To celebrate women in Engineering day – honor and commemorate women in engineering and learn about some inspiring women! Inspire others who show an interest in STEM and let girls know they are valued in the field.
UCAS data from 2017 to 2018 shows that in the UK only 35% of students in the core STEM subjects are women and for Engineering and technology the statistics are far worse with women comprising only 19% of students.
In 2018 26% of all core STEM subject graduates were women, a very small increase from previous years. (In 2015 it was 25%, to 24% in 2016, back to 25% in 2017.)
For engineering and technology the number of female graduates has been consistently only 15% since 2015.
In the UK the STEM sector of the workforce is 22% female. Despite women in the UK making up 43.2% of the science professional workforce in 2018, the numbers for engineering remain consistently low - the percentage of female engineering professionals is 12%. However, the percentage of female graduates over the years has seen a tiny increase: in 2016 only 8% of the professional engineering workforce was female. In two years 21,000 women have joined the industry.
Women now outnumber men studying sciences at A level. Women make up 63% of all biology students, just over 50% of chemistry students yet only 23% of physics students. Despite an interest in biology and chemistry in high school, when it comes to university women are less likely to pursue a degree in those fields than men, but physics and engineering have consistently low numbers of women from high school to the workforce.
But why is this?
Gender equality
One thing that affects the statistics for women in STEM is perception of gender equality. In a 2008 article titled 'Diversity. Culture, Gender and Math' it was shown that in countries where women are treated as equals (for example Sweden and Iceland) women perform better in mathematics tests, outperforming men. Gender equality will always be relevant when talking about why women either don’t pursue STEM careers or quit their STEM jobs, especially female engineers.
An article from Harvard Business review, questioning why so many women leave their engineering careers, stated that one of the top reasons is a culture of sexism and discrimination in the industry. Women are given menial tasks such as paperwork while their male co-workers, who were often less experienced or had the same qualifications were given actual engineering assignments. Women reported being treated like they didn’t know anything especially by the older men in the industry. Additionally the article stated that when asked about their engineering internships or summer jobs men were far more likely to review their experience positively than women.
Lack of Role Models
In an interview with WomaninSTEM.co.uk Dr Anna-Marie Imafidon, CEO of STEMettes had this to say:
“No-one ever needs to say to a girl: ‘Did you know you could become a police officer?’ That’s because we see female police officers in TV and film dramas all the time and they’re part of the culture.”
“Women in STEM need the same profile. But it’s not enough to make young people more aware of, say, female engineers. We have to make their parents, guardians, teachers and influencers more aware of them, too.”
Unjust laws were put in place preventing women from getting a proper education. The first educational institute allowing women to get degrees was Mississippi college in 1831 but very few institutions followed its lead. It took until 1920 for women to be allowed degrees from Oxford, for example, a full 89 years later. Federal law only guaranteed the right to an education free from sex discrimination in 1972. This discrimination although legally in the past, has had a huge impact on how people view what an engineer should be. Since women have not historically been seen to play a role in engineering due to a lack of knowledge of great female scientists, engineering is still seen as a man's job only. Women aren’t always perceived as being as smart or creative as men, detractors citing the historical lack of great female innovators as an example. This is unfair. Oppressive patriarchal structures prevented many women from using their talents but also in fact history is full of iconic female engineers despite this.
The facile, easy answer to the question 'why are there so few women in engineering or in STEM in general?' is far too often 'women just aren’t as capable as men in these areas'. The fact that this is something that people think – including women – is definitely a reason women avoid STEM careers. Feeling like you aren’t taken seriously or looked down on means that a lot of women have to work harder than their male classmates, as a mistake in front of your class or bad test results could ‘prove’ the sexist claims and give them more reasons to not believe in you. Although this is completely anecdotal, most women on STEM courses at university, especially in engineering or programming where women only make up 19% of their class, have experienced sexism, hence part of the need for a society which celebrates and brings up women in STEM.
Written by Alex Hopkinson
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