Photo: Participants in “Coding and Couture” Summer Camp, open to self-identified girls, trans, and nonbinary youth in grades 5-8.

Assemblers

Everyone who learns with us is an Assembler! No two Assemblers are alike—and that is an awesome thing.

We strive to serve everyone in our community and to create spaces where all Assemblers can be their full authentic selves. We captured the demographic data below for participants in our onsite programs through our registration and attendance management system, Jumbula.

Assemblers by Neighborhood

Assemblers join us from all over Pittsburgh—from Avalon to Homewood to Mt. Washington—but more hail from our home neighborhood of Garfield than any other.

Map: Assembler 2022 participation by zip code

Chart: Pittsburgh neighborhoods where Assemblers lived in 2022

Chart: Age of Assemble participants in 2022

Assemblers by Age

While Assemblers can be—and are!—any age, the bulk of our participants are youth. 2022 saw dramatic growth in participants ages five to seven, driven in part by a 250% increase in attendance at our Saturday Crafternoons. In contrast, the number of tweens—a group that several staff noted are increasingly difficult to engage post-pandemic—fell compared to previous years.

Assemblers by Gender

Over half of Assemblers in 2022 identified as female, far outpacing the proportion of women working in STEM. The National Science Foundation found that women made up just 35% of the STEM workforce in 2021. Of the roughly 400 Assemblers who reported their gender in 2022, 1.6% identified as non-binary or gender-neutral.

Chart: Gender of Assemble participants in 2022

Chart: Race of Assemble participants in 2022

Assemblers by Race

The majority of Assemblers are BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color). 27% are Black (more than Pittsburgh’s population of 23% according to census data); 48% are white (fewer than Pittsburgh’s population of 65%), and 14% are multi-racial (compared to 5% in census numbers). Again, these numbers outpace current representation in the STEM workforce, where the NSF found just 9% of workers are Black or African American.

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