Today (23 June) National Women in Engineering Day is being celebrated worldwide for the third time, giving the industry a platform to applaud current women engineers and to encourage other young women to consider a career in engineering.
According to the most recent statistics report by Women’s Engineering Society (WES), only 9% of the UK’s engineering workforce is female. In fact, the UK currently has the lowest percentage of female engineering professionals in the whole of Europe – about 20% lower than countries such as Latvia, Bulgaria and Cyprus.
Further statistics reveal that only 20% of A-level physics students are girls and this has not changed in the last 25 years. The amount of young women studying engineering and physics at university has remained virtually static since 2012, and only 15.8% of engineering and technology undergraduates are female.
Certainly, this is not due to a lack of ability. Ingrained societal and cultural norms act as a barrier for women entering into a field of work traditionally seen as “masculine.” As Naomi Climer, president of the Institution of Engineering & Technology (IET) puts it, “in France, the origins of engineer are in ‘ingenious’, while in English it is ‘engine’ and these subtleties have a symbolic impact.”
Moreover, a recent study into gender bias in the technology industry showed that women often outperformed men in some of the most male-dominated subjects, even though they represent the minority. The study also discovered that computer code written by a woman was more likely to be approved by peers than code written by a man, but only if it was not revealed that the code was written by a woman. It appears that the engineering industry’s existing prejudice has repercussions – whether conscious or not – in women’s ability to gain the same levels of recognition as men.
When women account for less than 10% of the engineering workforce, the only way forward is to push for change.
To find out about National Women in Engineering Day see http://www.nwed.org.uk/