Overall hiring progress
For the first time this year, we’re sharing the percentage of our hires who are Black and Hispanic. In 2015, our hiring for Black, Hispanic, and female Googlers grew faster than our current demographic representation for each of these groups. And our Hispanic Googlers in technical roles increased from 2 to 3 percent.
This data reflects the gender composition of Google’s global technical workforce and the race & ethnicity composition of Google’s U.S. workforce as of January 1, 2016. For more stats, visit google.com/diversity.
Building an Inclusive Culture
Hiring is important, but it’s equally important to make workplaces inclusive, fair and supportive for all employees. We’re continuing to build a culture where Googlers can grow, thrive and want to stay. We want to build a place where everyone feels comfortable sharing ideas and opinions—and empowered to grow their careers.
We check and recheck processes like promotion and performance reviews to make sure they’re producing equitable outcomes, and address any gaps we find. For example, Googlers in engineering or product management roles are able to nominate themselves for promotion, and in 2010 we discovered that women in technical roles were less likely than men to self-nominate. We found that with a small nudge—emailing these findings to all technical Googlers—the rate of women self-nominating went up and now the gap between men and women has closed.
We also continue to invest in our unconscious bias trainings. Over 65 percent of Googlers have participated in our unbiasing workshops, and all new Googlers take the workshop as part of their orientation. We’ve shared these materials and research on our platform re:Work with Google so anyone from any industry can create unbiasing trainings for their team.
We saw encouraging signs of progress in 2015, but we’re still far from where we need to be. To learn more about our diversity and inclusion efforts, hear from leaders across Google:
Posted by Nancy Lee, Vice President, People Operationshttps://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQZiCaZ_ZGaJTNo2SCvjwdS0Zzv__NgSgv-i7GPA4C8KVjiYdAhL5EH_y8mylhCWY0pk5PYfaBE1Ez1bT33WMeRGTHhC0x7hLIr-DSSpczy5-ocC8c46IZglRs1CYaGjrQR7Rs/s320/Diversity.jpg
In San Francisco and across the Bay area, these 10 organizations provide a range of services and programs focused on rapid re-housing and prevention, basic services, job training and more. Our newest grantee, Destination: Home, plans to use their $1 million grant to build a rapid re-housing system for homeless families in Mountain View and Sunnyvale in the form of security deposits, motel stays, time-limited rental assistance, move-in assistance, and a support system to make sure individuals and families find stable housing.
HandUp has helped both homeless and low-income individuals and families overcome poverty via a giving platform that connects donors directly with neighbors who are struggling to meet basic needs. The Downtown Streets Team provides a work experience program for homeless men and women through beautification projects in San Francisco’s Civic Center/Mid-Market neighborhoods. And Lava Mae is expanding their mobile showers for the homeless to Los Angeles with an additional $200K in Google.org grant funding.
The Downtown Streets Team helps people like Norman “Will” Williams gain work experience. Learn more on their website.
One in 25 kids in San Francisco Unified School District are homeless, and many families face at least a nine-month wait list for temporary shelter. In 2015, we supported the Hamilton Family Center (HFC) with a $1 million grant aimed to reduce the homeless family wait list for shelter by creating direct lines of communication with SFUSD teachers and staff to report and respond to new and potential cases of homelessness. HFC has already seen a 25 percent reduction in the family wait list, and hopes to continue that momentum.
Homelessness in our cities is a challenge decades in the making—and will require continued innovation and dedication to solve. We’re committed to helping, through financial support, volunteering and raising awareness. Find out more about this issue on our Google Trends site and join us in finding solutions by visiting Beyond Homelessness or contributing to any of our grantee organizations.
Posted by Justin Steele, Bay Area Giving Lead, Google.orghttps://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB81fwjvsyAnHB1C1eB0XwTWilLmzzgRw21mHZV27EIjceGmT22Q2eukieYRaKsiCVsFlyXrS66SmBlrY6Lx6NlfOrmiUIDU2mS7Ut3XIch_1ZMvFn4e9ejM6UAL3h-6QJgVSE/s200/10-1.jpg
Great teachers inspire us, listen to us and learn from us; they bring the most mundane subjects to life. Technology can help great teachers do what they do best—stimulating minds and fostering skills in the next generation—and make learning even more rewarding for students. So we’re excited by the updates and improvements to our tools for the classroom we’re announcing this week at the ISTE conference, one of the largest education technology gatherings in the world.
Expeditions for all
Since we launched the Expeditions Pioneer Program last September, more than a million students from 11 countries have taken one of our 200+ virtual reality trips—from the Great Barrier Reef, to the ancient ruins of Machu Picchu. Today, we’re making Expeditions available to everyone. To get started, all teachers need to do is download the Expeditions app onto a set of devices and choose where in the world they want to take their class. The app is available today for Android and will be available for iPhones and iPads soon.
While Expeditions can be used with many of the devices schools or students already have, Best Buy Education will also be making Expeditions kits available for schools to purchase. These kits will contain everything teachers need to bring their classes on amazing Expeditions: a tablet, virtual reality viewers and a router to connect them all.
Google Cast for Education
Sharing information on the classroom’s big screen helps students learn from one another. But today, students have to physically connect their computers to the projector to share their screens with the class. To open classroom collaboration and bring projecting into the 21st century, we’re announcing Google Cast for Education, a free Chrome app that lets students and teachers share their screens wirelessly from everywhere in the classroom, no new hardware required. Cast for Education carries video and audio across complex school networks, has built-in controls for teachers, and is integrated with Google Classroom.
Quizzes in Google Forms
Getting feedback helps students learn and teachers teach. But grading tests and quizzes is time-consuming; teachers often have to take time away from other tasks to do it, and if it’s not done promptly, everyone misses out on the opportunity to learn from the things students got wrong. Starting today, Quizzes in Google Forms will grade multiple choice and checkbox questions automatically—so teachers can spend less time grading work and more time teaching.
Teachers can set correct answers in Forms and even add review materials in the form of explanations, supplemental websites, or review videos—so students can get quick, informative feedback on how to improve. Plus, teachers can get an instant snapshot on what their students understand, so they know which lessons need more explanation or what to teach next.
Creative apps on Chromebooks
Teachers tell us educational apps on Chromebooks help them improve skills like problem-solving, teamwork, communication and creativity. In collaboration with teachers at EdTechTeacher, we’re announcing a collection of creative apps on Chromebooks that schools can now purchase at a discount: Explain Everything, Soundtrap, and WeVideo. These apps let students demonstrate their understanding of curriculum in their own way by creating unique animations, music, and videos.
Students use creative apps at Muller Road Middle School in South Carolina
As technology becomes an integral component of our classrooms, we also want it to be so easy to use that it fades into background, allowing teachers to spend their time doing what they love: engaging and inspiring students.
Posted by Bram Bout, Director, Google for Educationhttps://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCfUBQ-fzrGUxY-N8WbWVNioZUv8SxvG7XavytSkhE76maR5utJCp_6_RfDYIPwmQLqg5M9yCdJyXQThDdS1gEXYTHA6q0VGrwTL5ELYeCxlcwcQ9mPBCeEr1ITM8gg60_Bxsn/s1600/Expedition.jpg
Ahmed giving CODE.org classes to young refugees through the Chromebooks in a refugee center in Berlin
On World Refugee Day, we hope you’ll take time to hear stories of more refugees who are working so hard to rebuild their lives.
We also want to thank everyone across the globe who donated last year, and encourage you to continue to support our partners in their critical work. Though the impact of this refugee crisis will be felt for many years to come, we’ll continue to look for ways to contribute.
Posted by Jacquelline Fuller, Director of Google.orghttps://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihNy5IS6yFXQq4Lx5smu95lU1_IfYqEv0fEuomlvhPPnf8oq3xd-5JX7vnixNcWEhK5luUrxe4fiKFBphCAl_B3vTyuGK8fmJuve7Cl78x9XS5pSd92ilR-7lutxZ4ysuKAsYs/s1600/Reconnect_hero.jpg
New ways to access My Account
People are increasingly using their voices to navigate apps and services—for example, mobile voice searches on Google have tripled in the past two years. So, we’re making it easier to get to My Account just by using your voice. In the latest Google app you can simply say, “Ok Google, show me my Google account,” and we’ll take you right there. This is available today in English, with other languages coming soon.
We’re also making it easier than ever to find My Account by searching Google. Coming soon, you’ll be able to simply search for your own name, and if you’re signed in, you’ll see a shortcut to My Account.
When you entrust your data to Google, you should expect powerful security and privacy controls. These features are just the latest in our ongoing efforts to protect you and your personal information. We'll continue to make updates based on your feedback.
Posted by Guemmy Kim, Product Manager, Account Controls and Settingshttps://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinvyKzFk_hGspuvP3Sgp59-C6VnBsh3-QbC4QPX9xMMHyOofIuMhfGweT2GehQIhL0Fo6QtpcmV6bPeKYECAn8MRLy_V0XHVQOuRvEIfjKAE1GYrRJ9KVt1ZgM05WhupB3zf4M/s1600/Security.jpg
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