We’re thrilled to be mentioned in this Business Insider article about the lack of women in the hedge fund industry.
As we have seen from our work with many organizations in the financial services industry, hedge funds are among those that are not searching for gender diversity among their employees.
The article states, “Investing is one of the last frontiers where women are this underrepresented.” Think about it: No one bats an eye when a woman wants to become a lawyer, doctor, athlete, or many other professions. We want the same to be true for women who want to pursue financial careers.
Rock The Street, Wall Street aims to equip high school girls with financial skills and potentially pursue careers in finance. While a recruiter in the article says only 5% of the candidates he finds are women, our goal is to raise the visibility of qualified females and increase this number over the years.
Our classroom instructors include female financial pros from firms that include TD Ameritrade, Bank of America/Merrill Lynch, Jackson National, and UBS. Our pros are role models and mentors for the girls and share firsthand what careers in finance are like; that finance, for the most part, is nothing more than first-year algebra; and that our girls are very capable of being successful in the financial services industry.
While we educate high school girls to become financially literate — critical in itself given that 7 out of 10 women state they know little to nothing about finance — we also reach out to a variety of businesses, organizations and government entities in the financial sector to tell them about our mission and educate them on the lack of women in finance.
We believe finance is at the heart of opportunity.