Women Choosing Other Fields Over Engineering and Math
Posted on May 26, 2008 Comments (6)
The graph shows college degrees granted in the USA. This topic sets up one for criticism, but I believe it is more important to examine the data and explore the possible ideas than to avoid anything that might be questioned by the politically correct police. An import factor, to me anyway, is that women are now graduating from college in far higher numbers than men. And in many science fields female baccalaureate graduates outnumber male graduates (psychology [67,000 to 19,000], biology[42,000 to 26,000], anthropology, sociology [20,000 to 8,000]) while men outnumber women in others (math [7,000 to 6,000], engineering [53,000 to 13,000], computer science [39,000 to 11,000], physics [3,000 to 900]).
| Field | Bachelors |
|
Master’s |
|
Doctorate | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Women | Men | Women | Men | Women | Men | ||||
| Biology | 42,283 | 25,699 | 4,870 | 3,229 | 3,105 | 3,257 | |||
| Computer Science | 11,235 | 39,329 | 5,078 | 12,742 | 225 | 909 | |||
| Economics | 8,141 | 17,023 | 1,391 | 2,113 | 355 | 827 | |||
| Engineering | 13,197 | 52,936 | 7,607 | 26,492 | 1,174 | 5,215 | |||
| Geosciences | 1,660 | 2,299 | 712 | 973 | 243 | 470 | |||
| Physics | 903 | 3,307 | 427 | 1,419 | 200 | 1,132 | |||
| Psychology | 66,833 | 19,103 | 12,632 | 3,444 | 2,264 | 211 | |||
| Sociology | 20,138 | 8,438 | 920 | 485 | 343 | 211 | |||
| All S&E | 235,197 | 230,806 | 53,051 | 66,974 | 10,533 | 17,405 | |||
What does this all mean? It is debatable, but I think it is very good news for the efforts many have made over the last few decades to open up opportunities for women. I still support efforts to provide opportunities for girls to get started in science and engineering but I think we have reached the day when the biggest concern is giving all kids better math and science primary education (and related extracurricular activities). Also continued focus and effort on the doctorate and professional opportunities for women is warranted.
But for kids today it seems like the data shows there is at least as much reason to encourage boys to pursue college degrees and fields such as psychology as there is to encourage girls to pursue engineering (except of course I happen to favor engineering – hence the topic of this blog but…). After all the number of college degrees in science and engineering is equal for men and women, which is great. Granted since women are getting a significantly higher proportion of all degrees, so there is still a bias toward men getting science and engineering degrees. But there is a larger bias for women in all other fields combined.
Related: Diversity in Science and Engineering – Women Working in Science – Engineering Education at Smith College – The freedom to say ‘no’ – Girls in Science and Engineering – USA Science and Engineering Degree Data (2007) – Fixing Engineering’s Gender Gap – Worldwide Science and Engineering Doctoral Degree Data
* graph source: National Science Foundation, Division of Science Resources Statistics, special tabulations of U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System, Completions Survey, 1966–2005.
** Data source: National Science Foundation, Division of Science Resources Statistics, special tabulations of U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System, Completions Survey, 1996–2005. I suppose there has to be (or should be I would think) a specific url for this but I can’t find it (I would think you would want to make the url for this very obvious – at least I would if I were posting such info for NSF – a breadcrumb navigation on any specific data from the report should include a link to the permanent url for that report).
Categories: Engineering, Science, Students, Universities
Tags: curiouscat, data, engineering education, graduate students, quote, science education, undergraduate education, undergraduate students, Universities, women
6 Responses to “Women Choosing Other Fields Over Engineering and Math”
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May 27th, 2008 @ 11:21 am
Working in education I still meet many young women who have been conditioned from an early age to believe that girls are not very good at maths. A bit like ‘women can’t read maps’. Complete rubbish of course. It takes a lot of patience and effort to overcome these damaging preconceptions and brainwashing that these kids are subjected to.
October 25th, 2008 @ 8:50 am
There is one area of engineering that women are represented in a high proportion and that is Biomedical Engineering. In 2007 38% of all Biomedical Engineering graduates were female (See The Number of Biomedical Engineers Graduating into Job Market in 2007). The math argument that has bounced around doesn’t seem to hold completely since Biomedical Engineering curricula required students to cover a wider range of engineering subjects than the traditional engineering professions. They typically start their programs with the same courses as the traditional engineering curriculum. They are required to use math in chemistry, physics, electrical engineering, chemical engineering, mechanics, etc. Each subject requires the use of mathematics from a different perspective to find solutions. Contrast that to the more traditional engineering programs that essentially apply mathematics from a more narrow perspective. In my opinion considerably more mental gymnastics are needed to learn the math applications and switch between the different engineering fields as they move along in their curriculum.
Maybe the issue is motivation. Biomedical Engineers specifically work to create new life saving or quality of life improving products. Could the difference in the type of product created be the difference?
November 22nd, 2008 @ 10:38 am
The National Girls Collaborative Project for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) collaborates with those seeking to increase the participation of girls in STEM feeder activities…
December 2nd, 2008 @ 1:21 am
I’m a PhD candidate in a highly ranked engineering school. I can tell you, while we have come a long way, there is still a long way to go. I am aware that there are many talented people working to assist women in the engineering fields. However, the number of women in this field is still quite low and I have been in lecture courses where there were 3 girls in a class of 200. There are many men who think we do not belong, and in addition to the regular inflammatory comments, women are not included in social events etc. In order to encourage more women to join the engineering fields, the culture simply must change.
October 4th, 2014 @ 10:00 am
[…] I predicted in 2008 (Women Choosing Other Fields Over Engineering and Math) the trends continued and resulted in large imbalances in favor of women at the undergraduate level […]
December 14th, 2016 @ 11:52 am
[…] 25% of boys and 24% of girls reported that they expect to work in a science-related occupation. But boys and girls tend to think of working in different fields of science: girls envisage themselves as health professionals more than boys do; and in almost all countries, […]