Only About 1 In 5 Engineering Degrees Go To Women
Despite various efforts to encourage more women to study STEM fields in college, the percentage of engineering bachelor’s degrees earned by women in the United States hasn’t increased much in the 21st century. Specifically, it has risen from 18% in 1998 to 22% in 2018.
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Of all the fields in STEM – or science, technology, engineering and mathematics – the engineering workforce has the lowest proportion of women, at 14%.
That low participation matters for several reasons. Women are not only being left out of some of the highest-paying jobs in STEM, but companies are losing out as well. Research shows that gender-diverse teams make better business decisions than teams that are all-male.
So why aren’t women going into engineering? And what, if anything, can be done to help ...