New customizable book helps girls smash tech stereotypes
When Hillary Clinton lost her history-making bid for the presidency last week, many parents had the painful task of sharing a hopeful message with their little girls in the face of devastating defeat.
Only time can numb that grief, but a new book offers solace with a message that girls can be the heroes of their own stories.
Secret Code follows the adventures of young girl who loves coding and dislikes chores so much that she programs a robot to pick up after her. The robot, however, takes matters into his own hands and its creator must save the day.
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What makes the book, which is available to order online only, even better is the ability to customize the heroine to reflect a girl's appearance and race or ethnicity.
Mara Binudin-Lecocq, a digital creative director, said she developed Secret Code as an antidote to the stereotype that girls and women don't thrive in science, tech, math and engineering careers.
Binudin-Lecocq also felt it was essential to let young readers customize the protagonist instead of illustrating a single character.
"I wanted girls to be able to see themselves," she told Mashable.
Readers can choose from four prototypes that roughly reflect white, black, Asian and Latino heritage. There are options to customize hair style and color, eye color and skin tone.
The heroine's parents also make a brief appearance in the book, and Binudin-Lecocq said it will be possible in a few weeks to change those characters from a man and woman to a single parent, same-sex couple or mixed-race couple. (The parents' currently match their daughter's look.)
The book's custom features are pricey: Secret Code sells for $36, which includes shipping. The cost partly reflects the expense of paying illustrators to customize each book. Binudin-Lecocq is exploring ways to create a more affordable PDF version so that Secret Code can reach as many young readers as possible.
Secret Code concludes not only with a triumphant ending, but also with resources to help readers explore free and fee-based educational products and services like Code.org and the toy robots Dash and Dot.
"Showing role models is really important and girls need to literally see themselves in empowering roles," Binudin-Lecocq said. "My goal too was to turn inspiration into action."
Rebecca Ruiz is a Senior Reporter at Mashable. She frequently covers mental health, digital culture, and technology. Her areas of expertise include suicide prevention, screen use and mental health, parenting, youth well-being, and meditation and mindfulness. Rebecca's experience prior to Mashable includes working as a staff writer, reporter, and editor at NBC News Digital and as a staff writer at Forbes. Rebecca has a B.A. from Sarah Lawrence College and a masters degree from U.C. Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism.
