What can the society do to encourage more female participation in engineering and technology programmes in the universities, a step which may likely lead to more of them in the engineering and technology labour force in the future?
World-over, engineering profession is dominated by men. There are few women in the field of Engineering and Engineering Technology than men. A 2015 publication by the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) said that of all Bachelor degree awarded in all the field of engineering programmes, female accounted for just 19.9%.
A collection of data on the same issue by the "Catalyst" revealed that female accounted for 19.9% of all Bachelor degree awarded in Engineering and Technology programmes in same 2015. They were accounted for 25.2% of all Master degree awaded in same field of study and 23.5% of all PhD degree.
The situation in Canada and in Europe are not different. The report said that 20.6% of all enrolment for Architectural, Engineering and Technology programmes at post secondary institutions were females, while in Europe, it was said that 27.7% of females were graduated from manufacturing, engineering and technology programmes. The case is even worse in Asia and in Africa.
In the labour force, it is same story. Catalyst published data shows that women accounted for just 28.8% of all labour force across all region in Engineering and Technology sector.
What can the society do to encourage more females study engineering and technology programmes in the universities, a step which may likely lead to more of them in the engineering and technology labour force in the future?
Organising Enlightenment Programmes.
Massive enlightenment should be done to encourage female to pursue engineering and technology as a career in the university and other post secondary educational institution. Regular lectures, seminars and symposium should be organised for high school girls to open their understanding to why they should choose engineering and technology programmes at the university. The enlighment campaign to encourage young girls to go for STEM subjects must start from when they were in primary school and more should be done with them when they get into the secondary schools. Without then doing the STEM subject in secondary schools they cannot study engineering and technology programmes at the university.
Making Engineering Subjects Interesting.
It is a fact that STEM subjects are more difficult to learn in high school than any other subjects. High school managements and the teachers of each of the STEM subject should work hard to make them interesting to study in order to attract more girls into it. Method of teaching and learning each subjects should be modified by the ways of interactive, visual methods and more explanative to attract more youg girls into doing it..
Awarding of Sponsorships.
Sponsorship in form of scholarship should be designed to favour more girls than men especially those aim to study engineering and technology programme at the higher institutions. If girls discovered that there are more scholarships to study engineering disciplines than any other disciplines in higher institutions, especially in the university they may be tempted to apply for the programme knowing that part or full of their expenses at the post secondary school institution had already been catered for.
Removal of Unequal Treatment at Work:
Government and company owners should try hard to eradicate unequal treatment melted on women at work in the men dominated engineering and technology profession. It was cited that women were 45% most likely to leave engineering and engineering technology paid jobs than men due to unequal treatment such as isolation, bias, unequal pay and what is refers to as lack of effective women role at the work place.
If the above four things are effectively applied and monitor we might experience upward movement in the chart of women participation in STEM in the future.
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