up to six years in a "specialty occupation."

The list of companies requesting those H-1B visas is chock full of familiar, high-tech names: Cisco, Hewlett Packard, IBM, Lucent, Microsoft, Motorola, Nortel, Oracle, Sun Microsystems. All are among the top-20 users of H-1Bs.

Despite all this, the moment they enter college, women become dramatically underrepresented behind a keyboard. According to the Department of Commerce, while about 3.3 percent of undergraduate men choose an IT career, only 1.1 percent of undergraduate women do.

That's a lot of people. Would it make a difference if, say, three percent of women went into computer science?

"It would certainly go a long way," said Joe Chase, acting dean of Radford University's College of Information Science and Technology. Chase doesn't think that bringing those women in would solve the shortage, but every one who takes the road less traveled helps keep jobs and money in the U.S.

The Computing Research Association agrees. "If the number of women in the IT workforce were increased to equal the number of men, even the tremendous shortages of IT workers noted in the ITAA studies could be filled," it wrote in a report entitled, "The Supply of Information Technology Workers in the United States."

Paula Gulak, a founder of Sycom Technologies, a technology "solutions provider" with offices in Richmond, Roanoke and Norfolk, pointed out that "almost 50 percent of law students are women, and 50 percent of engineering students are women [because] there was a real push to attract women and to make scholarships available."

Not so, she said, for IT.

Alise McNeill, a spokeswoman for IBM, put it bluntly: "Across the board, people recognize that we need to attract more women into mathematics, science and technology fields."

Women, specifically. Harry Ungar, director of the National Science Foundation's Advanced Technological Education program told a group of educators recently, "We are not going to solve the shortage of IT professionals in this country by focusing on middle-class white guys."

'Math is hard'

There's no single reason that girls in middle and high school don't go into technology fields.

Part of the blame, as always, falls on society -- perpetuating the stereotype that girls just don't have the heads for math or science.

"In my opinion it's a combination of bad advising and bad press," said Chase. He sees it as the result of a number of things, starting with parents and guidance counselors.

"There is someone out there telling 12-year-old girls they aren't good at math," he said. "If we could just find that person and shut him up, that would go a long way to solving the problem."

Person, or people?

A 2005 study done by Virginia Tech's Center for Information Technology Impacts on Children, Youth & Families found that "female students rely on a fairly narrow circle of close family members and trusted friends for career advice."

Translation: If Chase is looking to shut someone up, he needs to look closer to home.

According to one of the study's authors, center director Peggy Meszaros, "The most startling finding out of our research to date is the impact that parents have on these girls' decision-making."

As it turns out, that's a good thing. Parents are catching up to reality. The idea of boys playing with bulldozers and science kits while girls have dolls and tea parties is fading. Fast.

In 1966, "The Exciting Game of Career Girls" offered (female) players a chance to become a teacher, actress, model, nurse, ballet dancer or airline hostess. Period.

The times changed. Twenty-three years later, in 1989, parents and educators erupted over Teen Talk Barbie when it uttered the infamous words that became a part of the national lexicon: "Math is hard!"

That wasn't the message they were trying to teach little girls; you'd never hear GI Joe say, "I can't calculate the azimuth of the grenade launcher!"

Today, even the vague suggestion that the genders approach science and math differently can spark an uproar. In January, at a conference on women and science hosted by the National Bureau of Economic Research, Harvard President Larry Summers commented on some of the differences between how men and women regard their family and work obligations.

In the media frenzy that followed, Summers was accused (incorrectly, it turned out) of saying that men have a greater aptitude for science and technology than women.

In 2005, that's not the kind of attitude parents will accept.

The message, it seems, has gotten through: Math may be hard, but girls can be as good at it as boys are, and parents aren't afraid to tell that to their daughters.

Katie Seckinger, 16, a junior at William Byrd High School, said her parents offer plenty of support no matter what she wants to study.

"They say, 'Whatever you want, but how about medicine?'," she said. (Her mother is a dentist and her father is a pharmacist.)

She's not sure what her college major will be, but she hasn't shied away from technology; she's currently taking a class in Java programming at the Roanoke Valley Governor's School for Science and Technology.

By the way, of the 266 students enrolled at the Governor's School, 47 percent are girls.

Stacy Hollins, also 16, is a junior at Craig County High School and is part of that 47 percent. Her interests lean towards the artistic, but these days that means computers.

Not surprisingly -- she's only 16 -- Hollins also isn't sure what she'll study in college. But "I do know it's going to be something in computers, technology or science," she said. "I love digital art -- I love Photoshop."

She, too, has her family's support.

Which raises the question: If high-school girls use and like technology, and they have their parents' backing, why are college women not studying it?

There are at least a couple of reasons, according to Chase. First is what he calls "the geek factor." A programmer isn't someone they picture taking to the high-school reunion. "They think it's a mumbly guy with poor social skills living in the basement," Chase said. "Revenge of the Nerds," anyone?

He's right. When asked her perception of computer geeks, Seckinger said, "Some of them spend way too much time in front of a computer. They don't have time to shower."

Ouch.

Meszaros found the same thing. What comes to mind, she said, is "the stereotype of the lone male sitting in front of the computer, in isolation."

The loneliest number

Meszaros and Chase focused on that word: "isolation."

The perception that a computer career means working alone is a turn-off to middle- and high-school girls who prefer to work in groups. More so than men, girls and women appreciate the social aspects of their jobs. They prefer to work together.

That doesn't surprise Meszaros. "We know that women are more relational in their working careers than are men," she said.

According to "Tech-Savvy," a report from the American Association of University Women, "[G]irls are concerned about the passivity of their interactions with the computer as a 'tool.' " When it comes to choosing a career, girls "assert a 'we can, but I don't want to' attitude toward computer technology."

Girls don't want to end up working alone. And that's what geeks do.

"They don't see the IT field as being a field where they can help people," said Meszaros.

The AAUW backs her up: "Girls tend to imagine that computer professionals live in a solitary, antisocial and sedentary world," it said in its report. "This is an alienating -- and incorrect -- perception of careers that will rely heavily on computer technology."

Hollins and Seckinger agreed wholeheartedly. "I don't want to sit in front of a computer all day," they said, disturbingly, in unison.