However, of that 48%, only 24% of them are involved in a STEM field. However, statistics are saying now, more than ever, women are pursuing STEM careers. Yet, what happens behind the scenes while earning your degree? My mother has experienced a prime example of exactly what happens when women attempt to pursue a STEM career. She had decided on taking a programming course in college. Long story short, she got to her assigned computer and began to design her screen like the creative woman she is. Her professor walked up to her found it unrighteous to have her computer screen pink when everyone else's where "manly" colors. He suggested that she goes to the counselor to change courses since technology was "manly" thing. Sadly, she listened along with many other women. I say that because "...nearly a third of women in science, engineering and technology (S.E.T.) fields say they are likely to quit within a year," (Sherbin, ...Bias in Their Labs). It's unfortunate that women all over feel that they are not worthy because of their gender or their lack of "manliness." STEM fields aren't a manly thing, they need to be identified as gender neutral profession, as every profession should
In STEM fields today there are only 24% women, even though this is the highest paying area. One must then ask themselves, is it acceptable to have female-focused scholarships and conferences for women in STEM? Making up for the lack of female participation in the STEM field through conferences and scholarships is important because of the wage gaps, lack of female role models, and lack representation of over half the world’s population.
After entering STEM fields, women are continuing to face societal pressures and negative stereotypes about their abilities in college. Higher Education Research Institute survey showed that “29 percent of male freshmen planned to enter STEM majors while only 15 female freshmen planned to enter similar majors.” Women get tied into gender role that makes them stuck to certain fields even within STEM. In post-secondary level, women are less likely to earn a degree in STEM fields than men because of the exception to this gender imbalance is in the life sciences. Usually biological sciences were tied with medical fields that were seen as ‘nurturing’ acts, tied with women’s place in society. This ties back in with women’s childhoods in which they were encouraged to believe that they didn’t have the mental capacity to analyze mathematical concepts as sufficiently as boys. This has nothing to do with their ability because “on average, high school girls take more math and science credits and earn higher grades in these subjects than boys”. Women have higher GPAs on average than men do in all majors that include STEM fields. The fact that it disturbs everyone that there is no
Ever since the study of mathematics and science has begun, women have been underrepresented in the STEM field. The STEM field is made up of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics careers. There have been a lot of efforts to increase the number of women in STEM careers; however, men remain dominant in the field. For example, in 2015 women filled 47% of all U.S. jobs, but held only 24% of the STEM careers (Women in STEM, par. 3). Meaning that in 2015 men held 76% of all the STEM careers. The gap between men and women in STEM continues to widen and men continue to dominate the STEM field because the societal stereotype steers women away from STEM careers
Over the past 50 years, women in the United States have made great strides in education an entry into the work force in this country. However, despite these advances, women continue to be underrepresented in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and math, collectively referred to as “STEM.” Women’s representation is low at all levels of the STEM career “pipeline,” from interest and intent to majoring in a STEM field in college and to having a career in a STEM field in adulthood. Studies show that girls lose interest in math and science during middle school, and STEM interest for girls is low, compared to boys. Most research on this topic has focused on representation of girls and women in these fields, primarily on the obstacles preventing more girls and women from entering them. It is time now to shift the focus toward understanding and developing solutions for “what works” for girls who show interest and engage in the fields of STEM.
The force of societal stereotypes is a large part of this gap. Instead of joining STEM careers, the most common careers among women are secretaries, nurses, and elementary and middle school teachers (Mandell). This truly illustrates that when well-rounded, talented women have the choice, they are inclined to delve into the field in which society expects them to belong. In this way, the stereotype of women not being involved in STEM is forcing less women to be involved in these fields. The deficiency of women in technical fields, despite their well-roundedness and ability, can be directly related to unyielding cultural stereotypes that stigmatize women in supposedly masculine fields.
Before women to get more involved in the STEM fields women first have to go and get degrees in STEM undergraduate programs. One way to help change this is the lack of female role models. Girls need role models to show that they can be successful in STEM fields. If there are such strong gender stereotypes it might be discouraging women from pursuing STEM education and STEM jobs. It is complicated to get young women role models because the people who are part of the hiring team said that were less likely to say they would hire the female applicants overall and that they would offered them lower salaries and fewer mentoring opportunities. This is a problem because women will be less likely to want to get into these fields because they will have to work so much harder to get the same recognition as the males. Young girls will be more interested in getting into one of these fields where they fear comfortable. Young girls need a role model like Emily Roebling who studied math and science and became the chief engineer in the building of the Brooklyn Bridge in 1860. Another reason that girls are less likely to pursue these majors is gender stereotyping, and less family-friendly flexibility in the STEM fields. Across all STEM fields, female PhDs have lower rates of patenting and entrepreneurship than do male PhDs. This difference is most pronounced in physics, astronomy and the computer sciences, in which women earned only 1 in 5 PhDs. There is a need to encourage and support women in
As a woman who goes to a large university with an abundance of peers who are like me and are looking to enter fields like this, the topic of discussion is heavily important to me for obvious reasons. However, it is also important for the general public to become aware of such under-represenation in such fields because everyone needs to do their fair share of preventing this issue going forward from employers to professors to parents and all the way back to students who will eventually be workers in the STEM industry. Everyone needs to recognize the importance of including more women in these fields in order to make necessary progress occur.
This report navigates the current state of STEM demographic in the country. It examines the reasons why there are less females undertaking STEM majors and gives recommendations on the problems. A brief history on STEM is outlined and the discussion follows with in depth analysis on the subject. STEM is a very critical education discipline with an importance in the economy of the country. Much as it is important, few students choose a career path in STEM. Although, there are more than 50% female students in Colleges and Universities, 12% take STEM related course. Why is this? This report is a compilation of empirical data collected in journals on the same subject explaining
Since the beginning, men have ruled the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Which explains the huge gender gap in STEM jobs. As of 2009, women occupied 24% of STEM jobs. Many of these women work in the science field. Only about 12% of women occupy the engineering and computer science field.
So you read about the challenges that women are going through. You read the stereotypical aspect about women and the STEM field. Women make up approximately 47% of a hundred of the us work force, they represent only 26 parts of a hundred of people who work in STEM (science, technology, designing and making, or mathematics). further, only 12 parts of a hundred of female college students will person with a degree with an unmarried men degree in science, and just 3 parts of a hundred will go on to work in a STEM field 10 years after becoming a person with a degree. While women make up 47% of the US work force, they represent only 26 % of people who work in STEM according to college raptor.com. Here are some more numbers. Only 12 % of female college students will person with a degree with an unmarried men degree in science, and just 3 % will go on to work in a STEM field 10 years after becoming a person with a degree.
Society often views women as objects to look at, even after society has evolved not much has changed for women. Of course, over many decades women have been granted the right to vote, work outside of the home, and for now have control over our reproductive rights. Women were never handed anything on a platter, everything we have we’ve had to work for. In a way, one could say that throughout the years women have been made to feel lesser compared to men. This could potentially be the reason why many women don’t take jobs that are stereotypically said to be “more suited for men”, such as Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM). The original reason being that they were once only a man’s job and now it’s more a matter of not knowing about
Traditionally, men take on the manufacturing, engineering, science occupations in society. Since the 1970’s women’s representation in science, engineering, mathematics, and technology, a group of subjects known as STEM, occupations has increased; but younger girls, under 40, remain underrepresented in these occupations (Census). Furthermore, within the group of few but strong females a part of STEM lies a huge discrepancy between employment of whites and Asians, compared to Africans, Hispanics, and native Americans. Although it is hard to identify the reason for the limited amount of girls in these subject areas, some specialist speculate lack of girls is due to stereotyping threat, stigmas of females lacking the intelligence to comprehend
Many people do argue that we, as humans, have made progress in the equality of women. Yes, there has been progress in integrating women into STEM. There are more women in STEM than there have been in the past. However, the progress has slowed to the point of almost a complete stop. Projections on total equality are not predicted to occur for another 50 years, at the earliest. Women should not have to wait another half a century to have the equality they have been fighting for since the pass of the 19th Amendment. It is not uncommon to find people, male and female, who believe that women are too dainty to be hard workers. STEM jobs are traditionally male associated because of the ‘dirtiness’ or ‘complexity’ or ‘intensity’. People say women
In the study presented by Wang, Eccles, and Kenny (2013), they indicated that prior researchers (Ceci, Williams, & Barnett, 2009; Eccles, 2009; Eccles, Barber, & Jozefowicz, 1999; Ferriman, Lubinski, & Benbow, 2009) provided an alternative explanation of the gender gap in STEM fields. They indicated that this is related to females not being interested in STEM fields, life choices, and mathematical aptitude. Their findings indicated that math aptitude is not the decisive reason for the underrepresentation of females in STEM