Not Blaming Women is Fundamental to Increase Their Presence in STEM Professions

Women make up only 34% of graduates in the EU in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). The amount is even lower in the STEM fields unrelated to care. The fact is that girls are systematically inhibited from studying these fields during their education, which restricts their chances for access to these fields as adults.

Putting an end to this circumstance is among the primary objectives of UN Women. The organization, which gets input from experts in a range of knowledge areas, has been supported by Milagros Sáinz, the lead researcher in the Gender and ICT research study group (GenTIC) at the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC) Internet Interdisciplinary Institute (IN3).

Sáinz was invited to contribute to the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women in the article “How to Address Stereotypes and Practices Limiting Access to STEM-Related Education for Women and Girls.” The scientist likewise participated as a guest speaker at the Expert Group Meeting of UN Women. In her research, she examines the causes and consequences of the obstacles hindering equality in STEM and offers several recommendations to stop stereotypes and achieve equality.

Women are undermined in STEM disciplines

Girls and women are under-represented in the STEM area in most western countries. Consequently, they are not included in the development of scientific and technological breakthroughs on equal terms with their male peers, and their necessities and troubles need to be remedied in the design and production of services and items.

Additionally, they receive less recognition because of the need for more representation in this field. This assists in settling the idea that STEM careers, commonly associated with higher salaries and more leadership than careers with more female involvement, are male-dominated fields.

This inequality originated in complex social and cultural phenomena and is influenced by both personal factors (the assumption that women themselves have that their abilities are restricted in some areas), their environment (based on stereotypes), and their education (teachers’ approaches and educational policies can inhibit girls from studying STEM disciplines).

Powerful, yet harmful stereotypes

Stereotypes are significant since they affect girls’ choices of educational paths. The concept that women are much less gifted than males in some areas is restated in several family environments, educational models, media, social media, and video games, amongst many other examples.

Consequently, in the hunt for solutions, the duty to get over sexism and inequality in education and at work mustn’t lie only with girls and women. Sáinz says that women must not be held responsible for the presence of a gender gap in education, so it appears that the lack of women in some areas of science and technology is something that only pertains to them.

He continues by saying that we live in a misogynistic society based upon solid sexist beliefs, wherein men have a privileged stance. Men have systematically been put in much better personal and professional positions than women, while women have been deprived of those privileges. This needs to change, and the changes must happen at all levels, including all the agents of socialization and society.

Recommendations for change

Measures and initiatives to eradicate sexism in education should ideally focus on various aspects: those that are related to the student’s personality (such as their abilities and mindsets), to social elements (such as roles or stereotypes), and the part played by other agents (such as families and teachers).

Some approaches include families understanding that educating girls in STEM is an advantage and an opportunity. Others require training teachers in equality issues and producing educational models with non-sexist teaching materials and women as role models.

To accomplish this, Sáinz is leading the brand-new HORIGESTEM project funded by the Spanish government, which analyzes the influence of leading women in STEM fields on motivating young girls’ interest in STEM fields.

Achieving gender equality

It is additionally important to promote gender balance in advanced studies. Therefore, the GenTIC team is coordinating INSPIRE, a new European project that strives to promote gender equality in scientific research and innovation.

“It is important to place women at the center of scientific and technological breakthroughs. In other words, they must not only be beneficiaries of those developments but additionally their designers and producers,” stated Sáinz. “Their skills, abilities, interests, and worries have been undervalued for too long. It’s likewise time to highlight the various contributions that women have made to the various areas of knowledge and to emphasize their significant role in care in both the family and social spheres and their value in advancement linked to those areas.”

According to Sáinz, it is necessary to convey that equal opportunities between males and females will certainly not be fully accomplished until the social stakeholders collaborate and work in the same direction.

Achieving this and positioning women at the center of scientific and technological breakthroughs would significantly contribute to resolving the world’s major challenges today, such as social injustice and climate change.

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