Moving Forward: Issues Facing Women in STEM & Space for Change
In this issues spotlight, Jessica and I provide an overview of the major issues facing women in STEM at all career stages and what we can do to confront these issues head-on.
Introduction
In our previous post, multiple of our interviewees made reference to the issues they encountered in their research careers, whether it be balancing family with the demands of the job or dealing with self-doubt. Here, we aim to elucidate the extent of the issues that prevent women’s success at multiple stages of their careers in STEM. In doing so, we also aim to highlight recent efforts aimed at confronting these issues and advocate for continued efforts to ensure we can all participate and contribute to STEM equally.
Issues In Getting Into STEM
Even before embarking on their careers, women in STEM are already at a disadvantage. Beginning as early as elementary school, young girls show gaps in confidence and subsequent performance in mathematics. A group from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign conducted a longitudinal study of over 20,000 kindergarten students across 1200 schools investigating mathematics proficiency. They showed that, at the beginning of kindergarten, there is no significant difference between the proficiency in math between boys and girls. However, this does not hold with time, as by the end of kindergarten, gaps begin to emerge that show greater proficiency in boys. These gaps continue through elementary school, peaking in grades 3 and 5. What is more concerning, however, is that differences exist between boys and girls when it comes to confidence in mathematics. Girls were found to display less confidence, and these gaps were larger than expected given differences in mathematics proficiency. Interestingly, these gaps were not as stark in mathematics interest (Lubienski et al., 2013). This paints a very dismal picture in which girls interested in mathematics from the start of their education begin to lose confidence in their abilities throughout.
A more recent study from 2023 investigated the issues contributing to the lack of Latinas in STEM, pointing to numerous boundaries that hindered Latinas in pursuing scientific training and education. While we are all well aware of the wage gaps that exist between men and women and across race and ethnicity, what we may not realize are the severe disadvantages for individuals at the intersections of these gaps, such as Latinas. For example, Latinas are paid 26% less than white women and a whopping 46% less than white men. As college tuition has increased 12% from 2010 to 2022 (Hansen 2023), it is evident that underprivileged women face especially high barriers to receiving the education they need to begin careers in STEM. Other important factors, from cultural norms surrounding community support and caregiving, to bias and lack of inclusion, to a shortage of mentors coming from underprivileged backgrounds across career stages, contribute to the ever-present obstacles leading to gender and race disparities in STEM (Werner Washburne et al., 2023).
Evidently, women face challenges hindering their ability to even begin receiving a STEM education. From a lack of confidence in their abilities at an early age, to financial barriers arising from intersectional disparities, to societal pressures surrounding what jobs men and women traditionally hold, it is no wonder that women make up the minority in STEM fields, with this disparity beginning very early on.
Issues With Retention
In 2022, doctoral recipients who identified as female were 47.0% across all disciplines. Compared to 30 years prior where this percentage was a mere 37.1%, this is a significant improvement. However, we must also consider the breakdown by field, as this paints a different picture. While the 2022 percentage for doctorates received by female scientists in the life sciences was 56.6%, the breakdown for other STEM fields is not as promising. The percentages are as follows:
This is a staggering difference, making it clear that the percentage of women who step into the scientific work force following their graduate education is disproportionately lower in a majority of STEM fields.
For the women who continue past graduate education into academia, the gender gap is only exacerbated, with retention rates decreasing across academic positions. A 2021 review compiled studies investigating why women feel compelled to exit academic jobs and identified three main motivations: the underrepresentation of women numerically in STEM fields, less social capital such as interpersonal connections or powerful networks for career support, and unwelcoming academic environments, all of which discourage women from pursuing academic positions in STEM (Casad et al., 2021). Taken together, women are still in the minority across many STEM fields very early into their careers. As each rung of the academic ladder moves further, retention of women in the workforce becomes less and less.
Issues With Career Progression & Achievement
While some may believe that successfully attaining a faculty position may set up a woman scientist for success and permanence in the field, factors involved in hiring of faculty, administrative “housework,” and biases against women’s teaching and research can prevent women scientists from achieving tenure or succeeding in their careers long-term.
Before these women even enter positions of power in academia, their inclusion is already under threat. For scientists planning to apply to faculty positions within academia, the grants and awards they receive prior to the application process can be a major factor in their acceptance to these positions. Of these, the NIH Pathway To Independence Award (K99/R00) is one of the most sought-after awards, as it “demonstrates to hiring institutions that the candidate has a track record for receiving extramural funding which is a requirement for future success in academic research careers.” About half of K99/R00 recipients go on to obtain R01 funding, another major NIH grant for primary investigators. However, despite the fact that this award was created to “promote scientists from diverse backgrounds into tenure-track faculty positions,” a recent study identified multiple biases that disadvantaged K99/R00 awardees from receiving another major NIH award. More specifically, they found that, on average, women took 2.8 years longer and had a 24.6% lower chance of receiving a major award compared to other male applicants (Woitowich et al., 2024).
Once in faculty positions, women are often relegated to the completion of administrative and internal service tasks, such as participation in committees and seminars. While this gender gap in service has been somewhat of an open secret in academia, a recent study (Kvalsvik, 2024) set out to better understand and quantify the disparities between genders. They found that male associate professors “actively engaged in evasiveness and did not want to participate if it was not positive for their careers,” whereas women were “governed by compliance” to a greater extent. Some male researchers even admitted to not “respond[ing] to emails or act[ing] in an exaggerated disorganized manner” to get out of service. By creating environments in which women are implicitly expected to devote their time and energy to internal service and men are allowed to avoid these tasks, women are inherently put at a disadvantage when it comes to their teaching and their research productivity.
Unfortunately, biases continue to carry into these areas as well. For example, a recent study found that “if more men were in a department, women had lower average student evaluation ratings when teaching higher level courses, and vice versa” (Melecio-Zambrano, 2023). While this bias applies to both men and women, given the issues with recruitment and retention, women are more likely to be in the gender minority of their department in the life sciences and therefore at a disadvantage. Additionally, because student evaluations are a part of tenure consideration for a professor, this bias can directly impact a woman scientist’s career. In a similar vein, when it comes to research, a recent study published in Nature found two surprising findings: first, that only about 17% of manuscripts submitted over a multiple-year period had a woman as a corresponding author and, second, that papers authored by women were being accepted at a lower rate than papers authored by men. While the cause of these issues wasn’t immediately discernible in some cases (for example, whether lower acceptance for women-led publications was a result of reviewer bias or publication quality) they do appear to reflect existing disparities in the field, exemplifying how deeply rooted these issues are and how far they can extend within a woman’s career. Regardless, number of publications and what journals they’re in, as well as citations are major factors considered for promotion to tenure, representing another barrier towards career progression for women in science.
Solutions & Progress
While the issues we have discussed are systemic and will require broad, sweeping changes to truly unroot, there is still much that can be done at the educational and professional levels to confront these issues head-on. Beginning with girls first learning about STEM in their K-12 education, teachers and community members can encourage girls’ interest and participation in multiple ways. For example, College of the Holy Cross students taught scientific concepts to elementary-school-aged girls in collaboration with Worcester’s Girls, a non-profit (Fidrocki). In doing so, these students help expose younger girls to STEM and encourage them to participate in it while also receiving an opportunity to directly impact their own field. By exposing girls to STEM and confronting misconceptions associated with their capability to succeed in STEM, we can begin to close the gender gap that forms during these pivotal developmental years. As Gallup researcher Zach Hrynowski commented during a study examining this gap, “The extent to which young people say, ‘I want to pursue STEM in college as a major or as a career’ has a lot to do with what’s going on in the classroom in K-12” (Jones, 2023). Other interventions that can boost girls’ participation in STEM at both the K-12 and college level include the involvement of a diverse set of mentors who reflect the identities of their students as well as increasing awareness of career opportunities in STEM through educational programs.
As women move further into their STEM careers, retention begins to drop for multiple reasons, such as underrepresentation in their field and a lack of support. To confront these issues successfully, multiple institutional interventions will be necessary. Universities and research institutions must be cognisant of biases present in hiring and promoting practices and invest resources into ensuring all faculty are receiving the support they need. This could be done in a number of ways, such as ensuring that internal service tasks are equally divided among all members. Additionally, grant agencies and journals can invest efforts into encouraging submissions from women scientists and assessing the biases present in their review processes. What is evident from these studies, however, is that measures must be taken at all levels of STEM to ensure women’s success in their respective fields.
Conclusion
The importance of quantifying the gender disparities in STEM and placing numbers and statistics to everyday social issues cannot be understated. Thanks to the studies and articles we have referenced along with countless others, concrete data continues emerging, shedding light on the obstacles faced by women at all levels of a STEM career. From differences in confidence levels surrounding academic performance in school-children to increased difficulties receiving crucial grants as a full professor, women encounter numerous invisible boundaries and setbacks to success. We can begin to see change only when we collectively acknowledge these disparities, as a more equal system must emerge from actions taken such as additional resources to support young girls’ interests in STEM and unbiased selection of applicants in higher academia. From the classroom to the lab, institutions and individuals alike must continue to call attention to these disparities and seek solutions to them. We hope that this piece has given you a sense of the data surrounding the gender differences present across all levels of STEM, and we thank you for taking the time to appreciate all the important research published on this issue. Change is possible, and it starts with us.
References
Sarah T. Lubienski, et al. “Girls’ and Boys’ Mathematics Achievement, Affect, and Experiences: Findings from ECLS-K.” Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, vol. 44, no. 4, 2013, pp. 634–45. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.5951/jresematheduc.44.4.0634. Accessed 15 Apr. 2024.
Hanson, Melanie. “College Tuition Inflation Rate” EducationData.org, August 13, 2023, https://educationdata.org/college-tuition-inflation-rate
Werner Washburne, Maggie, JoAnn Trejo, Ruth Enid Zambrana, Maria Elena Zavala, Alice Martinic, Angelica Riestra, Tracie Delgado, et al. “Early Career Latinas in STEM: Challenges and Solutions.” Cell 186, no. 23 (November 9, 2023): 4985–91. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cell.2023.10.016.
Casad, Bettina J., Jillian E. Franks, Christina E. Garasky, Melinda M. Kittleman, Alanna C. Roesler, Deidre Y. Hall, and Zachary W. Petzel. “Gender Inequality in Academia: Problems and Solutions for Women Faculty in STEM.” Journal of Neuroscience Research 99, no. 1 (2021): 13–23. https://doi.org/10.1002/jnr.24631.
Kam, K. K. J. F. a. L. (n.d.). Doctorate Recipients from U.S. Universities: 2022 | NSF - National Science Foundation. https://ncses.nsf.gov/pubs/nsf24300/table/1-11
Woitowich, Nicole C., Sarah R. Hengel, Christopher Solis, Tauras P. Vilgalys, Joel Babdor, and Daniel J. Tyrrell. “Analysis of NIH K99/R00 Awards and the Career Progression of Awardees.” eLife 12 (January 8, 2024). https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.88984.3.
Kvalsvik, G. (2024, April 12). Women end up doing the academic housework. Kifinfo. https://kifinfo.no/en/2024/03/women-end-doing-academic-housework
Melecio-Zambrano, L. “Teaching Evaluations Reflect—and May Perpetuate—Academia’s Gender Biases.” Accessed April 29, 2024. https://www.science.org/content/article/teaching-evaluations-reflect-and-may-perpetuate-academia-s-gender-biases.
“Nature Publishes Too Few Papers from Women Researchers — That Must Change.” Nature 627, no. 8002 (March 6, 2024): 7–8. https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-024-00640-5.
Fidrocki, M. (n.d.). How a new Holy Cross course is tackling the “Leaky pipeline” of women in STEM. Holy Cross Magazine. https://magazine.holycross.edu/stories/how-new-holy-cross-course-tackling-leaky-pipeline-women-stem
Jones, A. (2023, December 5). Efforts to close gender interest gap in STEM must be stepped up, Gen Z survey shows. CNN. https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/05/us/stem-gender-interest-gap-reaj/index.html