16 organizations advancing women in tech

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The 16 organizations advancing women in tech serve different needs: Ada Developers Academy is a tuition-free entry path; Girls Who Code and Black Girls Code focus on girls; SWE and IEEE WIE serve engineers; AnitaB.org, WITI, Women in Tech, and Women Tech Network emphasize community and mentoring. Women Who Code closed in April 2024; TechFutures carries forward its legacy.

The organizations in the list range from youth STEM programs and career-transition schools to engineering societies, mentorship networks, leadership groups, and employer-focused initiatives. The useful question is not which organization wins an overall ranking, but which one matches a reader’s age, career stage, identity, location, budget, and desired outcome. The list and current-status caveat are based on CIO’s March 19, 2026 feature, supplemented with current official organization pages where available.

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Key takeaways

• There is no universal best organization for women in tech: the right choice depends on age, career stage, desired outcome, geography, eligibility, cost, and time commitment.
• Ada Developers Academy is a tuition-free, structured coding pathway for women and gender-expansive adults, with priority for BIPOC, LGBTQIA+, and low-income learners.
• Black Girls Code and Girls Who Code focus on girls and younger learners, while Women in STEM adds one-to-one mentoring from university students and professionals.
• Society of Women Engineers and IEEE Women in Engineering are the clearest profession-specific choices for women engineers; NCWIT is more useful for employers, educators, and institutional change leaders.
• Women Who Code closed in April 2024 because of funding challenges; TechFutures says it welcomed the brand and is carrying forward its legacy, so Women Who Code should not be treated as an unchanged operating nonprofit.

How should you compare organizations supporting women in tech?

Compare each organization by the person it serves, the intervention it provides, and the outcome it is designed to support. Coding instruction, mentoring, professional networking, scholarships, leadership development, and employer DEI work solve different problems, even when organizations use similar language about inclusion.

The comparison below is descriptive rather than a ranking. The supplied research does not provide comparable employment, promotion, retention, or representation outcomes, so no organization can fairly be called the overall best. Fees, deadlines, locations, membership rules, and application status can change and should be checked on the organization’s current website before a reader applies or pays.

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Which organizations help girls learn coding?

Black Girls Code and Girls Who Code are the strongest youth-focused coding and computing choices in this list, while Women in STEM is the clearest choice when the primary need is a personal mentor rather than a coding course.

Black Girls Code

Black Girls Code’s program description centers on young and preteen girls of color. The organization provides resources intended to help girls participate and succeed in STEM, making it a pipeline and confidence-building option rather than an adult career-transition school.

Black Girls Code is especially relevant when representation and early exposure are the immediate goals. Families should verify the current local or online program schedule, age requirements, fees, and registration status before planning around a specific offering.

Girls Who Code

Girls Who Code supports girls across more than one education stage through after-school clubs, summer courses and programs, career advice, and networking support for college students. The model is useful for readers who want sustained community as a girl moves from adolescence toward early adulthood, not just a single introductory workshop.

Girls Who Code is therefore a better first match for a school-age learner than for an experienced professional seeking executive mentoring. Current clubs, summer programs, locations, and eligibility should be verified because availability can change.

Women in STEM

Women in STEM matches female university students and professionals with high-school girls for one-to-one mentoring. The organization also uses speakers, panels, and programming for elementary-, middle-, and high-school audiences.

Choose Women in STEM when the desired outcome is a relationship with a near-peer or professional role model. Mentoring can complement technical education, but the supplied research does not establish that the organization itself provides a complete coding curriculum or guarantees a later technology career.

How can women get into tech through structured learning?

Ada Developers Academy is the most intensive entry and career-transition option in the list, while Girl Develop It offers a more accessible, hands-on route for adults who want software-development learning without an intimidating classroom culture.

Ada Developers Academy

Ada Developers Academy is a nonprofit, tuition-free coding school for women and gender-expansive adults. The program combines collaborative instruction with mentors, tutors, mental-health support, affinity groups, and a paid applied-learning internship.

Ada is the clearest fit for someone seeking a structured pathway into software development rather than a general networking group. Ada also explicitly prioritizes BIPOC, LGBTQIA+, and low-income individuals. Tuition-free does not mean every cohort is continuously open, so readers should confirm current admissions requirements, locations, schedule, and cohort dates.

Girl Develop It

Girl Develop It offers affordable web and software-development courses in a judgment-free environment. Its hands-on learning includes live or hybrid workshops, instructor-led study, career topics, and networking for women and nonbinary people.

Girl Develop It fits an adult learner who wants practical skills and a supportive classroom experience but may not need the intensity of a full career-transition program. Because affordable is not the same as free, readers should check the exact price, format, instructor, and local chapter or online availability for the course they are considering.

Which organizations help women move from college into technology careers?

Rewriting the Code is the most directly aligned with the college-to-career transition, while AnitaB.org and Women Tech Network provide broader professional communities that can supplement a student’s or early-career technologist’s search for mentors and opportunities.

Rewriting the Code

Rewriting the Code supports women technologists at several stages, including college, entry-level work, and established professional careers. Its offerings include leadership, mentorship, networking, résumé workshops, career fairs, internship opportunities, meetups, and conferences.

RTC is also notable for culturally affirming communities including Black Wings, Latinas de RTC, and Tech Natives. Those groups can make RTC a particularly relevant starting point for women of color seeking community alongside career support. Program-specific eligibility, deadlines, and application requirements should be checked before referral.

AnitaB.org

AnitaB.org is a nonprofit founded in 1997 by computer scientists Anita Borg and Telle Whitney to support, connect, inspire, and guide women in computing. The organization’s wider professional ecosystem is useful for women seeking community and industry-facing opportunities rather than only beginner coding lessons.

Anita Borg founded Systers in 1987 as an online community for women in technical computing. Systers is an important part of the organization’s history and community model, but current event, membership, and scholarship details should be verified separately because program availability can change.

Women Tech Network

Women Tech Network hosts networking and educational events across cities worldwide and describes programs involving networking, mentorship, allyship, and career opportunities. The organization’s current mentoring page says mentorship is included with Professional Membership, limited mentorship scholarships are available, and members can browse hundreds of mentors when applications are open.

Women Tech Network is a practical option for a reader who wants a defined mentoring platform rather than only a public discussion group. Professional Membership, scholarship availability, application windows, geography, and any sponsorship arrangement should be confirmed on the current program page before a reader commits money or time. The organization’s current mentoring platform description is the relevant source for those program details.

What professional organizations are available for women engineers?

Society of Women Engineers and IEEE Women in Engineering are the clearest profession-specific organizations here: SWE combines career services, scholarships, and broad engineering community, while IEEE WIE adds technical conferences, recognition, workshops, and a global engineering network.

Society of Women Engineers

CIO’s 2026 organization profile says the Society of Women Engineers has supported women’s engineering careers for more than 70 years. SWE serves students and professional engineers through networking, professional development, career services, scholarships, youth programs, and adult professional programs.

SWE is a strong fit when the reader identifies primarily as an engineer and wants an established professional society that follows a person across career stages. Readers should verify current membership prices, scholarship deadlines, chapter locations, and event schedules rather than assuming that every benefit is available to every member.

IEEE Women in Engineering

IEEE Women in Engineering is the engineering-specific professional network in this list. Its global members and volunteers support women engineers and encourage girls through recognition programs, workshops, technical conferences, networking, and career development.

IEEE WIE makes more sense than a general women-in-technology network when technical engineering identity, conferences, professional recognition, or IEEE-connected community is the desired outcome. Current membership requirements and local section activity depend on geography and should be confirmed before joining.

Which organizations offer mentoring, leadership, or employer support?

Women in Technology, Women in Tech Council, Women in Tech International, WITI, and NCWIT address different parts of professional advancement: structured mentoring, executive pipelines, global networking, and organizational change.

Women in Technology

Women in Technology provides leadership development, education, networking, and mentorship for women technologists at every career level. Its mentor-protégé program is the most structured feature described in the supplied research: CIO says protégés are matched with four experienced members over five months.

This organization is a better fit for a professional seeking an intentional mentoring cycle and leadership development than for someone looking primarily for beginner coding instruction. The four-member, five-month description comes from the CIO profile, so readers should confirm the current program format, application period, and geography.

Women in Tech Council

Women in Tech Council focuses on the pipeline from high school to the C-suite. Its work includes DEI, women in the C-suite, women-led startups, innovation, inclusion, mentorship, networking, learning, and summit programming about technology talent and career trends.

WTC is most relevant to readers interested in executive advancement, women-led entrepreneurship, technology leadership, or employer-facing inclusion work. It should not be presented as a substitute for an entry-level coding school unless a current WTC program specifically provides that training.

Women in Technology International

Women in Technology International, commonly known as WITI, was founded in 1989 as the International Network of Women in Technology and rebranded in 2001. CIO describes WITI as connecting women in STEM across multiple countries through events, meetups, career coaching, and speaker events.

WITI is a natural fit for experienced professionals who want international connections, coaching, events, or speaking opportunities. Membership benefits, current countries of operation, and any membership-size claim should be verified from current WITI materials before publication or referral.

Women in Tech

The global Women in Tech organization says its mission is to bridge the gender gap and empower women through education, business, social inclusion, and advocacy. The USA chapter describes networking events, mentorship programs, and skills initiatives for students, professionals, and advocates.

The name can be confused with Women in Technology, WITI, or Women Tech Network. A reader should confirm the exact chapter or organization before registering, especially when geography, membership cost, or program eligibility matters. The Women in Tech USA organization page is the relevant source for the USA chapter’s current description.

NCWIT

The National Center for Women & Information Technology is a community of change leaders focused on underrepresentation in computing. NCWIT’s scope includes professionals, children, teens, young adults, educators, researchers, and companies seeking stronger hiring, inclusion, awareness, and systemic-change practices.

NCWIT is therefore especially useful for an employer, school, educator, or institutional leader trying to improve systems rather than only find an individual mentor. The organization belongs in an employer or education strategy, not solely in a directory of networking groups. Current tools, participation rules, and organizational services should be confirmed before use.

What is the difference between networking, mentoring, training, and employer support?

Training teaches a skill, mentoring provides guidance from a more experienced person, networking creates relationships and access to communities, scholarships reduce financial barriers, and employer support changes recruiting or workplace systems. One organization may offer several of these interventions, but the interventions are not interchangeable.

Where can women of color find support in tech?

Women of color may find the most explicitly identified support in Black Girls Code, Ada Developers Academy, and Rewriting the Code, although the three organizations serve different ages and career stages. Black Girls Code focuses on girls of color, Ada prioritizes BIPOC learners among its adult and gender-expansive audience, and RTC names culturally affirming groups for Black women and Latinas.

These inclusion descriptions do not mean that other organizations are unsuitable or that participation produces a guaranteed job or promotion. The practical question is whether the specific cohort, chapter, mentor group, or event matches the reader’s identity, age, career stage, and desired outcome.

What do the available numbers say about the need for these organizations?

The figures provide context for why pipeline, mentoring, and workplace interventions remain distinct needs, but the figures do not prove that any one organization caused a particular career result.

According to CIO’s 2026 feature, women represented 8% of the STEM workforce in 1970 and 28% by 2025. The same CIO feature reports that women held 25% of C-level leadership roles in technology, falling to 5% when adjusted for BIPOC women, and that 72% of women reported experiencing bro culture at work. CIO is a secondary editorial source for these figures, so the numbers should not be presented as original research by the organizations listed here.

The Center for Advancing Women in Technology currently presents a different education-pipeline comparison: women earn 58% of college degrees but only 19% of computer-science degrees. Because the CAWIT page places the figure alongside older program context, the underlying dataset should be verified before treating 19% as a current national statistic. The CAWIT organization page is the source for how the figure is presented.

Is Women Who Code still operating?

Women Who Code is not operating as the same nonprofit community it was before its closure: its current official page says, “In April 2024, Women Who Code closed due to funding challenges.” TechFutures welcomed Women Who Code into its family of brands and says it is carrying forward the organization’s legacy.

Women Who Code should therefore appear in a current article as a historical organization whose mission and legacy are being continued through TechFutures, not as an unchanged organization accepting applications or memberships. The original organization was known for coding skills, leadership, mentorship, company education, hiring, and retention.

The current official page preserves historical impact claims of nearly half a million technologists across 145 countries, more than 20,000 community-led technical trainings, $3.5 million in scholarships, more than one million volunteer hours, and more than 14,000 career opportunities. Those figures are historical organizational claims, not current operating metrics. Women Who Code’s official vision statement says, “When experienced women lead, innovation becomes stronger, organizations become more resilient, and the industry becomes more inclusive by design.” Both the status update and statement appear on the official Women Who Code and TechFutures page.

Are scholarships available for women in technology?

Some organizations in this list offer or describe scholarships, but the supplied research does not establish a single current scholarship program with universally open applications. SWE has scholarship programming, Women Tech Network describes limited mentorship scholarships, and Women Who Code’s $3.5 million figure is historical rather than a current scholarship budget.

AnitaB.org scholarship information also needs a current check before a reader is directed to apply. Confirm eligibility, deadline, geography, award conditions, and whether an opportunity pays tuition, offsets membership, or supports a specific event. Never imply that a scholarship or organization guarantees employment.

How can a reader choose and act on the right organization?

1. Define the immediate outcome. Decide whether the goal is coding instruction, a mentor, an internship, a job transition, professional credentials, engineering community, leadership development, or employer change.
2. Match the career stage. Start with Black Girls Code or Girls Who Code for younger learners, Ada or Girl Develop It for adult learning, RTC for college-to-career support, SWE or IEEE WIE for engineers, and leadership or employer-focused groups for experienced professionals and organizations.
3. Check inclusion and eligibility. Confirm whether the opportunity serves women broadly, nonbinary or gender-expansive adults, women of color, LGBTQIA+ participants, students, professionals, employers, or another defined group.
4. Check the practical requirements. Verify current cost, application process, dates, location, online access, membership status, time commitment, and whether mentoring or scholarships are open at that moment.
5. Use complementary support when appropriate. A coding course can build skills, a mentor can help interpret career choices, a professional society can provide industry connections, and an employer program can address systemic barriers. One does not replace the others.
6. Confirm organizational status. This step is essential for Women Who Code because its operating structure changed in April 2024. Historical descriptions and historical impact numbers must be labeled accordingly.

Further reading for a technology career

Readers who want practical preparation beyond an organization directory may find Women in Tech by Tarah Wheeler useful. The publisher describes the 272-page paperback as covering salary negotiation, technical résumés, interviews, contracting versus salaried work, mentorship, and starting a company; the publisher lists its publication date as August 22, 2017.

For readers specifically examining barriers affecting women of color, Women of Color in Tech by Susanne Tedrick addresses entry and retention barriers along with networking, mentorship, public speaking, communication, and related career skills. The book is a supplementary resource, not a representation of all 16 organizations.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Women Who Code still operating?

Women Who Code is not still operating as the same nonprofit community. Women Who Code’s official page says it closed in April 2024 because of funding challenges, while TechFutures says it welcomed the brand and is carrying forward its legacy. Historical Women Who Code impact figures should not be treated as current operating metrics.

Are there scholarships for women in technology?

Some organizations offer or describe scholarships, including the Society of Women Engineers and limited mentorship scholarships from Women Tech Network. Women Who Code’s reported $3.5 million in scholarships is a historical impact claim, and every scholarship’s current eligibility, deadline, geography, and award terms should be verified before applying.

Which women in tech organization is best for students?

Girls and young learners can start with Black Girls Code, Girls Who Code, or Women in STEM, depending on whether they need STEM exposure, continuing coding programs, or one-to-one mentoring. Adult learners seeking a structured software-development path should compare Ada Developers Academy with Girl Develop It.

Where can women of color find support in tech?

Women of color may find explicitly identified support through Black Girls Code, Ada Developers Academy, and Rewriting the Code. Black Girls Code focuses on girls of color, Ada prioritizes BIPOC learners among its adult and gender-expansive audience, and Rewriting the Code includes groups such as Black Wings and Latinas de RTC; current eligibility varies by program.

The Bottom Line

The best organization depends on the reader’s need: choose Black Girls Code or Girls Who Code for girls, Ada Developers Academy or Girl Develop It for adult coding education, RTC for the college-to-career transition, SWE or IEEE WIE for engineering, NCWIT for institutional change, and mentoring or leadership networks for professional advancement. Verify current eligibility, cost, availability, and status before taking action, especially for Women Who Code, which closed in April 2024.

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