Girls’ Lack Of Confidence In Academic Fields. Although

The underrepresentation of women in STEM is a problem in which I harbor particularly strong feelings, as female scientists are typically neither recognized nor celebrated for their scientific contributions. Young girls with dreams of being scientists find few role models as male figureheads historically dominate STEM fields, teaching women that this is not a suitable field of study.

51 percent of the United States is female but only 34.4 percent of doctors are women. While 90.4 percent of nurses are female (“Women in Medicine”; “Male Nurses Becoming”), the women who do become doctors earn an astounding 25 percent less than their male counterparts (Groves). These staggering figures are only a single piece in the larger overall lack of women in STEM, or science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, which has remained prevalent since the beginning of these fields. Although women are underrepresented in these STEM fields, this is not due to ineptitude, but instead it is a result of the force of societal stereotypes coupled with their wider range of abilities. The recent increase in women’s association with STEM seems

In a speech in February 2013 President Barak Obama said, “One of the things that I really strongly believe in is that we need to have more girls interested in math, science, and engineering. We’ve got half the population that is way underrepresented in those fields and that means that we’ve got a whole bunch of talent…not being encouraged the way they need to.” It been three years since President Obama has made that statement and the underrepresentation of women in science, technology, engineering and math as known as STEM majors is still a big problem today. The STEM workforce is crucial to Americas global competitiveness and groundbreaking capability. The people who work in the STEM field make up nearly half of the United

Women have struggled in establishing their rightful place in the STEM environment because of this image of a family where the mother is the chief caretaker of the children. Society believes that a woman’s first priority

While this bill undoubtedly aligned with the mission and purpose of women’s colleges, there remains an unbalanced amount of representation of women in STEM programs and careers. “Globally, women remain particularly behind in participation at elite institutions and in traditional ‘male’ fields of study including science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, or STEM” (Renn, 2014, p. 3). While the very existence of women’s colleges asserts their right to belong within realms of higher education, the work towards equity and inclusion must take place in all facets of life. “Even where women outnumber men in undergraduate enrollments and enjoy full access to higher education, women’s institutions act symbolically to remind society that in many other domains of public and private life, gender equality remains elusive” (Renn, 2014, p. 125).

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

During this day and age women in STEM is a very tough career. One question we bring to mind is does a female student having a female science teach motivate them to fill in those shoes? The answer to me is yes because women are starting to get rid of that stereotype about how they can’t feed off each other. Especially if the girl’s mom was a science teacher that would help a lot because women tend to look at their mother’s footsteps first. Also the pioneer’s women in STEM need to be brought upon more in history class. In order to get more women into the Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics field, women and young girls need these type of people to be brought upon in order to spark inspiration?.

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

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

Men are the people who have the most rank in technical skills. There has not been any growth in jobs in STEM since 2000 for women. It has been said that the pattern may begin in early education. Females may not be encouraged to study math and science as much as males are encouraged to do so. Very few of females who earn bachelor’s degree do so in the area of STEM. However, slightly over half of bachelor’s degrees are earned by women. Many people believe that females lack the intelligence to be successful in STEM. Others believe women do better in skills such as education, and humanitarian roles such as doctor’s an lawyers. Sometimes women themselves believe that men have what it takes to be successful in STEM. Sometimes females have “self-esteem”

In his article, “Does Gender Matter?”, Ben A. Barres writes about the apparent absence of women in the science, technology, engineering, and math fields. He starts out the article by informing the reader about a few of the hypotheses that aim to explain this difference in presence, hypotheses that Barres aims to disprove. Barres explains, and at a few points depicts with charts and graphs, the significance of the gap between the amount of white men in the STEM majors and fields of studies and the amount of women and minorities in these same areas. He tell the readers the misconceptions such as the idea that women are inferior in these fields are untrue, and the fact is that woman and minorities are discouraged from entering into these areas

Science, technology, engineering, and math are the four areas of study that make up STEM. These four areas all have one thing in common: they are all dominated by men. According to Lauren C. Williams, “men outnumber women 7 to 3 in tech jobs in New York City — and nationwide.”.7 Despite this, “women now earn more bachelor’s and master’s degrees than men”.6 However, “women are a minority”.2 Women are a minority in all STEM careers. The ratio of men to women in scientific fields has never been one to one. For some unknown reason very few women are choosing to become chemists, physicists, engineers, computer technicians, or mathematicians. There are many proposed theories for why women are extremely outnumbered in these scientific

Andresse St. Rose, Christianne Corbett, and Catherine Hill, are actively involved in the field of female studies in education and researchers for The American Association of University Women. In their 2010 book titled Why so Few? Women in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics, the first chapter is the book’s namesake and contains a wide depth of information, from statistics regarding a smaller female presence in STEM careers, differences across gender in students pursuing STEM related AP courses, and a comparison of the gender divide in earlier years with the present time.

Stereotype threat was first defined by Steele and Arson as the “social-psychological threat that occurs when one is in a situation or doing something for which a negative stereotype about one’s group applies. This predicament threatens one with being negatively stereotyped, with being judged or threatened stereotypically, or with the prospect of conforming to the stereotype” (Steele, 1997, p.614). The biggest stereotype when we talk about STEM fields is “Why so Few [women]?” Then comes the cultural stereotype that boys are innately better than girls at math and sciences, which is inescapable in the U.S. and apparently at the fault. Recent trends in achievements by girls and women compare to their counterparts, as well as years of scientific research, demonstrate that this notion is simply incorrect. Although the number of women still lags behind the number of men in many STEM fields, the reasons for this gap are cultural biases and institutional barriers that hinder the advancement of women.

Over the course of history, advances made by women in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) have been overshadowed and downplayed due to a male dominant culture in these fields. The primary reason for these fields being dominated by males is the way women have been forced into gender roles over the course of history. Women with ambition to build, create, and discover have been discouraged from following their passions and are instead told to focus on raising their children. This discrimination has hurt the overall progress in scientific communities as it has limited women in the resources available to them and has forced them to work in the shadows. Yet there has still been great progress in STEM made by women. Over the past