Discover 3 opportunities in STEM

Long gone are the days when women were believed to have no place in the workforce. In the United States today, women make up 49% of the college-educated workforce. However, despite this encouraging number, careers in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) remain severely lacking when it comes to females in the field. Let’s break down why that is, and how it can change.

For many years, around the world, it has been recognised that there is a skills shortage in engineering; that there simply aren’t enough engineers required to complete large-scale investments of local, national and international importance.

While in recent decades women’s participation in the labour market has significantly increased, wide gender gaps still persist. Broadly speaking, women’s working conditions tend to be worse, particularly remuneration; glass ceilings often block career progress, stifling motivation; and achievement goes less recognised, denting morale. Job opportunity, too, is restricted, some areas of work demarcated, implicitly, if not explicitly, as ‘men’s only’. Make no mistake: equality of the sexes is still some way off.