Losing Girls between High School and College
The transition from high school to college is a critical moment when many young women turn away from science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) career paths. Although nearly equal numbers of young men and women graduate from high school with the right classes and grades to pursue a STEM major, women are far less likely than their male peers to plan to major in these fields. Almost one-third (29 percent) of all male freshmen, compared with only 15 percent of all female freshmen, planned to major in a STEM field in 2006. The gender disparity is even more significant when the biological sciences are not included. Just over 20 percent of all male freshmen planned to major in engineering, computer science, or the physical sciences compared with only about 5 percent of female freshmen.
If they do decide to pursue STEM majors, many of these academically capable women change their minds early in their college careers, as do many of their male peers. For example, in engineering the national rate of retention from entry into the major to graduation is just under 60 percent for women and men. Although the overall retention of female undergraduates in STEM is similar to the retention rate for men, understanding why women leave STEM majors is still an important area of research since women make up a smaller percentage of STEM students from the start.
Why do you think we lose so many STEM-interested girls between high school and college? And what makes women STEM majors switch to different fields?
Phoebe, I think you make a good point about engineering and computer science as the areas where women are really underrepresented - and the areas where there are the most jobs.
And just to clarify, as Young Woman in Science points out, this graphic may not accurately illustrate the numbers of men and women who graduate with STEM degrees. I think the "intent to major" chart is interesting because it helps us understand where some young women appear to step off the path to a STEM career. This chart shows that it's more of a college recruitment problem than a college retention problem.
Regarding computer science as a hostile environment, for those of you who haven't read it, I recommend reading Unlocking the Clubhouse by Jane Margolis and Allan Fisher. We describe their research in the computer science department at Carnegie Mellon in chapter 6 of Why So Few (http://www.nature.com/scitable/content/chapter-6-the-college-student-experience-18255062). A very interesting (and short!) read.
Christi
Women dropping STEM fields (or not considering them) has been a primary concern of mine for some time. I have struggled and lost with so many of these girls, including my own daughter. We lose male STEM students, but lose women in larger numbers. I have several ideas as to why but no proof:
1. Despite all the years of effort on many parts, women are still severely discriminated against in STEM careers. They experience discrimination in pay and projects from the day they start work. They don't move up as far nor as fast in these careers as do their male counterparts. They get little support from their male bosses, many of whom are unaware that there are problems. Many (most?) in society think that the problem was fix 50 years ago, which just makes things worse. It's a very hard and uncomfortable path that women in STEM fields must travel.
2. STEM fields are not prestigious nor well paid. If you want money or glory, seek other fields.
3. Many young women feel an innate need to "improve society", to better the lives of others. Excluding the biological sciences, these young women don't see a way to improve the world through STEM careers.
Losing competent women (and men) from STEM fields to non-technical pursuits is becoming a huge national problem. Do we need another Sputnik to jump-start us?
From Engineering Trends
http://www.engtrends.com/IEE/0506C.php
Again remove biotech and the results are abysmal, with biotech they are just dismal.
A different take on this subject.
http://eu.techcrunch.com/2010/05/03/want-more-women-in-tech-girls-just-do-it-and-everyone-quit-the-patronizing/
I agree that we shouldn't let people continue on the line that women shy away from math intensive majors. That is a simplification that doesn't hold. As stated on this board many times, CS especially and engineering to a lesser degree are not friendly environments for women. I've heard too many horror stories from the women who stay in those fields to be persuaded otherwise.
How to then convince young women that these are worthwhile majors? Without a culture shift for these "macho-geeks" I doubt that would be possible....You could always promote for women to use such degrees for world development. That might do the trick as many women are attracted to fields where they can help others.
Of course, those are extremely low paying positions albeit needed.
Sciences do not attract as much as we need. Reason do scientists are able to come closer to the people ? Some remain really esoteric. We need brilliant people but what does brilliant mean ? We need to accept that humanities should be added to the formation,Innovation comes from poet and people who thinks out of the box. Women should have an advantage on that aspect. Orlin college of engineers is particularly special.
Reading Sciences and Nature recently they asking the right question. Do we need to train PhD or a hybrid formation that will help our students to get interesting job that fit what society and investors need.
Stop providing what Universities want and be more sensible to what students need to respond to societal needs
When I graduated, 1970, there were no computer science degrees. You got a BS in Electrical Engineering and you figured sometime in your future you might get to work with a computer.
Today, you don't even need the college degree to be considered a top notch coder. I often run into programmers who have little or no formal training but they have been programming since they were 10 years old. They are all male. They are not, for the most part, adept in social situations. Think of Bill Gates before he was married.
The reason women don't go into CS is that it is a hostile place.
http://blogs.osuosl.org/gchaix/2010/11/07/open-source-misogyny/
https://gimmebar.com/view/4d8a9a35ab4979e76b000000
Unfortunately, brilliant coders seem to be allowed to get away with any thing.
Looking on the bright side, the numbers of women getting bachelor's degrees in math and the physical sciences is going up. Between 2000 and 2008 numbers of women graduating in astronomy more than doubled, chemistry went up 36% and physics was up 30%. The percent women increased even more, because the numbers of men getting BA/BS in those fields has been going down.
The big problems are engineering and computer science; numbers of women graduating with a bachelors in engineering have not changed much, and in computer science they have declined.
We must stop letting pundits get away with the idea that women are avoiding the "hard sciences" or the math-intensive sciences. The are specifically avoiding the engineering and computer sciences.... and that is where most of the jobs are.
While it is absolutely true that women drop out of the STEM pipeline throughout their academic and professional careers, I am uncertain that this metric paints an accurate portrait of undergraduates majoring in STEM fields. For example, when I went to college I planned on becoming an international relations major...but wound up majoring in Biology because of inspirational teachers and courses that sparked my interest. So even though you have some dropping out of STEM majors, you have people picking them up as well.
What we ought to be studying is the reason young women do not intend to become science majors going in as freshmen...and I suspect it has something to do with the leaky pipeline later in academic careers in science. When women drop out of the more advanced echelons of a career in science, there are fewer and fewer professors, role models, and televised experts for young women to look up to and identify with.
