giee 2011 gender and interdisciplinary education for ... · giee 2011: gender and interdisciplinary...

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SENSE PUBLISHERS

GIEE 2011

Gender and Interdisciplinary

Education for Engineers

Formation Interdisciplinaire des Ingénieurs

et Problème du Genre

June 23 & 24 2011

Les Cordeliers, Conference Centre,

Université Paris VI (France)

Attracting more young people, particularly women, in Engineering

and Technology (ET) is a major concern in Europe today.

Their participation in engineering occupations appears to be

a key-issue for European economic and technical development,

as well as a central achievement towards gender equality and

social justice. Increasing young people’s interest in the sciences

and mathematics and underlining the importance of Engineering

and Technology developments in shaping our collective

future is an ongoing project in the education sector.

This book presents various analyses and ideas for possible

solutions.

Aujourd’hui, attirer plus de jeunes et en particulier des jeunes

femmes dans les formations d’ingénieurs est un souci majeur

en Europe. C’est une clé pour aller vers l’égalité des sexes

et favoriser le développement économique, scientifi que

et technologique de l’Europe. Accroitre l’intérêt des jeunes

pour les sciences et la technologie est essentiel pour notre

futur collectif et constitue un défi majeur pour l’éducation.

Ce livre présente des analyses et des idées pour de possibles

solutions.

SENSE PUBLISHERSwww.sensepublishers.com SENSE PUBLISHERS

GIEE 2011


Education for Engineers 2011



Proceedings

André Béraud, Anne-Sophie Godfroy,

Jean Michel, Eds.

June 23 & 24 2011

Paris, France

Centre of Conferences

of the University Paris VI

GIEE 2

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SENSE PUBLISHERS

GIEE 2011





June 23 & 24 2011













solutions.









solutions.


GIEE 2011





Proceedings


Jean Michel, Eds.

June 23 & 24 2011

Paris, France



GIEE 2

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SENSE PUBLISHERS

GIEE 2011





June 23 & 24 2011













solutions.









solutions.


GIEE 2011





Proceedings


Jean Michel, Eds.

June 23 & 24 2011

Paris, France



ISBN 978-94-6091-980-0

GIEE 2011: GENDER AND INTERDISCIPLINARY EDUCATION FOR ENGINEERS

GIEE 2011: Gender andInterdisciplinary Educationfor EngineersFormation Interdisciplinaire des Ingénieurs etProblème du Genre

Edited by

André BéraudAssociation ECEPIE, Paris, France

Anne-Sophie GodfroyUniversité Paris-Est-Créteil andInstitute d’Histoire et de Philosophie des Sciences et des Techniques, Paris, France

and

Jean MichelEcole Nationale des Ponts et Chaussées, Paris, France

SENSE PUBLISHERSROTTERDAM / BOSTON / TAIPEI

A C.I.P. record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.

ISBN 978-94-6091-980-0 (paperback)ISBN 978-94-6091-981-7 (hardback)ISBN 978-94-6091-982-4 (e-book)

Published by: Sense Publishers,P.O. Box 21858, 3001 AW Rotterdam, The Netherlandshttp://www.sensepublishers.com

Printed on acid-free paper

All rights reserved © 2012 Sense Publishers

No part of this work may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or byany means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming, recording or otherwise, without writtenpermission from the Publisher, with the exception of any material supplied specifically for the purposeof being entered and executed on a computer system, for exclusive use by the purchaser of the work.

v

Table of conTenTs

foreword ...................................................................................................... ix

KeY noTe sPeaKers ................................................................................... xi

an Ethical and sociological View on Women Engineers and on the role Interdisciplinary courses can play in attracting young people, and Women, to Engineering Education ................................................................... 1Christelle Didier

the bologna process and transparency in European Engineering Education:increased chances for equal opportunities ............................................................ 11Giuliano Augusti

Women in technology in the u.s.: Glass ceiling still not broken ......................... 21Sue V. Rosser

a Vision for the future of European Engineering: Greater gender equality and the utilisation of the skills and talents of all of society ................................... 35Barbara Bagilhole

session 1 : Teaching and learning, contents and cultures .................................................. 45

Interdisciplinary teaching and learning for diverse and sustainable Engineering Education ......................................................................................... 47Christine Wächter

Women in engineering in the uK: approaches to inclusion and Engineering curriculum development ............................................................ 65Sarah Barnard, Barbara Bagilhole, Andrew Dainty, Tarek Hassan

Influence of the perception of science on Engineering & Technologies study choices in lithuania .................................................................................... 79Virginija Šidlauskienė

Gender and science studies competence for students in Engineering, natural sciences, and science Education. the project “degendering science” at the university of Hamburg, Germany ............................................................ 101Helene Götschel

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tablE of contEnts

roles that gender, systemizing and teacher support play in stEm education .. 115Helena Dedic, Tomas Jungert, Steven Rosenfield

Project-Mentoring: a gender-sensitive teaching and learning module in Engineering and technology with interdisciplinary references .............................................. 131Brit-Maren Block

the appeal of innovation: new trends in stEms from a gender point of view ... 147Silvana Badaloni, Sonia Brondi, Alberta Contarello

Facteurs d’influence des choix d’etudes en genie des femmes ........................... 159Nadia Ghazzali, Nydia Morin-Rivest, Vanessa N.W. Kientega, Suzanne Lacroix, Nathalie de Marcellis-Warin, Diane Riopel, Annie Ross, Elisabeth Bussières, Nadine Bernardini

serious games as an interdisciplinary approach in Engineering degree courses ........................................................................... 169Gabriele Hoeborn, Jennifer Bredtmann

crossing disciplinary boundaries – deconstructing gendered practicesin Engineering Education ................................................................................... 183Anne-Françoise Gilbert

thinking interdisciplinarity in Engineering Education: challenges for future research .......................................................................... 197Anne-Sophie Godfroy

session 2 : student’s experiences ...................................................................................... 207

Interdisciplinarities – students’ perception of interdisciplinary EngineeringEducation in Europe ........................................................................................... 209Anita Thaler

female engineering students: career attractors ................................................... 223Michelle Wallace, Ian Lings, Neroli Sheldon, Roslyn Cameron

students’ perception of It curricula and career opportunitiesin serbia and macedonia .................................................................................... 241Mirjana Stojilović, Sonja Filiposka, Ana Krsteska, Ana Vidosavljević, Valentina Janev, Sanja Vraneš

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tablE of contEnts

social relevance and interdisciplinarity in canadian Engineering Education:perceptions of female and male students ............................................................ 255Ann B. Denis, Ruby Heap

Interdisciplinarity as a factor of success to attract more students - a sociological-empirical analysis of It study programmes in austria ............... 267Jenny Maria Käfer

session 3 : other ways to attract more women ................................................................ 281

the micropolitics of disciplinary summer universities for Women ................. 283Veronika Oechtering, Maya Schulte

Women-only Engineering Education – a promising austrian model initiative .... 297Daniela Freitag, Birgit Hofstätter, Anita Thaler

technical companies in switzerland on the way to a corporate culture in line with gender equality ........................................................................................... 309Nadja Ramsauser, Sylvia Manchen Spörri, Thea Weiss Sampietro

make Engineering and technology more appealing to women via gendercompetence as an innovative element of teacher-training in mathematics ..... 327Bettina Langfeldt, Anina Mischau

How to promote young boys and especially girls for engineering issues .............. 341Susanne Ihsen, Wolfram Schneider

la relative féminisation et ses raisons d’une structure française originale : les cycles préparatoires polytechniques ............................................................ 355Josette Costes

Are single-sex educational programmes still relevant for young women? .......... 369Christel Bächle-Blum, Martina Kaiser, Ulrike Busolt

session 4 : Policies .............................................................................................................. 381

Interdisciplinarity towards gender equality in Engineering and technology Education. recommendations .................................................. 383Ezekiela Arrizabalaga, Araceli Gómez, Begoña Sánchez

tablE of contEnts

breaking patterns: How opportunistic sponsorship and women’s moral compass shape careers of female scientists ....................... 401Marita Haas, Christina Keinert-Kisin, Sabine T. Koeszegi, Eva Zedlacher

Women presence in engineering in spain: causes and measures to attract morewomen. the case of the polytechnic university of madrid (upm) ...................... 403Mercedes Del Río Merino, Isabel Salto-Weis Azevedo

Rebecca Apel, Carmen Leicht-Scholten, Andrea Wolffram

Gender counts?! analysis of student dropout at Vienna university of technology ................................................................... 439Elisabeth Günther, Sabine T. Koeszegi

HElEna software for curricula analysis ........................................................... 455Valentina Janev, Jovan Duduković, Sanja Vraneš

conclusion of GIEE 2011 .................................................................................. 471Jean Michel

Authors’ index .................................................................................................... 475

Changing the face of STEM: The example of computer science in Germany ..... 421

ix

foreword

Women’s presence in engineering appears to be a key-issue for European economic and technical development, as well as a major step towards gender equality and social justice. In order to improve this situation it is important to understand why there are so few women in technology, what solutions exist and can be recommended.

two main reasons are traditionally put forward:• Technology has a very clear gendered representation, which is a masculine one:

culturally, symbolically and professionally. the history of technology is linked with masculinity, “the social process of technological development has been overwhelmingly a male process” (cockburn, p. 201, 1992)

• The lack of interdisciplinary subjects in ET curricula is therefore acting as a foil to potential Et students, males and females. previous studies have established that a 37.6% of female students want more interdisciplinarity in their engineering courses, such as subjects from the Humanities and social sciences (thaler and Wachter, 2005).

The Helena research project investigated gender-based preferences and choices of study fields by male and female students. It analyzed literature and data from traditional and piloteuropean Higher education eT curricula in order to question or confirm these statements, to provide indicationsand recommendations about how to launch such measures and monitor the resultsobtained.

results from the HElEna research project were presented during the GIEE 2011conference in paris, June 23d and 24th, discussed and confronted with other points of view expressed by experts of the field from 17 different countries.

the GIEE 2011 organizing committee wants to thank pr Jean michel for having accepted to be President of the Scientific Committee, the members of the SC and all the persons who made this conference possible.

dr yvonne pourratpresident of the organizing committee

GIEE 2011 Scientific Committee

president of the sc: pr Jean mIcHEl, france

• Andre BERAUD - INSA Lyon and ECEPIE, France• Marina BLAGOJEVIC - Altera MB Research Centre on Gender and Ethnicity,

serbia• Christelle DIDIER - University of Lille, France • Susanne IHSEN - TU Munchen and SEFI, Germany• Carmen LEICHT-SCHOLTEN - RWTH Aachen, Germany• Mario LETELIER - University of Santiago, Chile• Tony MARJORAM - UNESCO, France• Gièdre PURVANECKIENE - Gender Studies Centre of Vilnius University,

lithuania• Natasha VAN HATTUM-JANSSEN - University of Minho, Portugal • Christine WAECHTER - IFZ and University of Klagenfurt, Austria• Henk ZANVOORT - Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands

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KeY noTe sPeaKers

cHrIstEllE dIdIEr

An EthICAl And SoCIoloGICAl vIEw on womEn EnGInEErS And on thE rolE IntErdISCIplInAry CourSES CAn plAy

In AttrACtInG younG pEoplE, And womEn, to EnGInEErInG EduCAtIon

How can we make studying engineering and technology a more attractive option to young people? How can we attract more women and therefore improve the balance between male and female engineers in society? these are the two questions this conference intends to address. among the solutions, the organizers of the Helena conference have chosen to focus on engineering education as a means of solving two “problems”: firstly the underrepresentation of women in engineering; and secondly the lack of interest expressed by young people in science and technology – and the shortage of graduate engineers for business companies in the future. the hypothesis proposed for these two days of exchanges and discussions is that more interdisciplinary training in engineering education might be one answer because it would appeal more to young people, and especially to women. the aim of the conference is to share the best practices in education, evaluate their effectiveness, gather students’ experiences and discuss other ways of attracting women to the field of engineering.

This presentation will be developed in four parts. In the first part, I’ll discuss the question of social injustice in connection with the underrepresentation of women in engineering. In the second, I’ll discuss the issue of the lack of interest in science and technology shown by young people and the shortage of engineers in the world. I will seek to look at these problems from both an ethical and a sociological perspective and explain why the issue of the small number of women entering into engineering and the issue of young people’s choices as regards their professional orientation need to be studied separately. In the third part of my presentation, I’ll look at the role interdisciplinary teaching can play, from an ethical perspective, in engineering education. In my conclusion, I’ll go back to the question of the need for engineers in the world. rather than going into further discussion as regards the general complaint about the “shortage of engineers” expressed regularly in the media by business companies, professional associations and engineering schools’ deans, I’ll present my insights as regards the role engineers could and should (morally) have to play in achieving the united nations millennium development goals.

A. Beraud et al. (eds.), GIEE 2011: Gender and Interdisciplinary Educationfor Engineers, 1–10.© 2012 Sense Publishers. All rights reserved.

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IntroductIon

How can we attract more young people to engineering and technology studies and how can we attract more women also and therefore begin to redress the imbalance between male and female engineers in society?

these are the two questions this conference intends to respond to. among the solutions, the organizers of these two day-discussions chose to focus on engineering education as a means of solving these “problems”: the first one being the underrepresentation of women in engineering; the second one being the lack of interest shown by young people in science and technology, and the eventuality of a lack of graduate engineers for business companies in the future.

The hypothesis proposed for these two days of exchanges and discussions is that more interdisciplinary training in engineering education might be one answer because it would appeal more to young people, and especially to women. the aim of the conference is to share the best practices in education, evaluate their effectiveness, gather students’ experiences and discuss other ways of bringing more women to the field of engineering.

WHat Is my bacKGround?

I first trained as an engineer, studied two years in preparatory classes (classes préparatoires aux grandes écoles: cpGE) and one year in an engineering school of higher education, which was supposed to last for three years as is the standard in france. I left this school before graduation at the beginning of the second year. It was meant to be a one-year break for me to rethink my orientation. but, it turned into a longer break, since I never went back to an engineering school – well never again as a student.

I was a very idealistic young woman. I wanted to change the world and to make it a better place to live in. I thought, at that time of my life, that engineering education was not the right place to achieve my goal.

Instead, I worked as a social worker with illiterate young french people, traveled quite a lot in Europe and in India. When I returned to france, I was determined to go to university and study education in order to understand better the reasons why young people who were born in my country, and educated many years here, were not able to read and write in their mother tongue. later, I met a graduate engineer, who was also a Jesuit father, called bertrand Hériard dubreuil. He was trying to introduce “engineering ethics” into engineering education in france. He was back from the us where he had discovered this field of research and teaching. He proposed that I choose this unusual topic, engineering ethics, for my research in education. I had to write a long dissertation to complete my master’s degree.

I accepted out of curiosity and as a kind of challenge because I thought that engineering and ethics were two incompatible fields of interest.

Unexpectedly, this research project was a revelation for me and a few years later I wrote a doctoral thesis in sociology on “engineering ethics and the french engineers’

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an EtHIcal and socIoloGIcal VIEW on WomEn EnGInEErs

ethos”. It has been now 16 years that I have been developing engineering ethics, combining a sociological and philosophical approach, in france and abroad in various international research programs.

from WHat posItIon do I spEaK today?

my presentation will be that of a curious observer, from the outside, of engineering education. although I am very close to a few engineering schools in my university and in my country, I am a faculty member of none of them. I am working as a researcher in a multidisciplinary ethics center and give courses, conferences and lectures in various engineering schools in France. I am not an expert of engineering education but rather an expert of the engineer’ culture and value. I am also concerned by business ethics, corporate social responsibility and sustainable development. of course, engineering education is of great interests to me, because it is a major factor in professional socialization.

the subject of women engineers has also always been of great interest to me, not only because I could have been one of them, not only because I have had the experience of being among the few female students in a large class of predominantly male engineering students, but also because it is an important issue for society as a whole and because it is, sociologically and ethically, a fascinating subject. I consider that the situation of women in engineering is very revealing of the whole profession, its culture and values.

Interdisciplinary teaching in engineering education is an area I have also been following and studying a great deal because of my interest in ethics, human and social sciences, social responsibility and humanitarian engineering. but I must say that I had never focused my attention on how appealing non-technical topics may be to students. It may be that my experience as a lecturer in ethics has not always given me this impression. While some students appear to be interested in the presence of ethics in their program (which they mostly discover once within the curriculum), many are not very willing and just don’t see the point. It has sometimes demanded from me a huge amount of energy to gain the students’ interest in a topic which they see as a moment of recreation from the ‘real thing’, i.e. ‘hard science’, mathematics, physics, fluid mechanics, materials’ resistance et cetera… and which they also consider less useful – or appealing – than other soft topics such as personal development or management.

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My presentation will fall into four parts: 1. In the first one, I’ll discuss the question of social injustice in connection with

the underrepresentation of women in engineering. 2. In the second, I’ll discuss, from a sociological and ethical viewpoint, the issue

of the lack of interest in science and technology shown by young people and the shortage of engineers in the world.

3. In the third part of my presentation, I’ll question the role of interdisciplinary teachings in engineering education.

4. In my conclusion, I’ll return to the question of the need for engineers in the world and on the role engineers could and should have in achieving the united nations millennium development goals formulated by the unEsco at the millennium summit in 2000.

1. socIal InJustIcE and tHE undErrEprEsEntatIon of WomEn In EnGInEErInG.

the underrepresentation of women in engineering education and in the engineering profession is an indisputable fact. another fact is that while the presence of women in engineering has grown since engineering education opened its doors to female students, very cautiously at first, their percentage has remained stable these last years. this rate may differ from country to country. the year girls were accepted into engineering education may also differ. but, there seems to be a general tendency all over the world which makes it hard to believe that a gender balance will ever be fully reached within the engineering profession. My question is: “to what extent should this underrepresentation be considered as an ethical question? What does it tell us about social injustice towards women?”

there was an obvious social injustice when girls who could have studied engineering – and would have liked to – were literally excluded from scientific education. The first engineering school to convert to co-education in France did so in the 1920s, while the prestigious Ecole Polytechnique waited until 1972.

The social injustice is less obvious but is still present today when a girl is explicitly or implicitly discouraged from choosing an orientation that would be more suitable (sic) for a boy, or when, for example, less money is allocated by her family to her than is to her brother on tutoring to help her succeed in science.

this injustice is even less obvious when it is linked to the dearth of images of women engineers (and inventors) found in the official history of science and technology. this is partly due to the fact women engineers and inventors have been rarer than men, which is a fact I do not contest. but this lack of representation is also due to the fact that women inventors and scientists have not been sufficiently acknowledged by historians.

so, there are many reasons, from the most obvious to the least obvious, from external pressures to renounce a desired career to internal auto-censorship, many reasons that explain why women were and are still today less numerous than men in

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the engineering profession. obviously, allowing girls into engineering education was a first step, a necessary one, but does not suffice in achieving a gender balance in engineering.

two other important facts are to be kept in mind.

The insufficienT “women-friendliness” of business

The first fact to keep in mind is that the drop-out rate of women engineering students after their graduation is higher than that of their male colleagues. for some of them, this renouncement may occur soon after their graduation, for others it occurs after their first or, more often in France, after their second child. The difficulties, still present today, for women of having a career and bringing up children – who are of course very often also their husband’s children – lead them to give up, because of the lack of support from their partners (often engineers themselves) and from their companies (despite the diversity programs that have been set up these last ten years).

things are changing, but they are changing slowly. I would like to say a few words about company policies even though I know it

was the topic of the last HELENA conference. In the field of business, companies have shifted from an equal opportunity approach (based on affirmative action since the 70s in the us) to another way of dealing with gender imbalance, called ‘diversity’. diversity policies concern women as well as ethnic minorities and disabled people (just as affirmative action used to do). But the philosophy, should I say the ideology, of diversity is rather different. Instead of wondering what a company can do for people, it focuses on what people (discriminated people) can do for the company.

the diversity policies developed more recently in Europe, mostly through american companies that have been set up here. today, the great majority of north american companies who seem to care about women’s careers are, in fact, motivated by business motives and not by the promotion of equal opportunity and people’s rights.

Indeed, many studies have now shown that the more women in the higher position in a company, the better the economic results for this company. It is a good thing that managers have realized that diversity is good for business. but just as I do not believe that being ethical always pays, I think that achieving equal opportunity remains an issue even when it does not pay. “pink washing”, just like “green washing” (when ecological issues are at stake) is not the right solution.

so, the issue of women in engineering is not only a problem of orientation after high school, neither is it solely a question of inner and external obstacles. It is also a problem of “women-friendliness” within the workplace. If companies want women engineers to stay, a few things still need to be changed in the companies’ policies as well as in the corporate culture. Whitewashing will never convince, and be efficient, in the long term.

By the way, the concept of “pink washing” which I thought I was inventing for this lecture, following the model of ”green washing” does already exist in the

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uS where it is used to describe companies who show off their care for women through an involvement in charity linked to breast cancer issues in order to appear “women- friendly”.

differenT legiTimaTe desires?

There is another fact to keep in mind which has to do with the gender specificity of career interests and choices. Women seem to be more attracted to topics such as human biology and agronomical sciences, men to mechanics and information technology. this appears as a fact today in many countries.

It has not always been so and I do not believe that this cannot change. this gender bias may need to be analyzed and explained. But it needs also to be taken into account as it is today, and looked at with some caution. In the field of engineering, the percentage of women is high in biological engineering while it remains low in most fields. My question is: should it be so radically different?

Ethically, I would defend any project that intends to reduce internal and external obstacles to the right of women to choose as freely as possible their professional orientation, be that to become an engineer or a doctor of medicine. I would also defend any corporate program that intends to enable all engineers (women and men) to find a better balance between their personal and professional lives and succeed in both. but, I would be slightly wary of programs that seek to help only women engineers (who are seen as mothers) to cope more easily with their domestic and educational tasks, or with companies who try to attract women by being active in a charity fighting against breast cancer (the actual meaning given to “pinkwashing today in the us, as I said before).

But I do not see much ethical justification in the percentage of women in mechanical engineering being the same as that of men, no more than I would see any ethical reason for the military to be 50% male and 50% female. It may be that even if we could end all the internal and external obstacles (which I hope we can do one day but which is still utopian), women may still have different choices.

By the way I need to say that I do not consider that boys are completely free in their career choices either. They too suffer from social pressure, but not the same. they are more influenced by social pressure that pushes them to go to sciences (even if they are good at literature and love it). In the very hierarchical educational system we have in france a boy who is good at Maths has to go to Classes préparatoires for an engineering education and take the most prestigious competitive exams. Then he “has” to choose among the schools he can enter the one whose rank is the highest, and which is not always the one he prefers. How would anyone (I am talking about boys here) dare to say that his dream is to become a Maths teacher in secondary school when he happens to be able to enter Polytechnique?

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2. tHE lacK of IntErEst sHoWn by tHE younG GEnEratIon In scIEncE and tHE sHortaGE of EnGInEErs

let’s say a few words about the lack of interest of the young generation in science and the shortage of engineers. from a sociological viewpoint, the two questions “Why aren’t there more women in engineering?” and “Why do young people not seem to be interested enough in engineering?” are two very different questions.

While the underrepresentation of women in engineering is an obvious fact – although there are various explanations – the lack of interest of the young people in science and technology is a much more controversial statement. While the media seem to listen and spread the alarmist statements coming from business world and from the field of education, scholars who study this question do not assert in such stark terms this lack of interest in the sciences.

For example, the latest Eurobarometer shows that interest in science has not decreased among young people: it is stable and rather high. concerning the interest of young people in the news, it appeared that while ‘soft news’ (culture and entertainment) proved to be the most popular, interest in science and technology is nevertheless high: two thirds of the young people interviewed for the last Eurobarometer are attracted to these topics. they also appear to be very interested in the “new inventions” in all European countries. Various surveys conducted in france also show that the image of science has been stable among the young generation and their parents. As far as France is concerned, the prestige and the financial reward of holding an engineering title remain rather attractive.

From an ethical viewpoint, two other questions need to be asked. The first one is “why should there be more women studying engineering?”. the second one would be: “why should there be more young people studying engineering?”. While the first question leads to a moral discussion and while the answer might entail ethical justification (which I have sought to develop during this presentation); it is obviously not the case as far as the second question is concerned unless one can prove that this shortage of engineers is first of all a reality (which may be true but is not agreed upon by all) and second that this shortage is a moral problem. It may be the case, but it is not obvious to me, at least not at this point of my presentation.

although it is often presented in the media as a major economic problem, like other skeptics, I am not fully convinced because I consider that an economic problem is not always a moral one. To take a provocative example, the fact that a company which designs and makes landmines goes bankrupt may be considered as a rather good piece of news for an ethicist.

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3. WHy sHould tHErE bE morE IntErdIscIplInary coursEs? and WHat for?

While the conference’s organizers see in interdisciplinary courses, non-technical education such as human and social sciences, as a means of attracting more students to engineering education, I would rather ask the question: How could such courses be of benefit to both engineers-to-be and to society as a whole?

I conducted research a few years ago on the curricula of the first French engineering schools. this work showed that the desire to educate a “complete engineer” has been widespread for a long time in french engineering education. philosophy was already taught long ago at the prestigious Ecole Polytechnique, law at the Ecole Centrale, social economics at the Ecole des Mines de Paris. more than a century ago, at least in the few top schools, nontechnical education had undoubtedly its place in the curriculum. of course, this was not the case everywhere but only in the top schools.

In the 50s many interest groups in france (unions, professional associations) agreed upon the inclusion of more interdisciplinary teaching in engineering education, but their motives were not the same. for the national union of employers, engineers needed to be better-skilled in economics, in order to improve productivity. for the major labor trade unions, the aim of social training was to enable engineers to improve the workers’ social conditions. the senior-level employees’ union considered that engineers needed to have a better understanding of what the “human factor was and develop a wider general liberal education”. some catholic movements argued in favor of the inclusion of traineeships in factories as a way of reducing the mutual ignorance that leads to class conflicts.

after a lot of thinking since the mid 80s, the french accreditation body for engineering education has expressed its wish that humanistic training be better-addressed in the programs. but it has not set out any formal requirement. only recently, it created a commission in charge of clarifying the teaching goals of Human and social sciences. simultaneously, a network of students who are members of “Engineers Without borders” has been leading a national discussion on the introduction of human and social sciences in engineering education, in order to help engineers become “citizens of the world”. as you may guess, I agree with such a goal for a broadening of engineering education: contributing through science and technology to build a better world.

the inclusion of interdisciplinary teaching is not a new question and it is important to keep in mind that it is a controversial one because transmitting human and social skills can imply different goals – even antagonistic ones (i.e. improving productivity vs. preventing class war or improving the relation between workers and engineers).

therefore, I will be very interested to listen to the presentations during this conference that will try to see if offering more of such content in the programs will enable us to attract more young people to engineering and also more women. but, as an ethicist, I have other reasons to wish that more interdisciplinary teachings be proposed to all engineering students. However, I would be very happy if teaching

9


programs which are conceived in such a way as to help engineers become “citizens of the world” happened to attract more young people, and more women.

let’s hope that more interdisciplinary teaching can indeed attract more young talented people to engineering, and more talented women, not just because of its current image but also because a more balanced education will make better engineer-citizens, and therefore a better world… and, with hope, make them happier

conclusion: why does the world need engineers? what kind of engineers does the world need? how many women find careers that fit better with their engineering abilities?

What are the fundamental needs of our world and of the future generation? the un millennium development goals may give us a few insights. What is needed for a better world is engineers who are aware of social issues and who are able to respond to the challenge of development and sustainable development.

at the Millennium summit in september 2000, world leaders passed the Millennium declaration which formally established the Millennium development Goal: ”halving extreme poverty and hunger, achieving universal primary education and gender equity, reducing under-five mortality and maternal mortality by two-thirds and three-quarters respectively, reversing the spread of hIv/AIdS, halving the proportion of people without access to safe drinking water and ensuring environmental sustainability.”

I will conclude with a quotation from the first UNESCO report on engineering and development published last year, and coordinated by tony marjoram. this quotation is by Irina bokova, director general of unesco, who wrote the foreword of the report. she says: “the report shows that the possible solutions to many of these issues, challenges and opportunities are interconnected. For example, a clear finding is that when young people, the wider public and policy-makers see information and indicators showing that engineering, innovation and technology are part of the solution to global issues, their attention and interest are raised and they are attracted to engineering. the report is an international response to the pressing need for the engineering community to engage with both these wider audiences and the private sector in promoting such an agenda for engineering – and for the world.”

Thank you for listeningGrateful acknowledgement for proofreading and correcting the english

edition go to Jacqueline béraud and Mia farlane.

rEfErEncEs

didier christelle, 2010, «Engineering Ethics», in marjoram tony, Engineering: Issues, Challenges and Opportunities for development, unEsco publishing, paris, 184-186.

didier christelle, 2010, « professional ethics without a profession. », in Goldberg david, van de poel Ibo, Philosophy and Engineering. An emerging Agenda, springer, pp. 161-174.

didier christelle, Heckert Joseph, 2010, «Volunteerism and Humanitarian Engineering - part II», IEEE Technology and Society Magazine, vol. 29, n°1.

cHrIstEllE dIdIEr

didier christelle, 2009, « Engineering Ethics », in olsen J-K berg, pedersen stig andur, Hendricks Vincent F, A Companion to Philosophy of Technology, Blackwell, Oxford, pp. 427-432.

didier christelle, 2009, «les ingénieurs et l’éthique professionnelle : pour une approche comparative de la déontologie», in Gadéa charles, demazières didier, sociologie des groupes professionnels. acquis recents et nouveaux defis, La Decouverte, «Recherches», Paris.

didier christelle, 2009, « religious and political values and the engineering ethos », in christensen s H, meganck m, delahousse b, 2009, Engineering in Context, academia, aarhus, pp. 417-434.

didier c., 2008, Les ingénieurs et l’éthique : pour un regard sociologique, Hermès, londres, 218 p.didier christelle, 2008, Penser l’éthique des ingénieurs, puf, «Questions d’éthique», paris, 109 p. didier christelle, Huët romain, 2008, « teaching csr in engineering education », European Journal

of Engineering Education, vol. 33, n°2, pp. 169-178.

Christelle Didier. Ethics Department, Catholic University LilleLille Economie&Management

Born in 1967. BS Electrochemistry Engineering, Master of Education, PhD in Sociology. Professor, Ethics Department, Engineering Ethics Team. Catholic University of Lille, France. Member of Lille Economie&management (CNRS). Co-author of Ethique industrielle (DeBoeck, Brussels, 1998), author of penser l’éthique des ingénieurs (PUF, Paris, 2008) and les ingénieurs et l’éthique. pour un regard sociologique (Hermes, 2008) Research areas: engineering ethics, including historical, cultural and gender perspective; sustainable development and corporate social responsibility.

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GIulIano auGustI

THe boloGna Process and TransParencY In EuropEAn EnGInEErInG EduCAtIon:

InCrEASEd ChAnCES for EquAl opportunItIES

summary

It is well known that the “bologna process” started in 1998 aiming not at uniformity of the various European HE systems, but at creating “a system of easily readable and comparable degrees”. by 2010, this objective has been achieved to a large extent, and the 47-country “European Higher Education Area” (EHEA) has been established. However, not all problems are yet solved and the mobility of students and graduates is still often hampered by lack of trust and/or knowledge of the actual situations: to remove these remaining obstacles will be a great contribution to the increase of equal opportunities for all genders and nationalities.

In engineering, a field in which internationalization is essential, a great effort in this direction is being made by the “European network for accreditation of Engineering Education”(EnaEE), that has devised and is implementing a decentralized accreditation system (the “Eur-acE” system), described in this lecture. as of June 2011, seven national Qa agencies participate in the Eur-acE system and have awarded approximately 800 “EUR-ACE labels”, testifying that the accredited programmes satisfy a common set of “European Standards”; about the same number of agencies have applied to join the system and are being assessed by EnaEE, entitled to authorize an agency to award the Eur-acE label. the strengthening and the development of the Eur-acE system will be small but significant contributions to transparency and transnational recognition of the outcomes of European higher education, hence to the increase of opportunities for all European citizens.

IntroductIon

I am grateful, first of all to my old-time friend Jean Michel, and quite happy to be here and have the opportunity to speak at this conference to an audience quite different from the ones I am used to.

but before starting my lecture, let me confess my embarrassment.When I gladly accepted to speak at this conference, I did not pay much attention

to the “gender” environment I would meet. then, I thought about it, and have realized that at this moment, notwithstanding that engineering is traditionally a “male-


12

GIulIano auGustI

dominated” environment, there are a great number of women in top posts in Engineering Education and Professional Associations, for example:

• SEFI (European Society for Engineering Education): woman President and Secretary General;

• IFEES (Intern. Federation of Engineering Education Societies): woman Past-President;

• WFEO (World Federation of Engineering Organizations): woman President;• LACCEI (Latin American & Caribbean Consortium of Eng. Institutions):

woman exec. Director;and I certainly forget others… On the contrary, no women hold significant posts in ENAEE, the European

Network I have founded (and will chair until 31 March 2012): I am ashamed… I have indeed suggested to have women candidates for the next ENAEE Administrative council to be elected in february 2012, but I confess I have little hopes of success in this direction… unless some new entry comes into the picture in the next few months… perhaps even at this Conference…

Actually my Lecture does not tackle explicitly “gender” issues: its relevance in this context is based on the assumption that any move towards transparency increases the chances of equal opportunities…

tHE “boloGna procEss”, 1998-2010 and bEyond.

It is well known that the “bologna process” started in 1998 aiming not at uniformity of the various European HE systems, but at creating “a system of easily readable and comparable degrees” and - in parallel to the “European research area” - an “European Higher Education area” (EHEa), much wider than the European union. as ascertained by the HE ministers of the participating countries in the “anniversary conference” held in budapest and Vienna in 2010, this objective has been achieved to a large extent, and the 47-country EHEA can now be considered as established. However, not all problems are yet solved and the mobility of students and graduates is still often hampered by lack of trust and/or knowledge of the actual situations: therefore, as the ministers pointed out, “adjustments and further work, involving staff and students, are necessary at European, national, and especially institutional levels to achieve the European Higher Education area as [envisaged]”.

to remove the remaining obstacles to mobility will be a great contribution to the increase of equal opportunities for all genders and nationalities. In particular, we suffer from the lack of a European accreditation system of engineering education accepted on the continental scale: to fill this lack is what ENAEE is trying to do with the EUR-ACE system, as it will be briefly described in the following.

QualIty assurancE and accrEdItatIon of HIGHEr EducatIon

one of the most important achievements of the bologna process has been the development and implementation of specific Quality Assurance (QA) procedures for

13

tHE boloGna procEss and transparEncy In EuropEan EnGInEErInG EducatIon

Higher Education (HE) and their rapid and widespread diffusion. the “standards and Guidelines for Quality assurance in the European Higher Education area”, briefly known as “ESG”, were officially endorsed by the HE Ministers meeting in bergen in 2005 and have completely replaced the Iso standards in the Qa of HE programmes (although these are still occasionally used in the evaluation of HE managerial structures). the implementation of Qa practices throughout the EHEa has been strongly encouraged, and in almost every country at least a Qa agency has by now been established. Since 2010 the officially recognized European Agencies working in Quality assurance of Higher Education are recorded in the “European register of Quality assurance agencies” (EQar), that as of may 2011 lists 27 agencies (in some countries including regional agencies).

most of the Qa agencies listed in the EQar are “general” agencies, i.e. deal with all disciplines (and some even with all levels of education, from primary to tertiary). Notable exceptions are the subject-specific CTI (Commission des Titres d’Ingénieur, france) and asIIn (akkreditierungsagentur für studiengänge der Ingenieurwissenschaften, der Informatik, der naturwissenschaften und der mathematik, Germany), both members of EnaEE and active in Eur-acE.

all Qa procedures have great similarities: they always include a self-assessment (“internal QA”) and an “external QA” phase, that can take various forms, the main differences being related to the alternative between “institutional” or “subject-specific” approaches: the first approach is essentially concerned with the educational “process”, while the second alternative implies evaluation of the content of the assessed educational programme. the two approaches are compared in figs.1 and 2, that reproduce two slides presented by the representatives respectively of EnQa (European network of QA in Higher Education) and EUA (European University Association) at the final conference of the Eur-acE sprEad project in october 2010. you can note that the “programme” approach is explicitly recognized as more suitable for disciplines leading to professions relevant for “public health and safety”, like engineering.

Indeed, the implementation of Qa in HE has lead also to reconsider the role and practice of “accreditation”, nowadays a much used word that has several similar but not identical meanings, and therefore needs to be appropriately defined.

as a matter of fact, “programme accreditation” (under different names) is a rather old practice in European HE, at least in some disciplines like engineering: for example, the UK engineering Institutions started their activity, that included promotion of learning and evaluation of professional qualifications (a sort of “accreditation”) in the 1800s.

on the other hand, the word “accreditation” has been accepted in the European usage (especially in Eu circles) only in the late 1990s, when it came from the usa where the “accreditation board for Engineering and technology” (abEt) had been established in 1932 as “Engineers’ council for professional development” (Ecpd). However, in france, the ctI (“commission des titres d’Ingénieur”) was established by law already in 1934, with among its main missions to award the “habilitation” (indeed, the “accreditation”) to engineering programmes and HE Institutions.

14

GIulIano auGustI

3

of“accreditation”)inthe1800s.

Ontheotherhand,theword“accreditation”hasbeenacceptedintheEuropeanusage(especiallyinEU

es)onlyinthelate1990s,whenitcamefromtheUSAwherethe“AccreditationBoardforEngineering

Technology”(ABET)hadbeenestablishedin1932as“Engineers'CouncilforProfessionalDevelopment”

D).However,inFrance,theCTI(“CommissiondesTitresd’Ingénieur”)wasestablishedbylawalreadyin

4,withamongitsmainmissionstoawardthe“habilitation”(indeed,the“accreditation”)toengineering

rammesandHEInstitutions.

15


In current usage (at least, in my personal usage), “accreditation” is usually “programme accreditation”:

At this point, it is worth quoting the defi nition of “accreditation” adopted by EnaEE/Eur-acE: “accreditation of an [Engineering] Education programme is the result of a process to ensure suitability of programme as entry route to the engineering profession”, and this process must involve “trained and independent panels including academics and professionals”. (the word “engineering” is in brackets because the defi nition would remain valid if it is substituted by another profession… .)

Under this defi nition, the word “accreditation” implies the assessment not only of the academic and scientifi c “quality” of a programme, but also of its “relevance” for the professional world and the job market: this is – in my view – the big difference with Quality assurance.

On the other hand, “programme accreditation” does not exclude the “institutional” approach: indeed, the two approaches can usefully complement each other. as a matter of fact the EnaEE mission statement reads:

• ENAEE strongly supports a fi eld-specifi c approach and programme accreditation, considering it essential to fulfi l the need of aligning the goals of educational programmes with the expectations of the relevant stakeholders and ensuring their relevance for the labour market.

• Programme accreditation does not exclude institutional accreditation: on the contrary, it may become easier if an overall system of Qa authorizes only quality HEIs to deliver academic degrees.

IntErnatIonal aspEcts of accrEdItatIon of EnGInEErInG EducatIon: tHE Eur-acE approacH

However, in a globalized world, “accreditation” should by recognized internationally, especially in the case of professions like engineering. unfortunately, while recognition of professional qualifi cations within the EU is guaranteed since 1989 by “directives” with validity of “laws” (the current “directive on recognition of Professional Qualifi cations” was approved in September 2005), it has already been hinted that European engineering graduates still suffer from the lack of a European accreditation system of engineering education accepted on the continental scale. This last part of this Lecture describes an effort for fi lling this lack: the EUR-acE system, whose elaboration started in 2004.

the Eur-acE accreditation system is a bottom-up system for international recognition of national accreditation in which national (or possibly regional) agencies accredit the educational programmes, and EnaEE authorizes these agencies to add the a common quality label (the Eur-acE® label) to their accreditation of engineering programmes, after checking that the agencies’ procedures and requirements satisfy the “Eur-acE framework standards for accreditation of Engineering programmes”, elaborated and maintained by EnaEE, that is turn require satisfaction of the already

16

GIulIano auGustI

quoted “European standards and Guidelines for Quality assurance in Higher Education” (ESG). In this way, national differences and other specific requirements can be accommodated, while the experience of long-established national accreditation agencies (like the french ctI and the british Engineering professional Institutions) is fully exploited.

Eur-acE accreditation system has been quoted by the European commission as an example of good practice in their “Report on progress in quality assurance in higher education” (september 2009) and mentioned also in the publication “the Eu contribution to the European Higher Education area”, issued in march 2010 in occasion of the “bologna anniversary conference”.

the Eur-acE framework standards are valid for all branches of engineering and all profiles of study. They distinguish between First and Second Cycle programmes, as defined in the European Qualification Frameworks (often referred to a “bachelor” and “master” programmes respectively) and are applicable also to “integrated programmes”, i.e. programmes that lead directly to a second cycle (master) engineering degree.

The EUR-ACE Framework Standards specifies the abilities that the graduates must achieve, called “Programme Outcomes”; namely 21 Programme Outcomes for first cycle degrees and 23 for second cycle degrees, grouped under the following six headings:

1. Knowledge and understanding2. Engineering analysis3. Engineering design4. Investigations5. Engineering practice6. transferable (personal) skillsAlthough all six of the Programme Outcomes apply to both First Cycle and

second cycle programmes, there are important differences in the requirements at the two levels. these differences are particularly relevant to those learning activities that contribute directly to the programme outcomes concerned with engineering applications, i.e. falling under Engineering analysis, Engineering design, and Investigations.

As an example showing the differences between the problem solving skills expected from First Cycle and Second Cycle graduates, the Programme Outcomes falling under the “Engineering analysis” heading are:

17


First Cycle graduates should have:• the ability to apply their knowledge and understanding to identify, formulate and

solve engineering problems using established methods;• the ability to apply their knowledge and understanding to analyse engineering

products, processes and methods;• the ability to select and apply relevant analytic and modelling methods.

Second Cycle graduates should have:• the ability to solve problems that are unfamiliar, incompletely defined, and have

competing specifications;• the ability to formulate and solve problems in new and emerging areas of their

specialisation;• the ability to use their knowledge and understanding to conceptualise engineering

models, systems and processes;• the ability to apply innovative methods in problem solving.

In addition to defining the set of programme outcomes outlined above, The EUR-acE framework standards require the assessment of a programme considering at least the following items:

1. Needs, Objectives and Outcomes;2. Educational Process;3. Resources and Partnerships;4. Assessment of the Educational Process;5. management systemAssessment criteria for each item above and are also specified in the EUR-ACE

framework standards.Note that the EUR-ACE Standards are at the same time rigorous and flexible:

thus, they can accommodate national differences of educational and accreditation practice, and also variants and special requirements for the many “branches” (or “disciplines”) in which engineering is articulated.

currently, seven national accrediting agencies, based in seven different countries throughout the European Higher Education area (france, Germany, Ireland, portugal and united Kingdom within the Eu, russian federation and turkey outside the Eu), are authorized to deliver the Eur-acE label. as of June 2011, these agencies have awarded the Eur-acE® label to more than 800 first- and second-cycle engineering programmes, some outside the 7 countries.

at the same time, a number of other national accrediting agencies are either being reviewed by the EnaEE (through its “Eur-acE label committee”) in order to be authorized to award the Eur-acE label or are in the process of adapting their accreditation criteria and processes for compliance with the Eur-acE accreditation system. several of these are “general” Qa/accreditation agencies that accredit engineering programmes as well; the establishment of specialized Engineering accreditation agencies is instead being pursued in some countries.

18

GIulIano auGustI

EnaEE membership is not a prerequisite for the authorization to award the Eur-acE label. accreditation agencies seeking this authorization may freely apply to EnaEE. In the authorization process they will need to provide evidence that their standards and procedures comply with the “EnaEE standards and Guidelines for Accreditation Agencies” and the programmes which they accredited fulfil the programme outcomes as set out by the Eur-acE framework standards.

ENAEE recognises that the full benefits associated with its mission will only be realized satisfactorily if authorization to award the Eur-acE label is granted to as wide a range of accreditation agencies as possible. to this end, EnaEE offers a mentoring or advisory service to all new applicants for this authority: the purpose of the mentoring process is to advise and mentor an applicant in relation to the establishment and/or the further development of an accreditation agency so that it can satisfy the Eur-acE framework standards. an accreditation agency may choose to apply for authorization without making use of the mentoring services outlined above. Any accreditation agency interested in the authorization should fill in and submit an application form posted on the EnaEE website. the review process, initiated after this application form and the supporting documentation is received, is handled by an ad-hoc EnaEE committee, called “Eur-acE label committee”. the label committee will nominate a 3 member review team which will review the application form and the supporting documentation, and - if this preliminary assessment is positive - will normally (i) attend and evaluate at least two visits of the applicant agency to accredit at least one degree programme at each programme level covered by the agency, and (ii) observe and evaluate the decision making process at a meeting of the decision-making body of the applicant agency, preferably the one in which the decisions on the observed accreditation visits are to be reached (normally only the chair of the review team attends in such a decision making meeting). after assessing all the evidence, the review team will draft a report on the application, sent to the applicant for the correction of any errors of fact, then submitted, together with an appropriate recommendation, to the Eur-acE label committee and subsequently to the EnaEE administrative council, that takes the final decision on the authorization to award the EUR-ACE label. The maximum period of authorisation is five years. Before the expiration of this period, an authorised agency should apply for re-evaluation to demonstrate compliance with the current EUR-ACE Standards and Procedures. (Indeed, the first six Agencies, that were authorized in 2006, have already undergone in 2008 this re-review process.)

conclusIons

If coupled with rigorous quality assurance rules, as it should always be, outcome-based programme accreditation assures that an educational programme is not only of acceptable academic standard, but also that it prepares graduates who are able to assume relevant roles in the job market. specifying the minimum programme outcome requirements to be met and participation of non-academic stakeholders in


the accreditation process is a guarantee to this effect. an internationally recognized qualification like the EUR-ACE label, added to the national accreditation, will facilitate job mobility as well.

the Eur-acE accreditation system allows national differences and appropriate distinctions between the cycles. but creating such a pan-European scheme certainly finds major difficulties in the great differences between educational practices, legal provisions and professional organizations across the different European countries. These are, however, the typical difficulties encountered in building a unified, but not homogenized, Europe. the fact, that common standards could be written and can be now implemented from Portugal to Russia, in continental and Anglo-Saxon countries, is a matter of great pride for EnaEE. the strengthening and further development of the EUR-ACE system will be small but significant contributions to transparency and transnational recognition of the outcomes of European higher education, hence to the increase of opportunities for all European citizens.

Giuliano Augusti,President, ENAEE (European Network for Accreditation of Engineering

Education; 2006-2012)President, QUACING (Italian Agency for QA and EUR-ACE accreditation

of engineering programmes)Prof. of Structural Mechanics (ret.), Sapienza Università di [email protected]

19

suE V. rossEr

womEn In tEChnoloGy In thE u.S.: GlASS CEIlInG StIll not BrokEn

In the united states, the national science foundation collects data on the participation of women and racial/ethnic minorities in science and engineering education and employment under a mandate of a law passed by congress called the science and Engineering Equal opportunities act. Women and blacks, Hispanics, and american Indians are considered to be underrepresented in science and engineering because of their smaller percentages of degree recipients and employed scientists and engineers relative to their percentages in the u.s. population. asians are not considered under-represented because they are a larger percentage of science and engineering degree recipients and employed scientists and engineers than they are of the population. although women constitute more than half of u.s. residents, they are underrepresented in science and engineering. by 2050, minorities are projected to be about half of the u.s. population. Hispanic women represent the largest group of minority women in the u.s. (national science foundation 2011).

1

WomeninTechnologyintheU.S.:GlassCeilingStillNotBroken

SueV.Rosser

IntheUnitedStates,theNationalScienceFoundationcollectsdataontheparticipationof

womenandracial/ethnicminoritiesinscienceandengineeringeducationandemploymentundera

mandateofalawpassedbyCongresscalledtheScienceandEngineeringEqualOpportunitiesAct.

Womenandblacks,Hispanics,andAmericanIndiansareconsideredtobeunderrepresentedinscience

andengineeringbecauseoftheirsmallerpercentagesofdegreerecipientsandemployedscientistsand

engineersrelativetotheirpercentagesintheU.S.population.Asiansarenotconsideredunder‐

representedbecausetheyarealargerpercentageofscienceandengineeringdegreerecipientsand

employedscientistsandengineersthantheyareofthepopulation.Althoughwomenconstitutemore

thanhalfofU.S.residents,theyareunderrepresentedinscienceandengineering.By2050,minorities

areprojectedtobeabouthalfoftheU.S.population.Hispanicwomenrepresentthelargestgroupof

minoritywomenintheU.S.(NationalScienceFoundation2011).

StatisticsonWomeninScienceandEngineeringintheU.S.

Duringthepastfourdecades,thenumbersandpercentagesofwomenintheU.S.receivingboth

undergraduateandgraduatedegreesinscience,technology,engineeringandmathematics(STEM)have

increaseddramatically.Overall,morewomenthanmenearnabachelor'sdegree;womennowreceive

50.3%ofundergraduatedegreesinSTEM(includesthesocialsciences),althoughmenearnahigher

proportionofdegreesinmanySTEMfields.Womenalsoearn40.7%ofPhDsinST

participationamongthesefieldsvaries,butwithinfieldsitisconsistentovereveryA. Beraud et al. (eds.), GIEE 2011: Gender and Interdisciplinary Educationfor Engineers, 21–34.© 2012 Sense Publishers. All rights reserved.

22

suE V. rossEr

statIstIcs on WomEn In scIEncE and EnGInEErInG In tHE u.s.

during the past four decades, the numbers and percentages of women in the u.s. receiving both undergraduate and graduate degrees in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (stEm) have increased dramatically. overall, more women than men earn a bachelor’s degree; women now receive 50.3% of undergraduate degrees in stEm (includes the social sciences), although men earn a higher proportion of degrees in many STEM fields. Women also earn 40.7% of PhDs in STEM. Women’s level of participation among these fields varies, but within fields it is consistent over every level of degree.

2

Table1WomenasaPercentageofDegreeRecipientsin2008byMajorDisciplineandGroup

All

Fields

AllScience

&

Engineering Psychology

Social

Sciences Biology

Physical

Sciences Geosciences Math/Statistics Engineering

Computer

Science

Percentage

ofBachelor’s

degrees

receivedby

women

57.4 50.3 77.1 53.5 59.8 41.3 40.7 43.9 18.5 17.7

Percentage

ofMS

degrees

receivedby

women

60.6 45.6 79.2 55.8 58.7 35.8 45.4 42.8 23.0 26.8

Percentage

ofPh.D.

degrees

receivedby

women

50.4 40.7 72.0 48.6 50.6 29.3 35.7 31.1 21.6 22.0

Source:CalculatedbyauthorfromdatainNSF2010,Women,minorities,andpersonswithdisabilities;TableC‐4forBS,E‐2forMasters,F‐2fordoctoral.

PsychologyandMedicalsciencesconstitutehighparticipationfieldsforwomen;biosciencesand

socialsciencesmightbecharacterizedasmediumparticipationfieldsforwomen,withincreaseshaving

stabilizedatthemaster'sandbachelor'slevelsoverthelastfiveyears.

Physicalsciencesandmathematicsconstitutemedium‐lowparticipationsfieldsforwomen,withgrowth

atthebachelor'sandmaster'slevelsnothavingkeptpacewithgrowthatthedoctorallevel.Women's

participationislowestincomputerscienceandengineering.Inthe20yearssince1989,theproportion

ofwomeninengineeringhasincreasedattheM.S.andPh.D.levels.Womenearned23.0%and21.6%of

theM.S.andPh.D.degreesinengineeringand26.8%and22.0%ofthoserespectivedegreesin

Table 1. Women as a Percentage of Degree Recipients in 2008 by Major Discipline and Group

Psychology and Medical sciences constitute high participation fields for women; biosciences and social sciences might be characterized as medium participation fields for women, with increases having stabilized at the master’s and bachelor’s levels over the last five years.

2

Table1WomenasaPercentageofDegreeRecipientsin2008byMajorDisciplineandGroup

All

Fields

AllScience

&


Social

Sciences Biology

Physical

Sciences Geosciences Math/Statistics Engineering

Computer

Science

Percentage

ofBachelor’s

degrees

receivedby

women

57.4 50.3 77.1 53.5 59.8 41.3 40.7 43.9 18.5 17.7

Percentage

ofMS

degrees

receivedby

women

60.6 45.6 79.2 55.8 58.7 35.8 45.4 42.8 23.0 26.8

Percentage

ofPh.D.

degrees

receivedby

women

50.4 40.7 72.0 48.6 50.6 29.3 35.7 31.1 21.6 22.0

Source:CalculatedbyauthorfromdatainNSF2010,Women,minorities,andpersonswithdisabilities;TableC‐4forBS,E‐2forMasters,F‐2fordoctoral.

PsychologyandMedicalsciencesconstitutehighparticipationfieldsforwomen;biosciencesand

socialsciencesmightbecharacterizedasmediumparticipationfieldsforwomen,withincreaseshaving

stabilizedatthemaster'sandbachelor'slevelsoverthelastfiveyears.

Physicalsciencesandmathematicsconstitutemedium‐lowparticipationsfieldsforwomen,withgrowth

atthebachelor'sandmaster'slevelsnothavingkeptpacewithgrowthatthedoctorallevel.Women's

participationislowestincomputerscienceandengineering.Inthe20yearssince1989,theproportion

ofwomeninengineeringhasincreasedattheM.S.andPh.D.levels.Womenearned23.0%and21.6%of

theM.S.andPh.D.degreesinengineeringand26.8%and22.0%ofthoserespectivedegreesin

23

WomEn In tEcHnoloGy In tHE u.s.: Glass cEIlInG stIll not broKEn

Physical sciences and mathematics constitute medium-low participation fi elds for women, with growth at the bachelor’s and master’s levels not having kept pace with growth at the doctoral level. Women’s participation is lowest in computer science and engineering. In the 20 years since 1989, the proportion of women in engineering has increased at the m.s. and ph.d. levels. Women earned 23.0% and 21.6% of the m.s. and ph.d. degrees in engineering and 26.8% and 22.0% of those respective degrees in computer science in 2008. since 2000, the percentage of women receiving the B.S. in engineering has declined from 20.5% to 18.5%; in computer science, it has declined from 28% to 17.7% (nsf, 2011).

3

computersciencein2008.Since2000,thepercentageofwomenreceivingtheB.S.inengineeringhas

declinedfrom20.5%to18.5%;incomputerscience,ithasdeclinedfrom28%to17.7%(NSF,2011).

Underrepresentedminoritywomen,likewomeningeneral,earnhigherproportionsofbachelor's

degreesinmedicalsciencesandsocialsciences,whileearninglowerproportionsofbachelor'sdegreesin

engineeringandcomputersciences.Internationalcomparisonsoffirstuniversitydegreesinengineering

earnedbywomenrevealthatinnocountrydowomenearnmorethan34%ofdegrees;onlyinSpain,

ItalyandDenmarkdowomenearnmorethan30%offirstengineeringdegrees.AlthoughtheU.S.still

confersmoredoctoraldegreesinnaturalsciences(excludingsocialsciences)andengineeringto

individualsofbothsexesthananyothercountry,moreofthoseareearnedbyindividualsfromforeign

countriesthanbyU.S.citizens.ChinademonstratesthemostrapidincreaseinproductionofSTEM

doctoraldegreesfrom1993‐2007(NSB,2010).

ACurriculumProjectinEngineeringDesignedtoAttractWomen

underrepresented minority women, like women in general, earn higher proportions of bachelor’s degrees in medical sciences and social sciences, while earning lower proportions of bachelor’s degrees in engineering and computer sciences. International comparisons of fi rst university degrees in engineering earned by women reveal that in no country do women earn more than 34% of degrees; only in Spain, Italy and Denmark do women earn more than 30% of fi rst engineering degrees. Although the U.S. still confers more doctoral degrees in natural sciences (excluding social sciences) and engineering to individuals of both sexes than any other country, more of those are earned by individuals from foreign countries than by u.s. citizens. china demonstrates the most rapid increase in production of stEm doctoral degrees from 1993-2007 (nsb, 2010).

24

suE V. rossEr

3

Underrepresentedminoritywomen,likewomeningeneral,earnhigherproportionsofbachelor's

degreesinmedicalsciencesandsocialsciences,whileearninglowerproportionsofbachelor'sdegreesin

engineeringandcomputersciences.Internationalcomparisonsoffirstuniversitydegreesinengineering

earnedbywomenrevealthatinnocountrydowomenearnmorethan34%ofdegrees;onlyinSpain,

ItalyandDenmarkdowomenearnmorethan30%offirstengineeringdegrees.AlthoughtheU.S.still

confersmoredoctoraldegreesinnaturalsciences(excludingsocialsciences)andengineeringto

individualsofbothsexesthananyothercountry,moreofthoseareearnedbyindividualsfromforeign

countriesthanbyU.S.citizens.ChinademonstratesthemostrapidincreaseinproductionofSTEM

doctoraldegreesfrom1993‐2007(NSB,2010).

ACurriculumProjectinEngineeringDesignedtoAttractWomenA CURRICULUM PROJECT IN ENGINEERING DESIGNED TO ATTRACT WOMEN

the dearth of women obtaining bachelor’s degrees in engineering and computer science has led to many initiatives, often funded by federal agencies, to attempt to increase the numbers and percentages of women in those fi elds. Building upon the research (Engineers Dedicated to a Better Tomorrow 2006a; Rosser 1997) that documents that women and underrepresented minorities are attracted to engineering when they can see its specifi c and tangible contributions to society and in bettering local communities, the nation, and the world, an interdisciplinary team at Georgia tech developed the IntEl project with funding from the Engineering directorate (award #0647915) at the national science foundation (nsf), using properties of digital media to create interactive and socially contextualized exercises to support model-based reasoning about statics. statics was chosen as the course upon which to focus because it is most students’ fi rst introduction to engineering problem solving and serves as the gateway course for the fi elds in engineering where women have lowest participation.

a substantial body of research has uncovered factors that deter women from engineering, including the following: a technical experience gap relative to their male peers (Margolis and Fisher 2005), lower self-confi dence than their male peers, poor quality of classroom experience that leaves women feeling isolated, unsupported and discouraged, not perceiving the practical applications of engineering, not perceiving the creativity and inventiveness of engineering, not perceiving the social usefulness of engineering, particularly to help people (Engineers dedicated to a Better Tomorrow, 2006a). Under-represented minorities (URMS) experience similar deterrents, particularly concerning the request for practical applications and the need to overcome the experience gap (Engineers Dedicated to a Better Tomorrow, 2006b). on the other hand, research documents that women and urms are attracted to engineering when they can see its “specifi c and tangible contributions to society and in bettering local communities, our nation, and the world” (national academies press, 2004). the abEt criteria, especially criterion 3, for better engineering education, overlap with strategies that have been shown to be particularly effective

25


for the recruitment, success, and retention of women and minorities (rosser, 2001), such as offering students extended experience in experimentation, observation, and holistic problem-solving, through interactive methods.

4

Asubstantialbodyofresearchhasuncoveredfactorsthatdeterwomenfromengineering,

includingthefollowing:atechnicalexperiencegaprelativetotheirmalepeers(MargolisandFisher

2005),lowerself‐confidencethantheirmalepeers,poorqualityofclassroomexperiencethatleaves

womenfeelingisolated,unsupportedanddiscouraged,notperceivingthepracticalapplicationsof

engineering,notperceivingthecreativityandinventivenessofengineering,notperceivingthesocial

usefulnessofengineering,particularlytohelppeople(EngineersDedicatedtoaBetterTomorrow,

2006a).Under‐representedminorities(URMS)experiencesimilardeterrents,particularlyconcerningthe

requestforpracticalapplicationsandtheneedtoovercometheexperiencegap(EngineersDedicatedto

aBetterTomorrow,2006b).Ontheotherhand,researchdocumentsthatwomenandURMsare

attractedtoengineeringwhentheycanseeits“specificandtangiblecontributionstosocietyandin

betteringlocalcommunities,ournation,andtheworld”(NationalAcademiesPress,2004).TheABET

criteria,especiallycriterion3,forbetterengineeringeducation,overlapwithstrategiesthathavebeen

showntobeparticularlyeffectivefortherecruitment,success,andretentionofwomenandminorities

(Rosser,2001),suchasofferingstudentsextendedexperienceinexperimentation,observation,and

holisticproblem‐solving,throughinteractivemethods.

Free‐bodyDiagramUsingArmandPurse

TheInTELproject(http://intel.gatech.edu)isaimedatusingthepropertiesofdigitalmediato

createinteractiveandsociallycontextualizedexercisestosupportmodel‐basedreasoningaboutStatics.

Free-body Diagram Using Arm and Purse

the IntEl project (http://intel.gatech.edu) is aimed at using the properties of digital media to create interactive and socially contextualized exercises to support model-based reasoning about statics. beginning with identifying representative student errors in creating the free body diagram, which is the basis of understanding Statics problems, interventions were created that address these specific points of confusion. Over three years students who used the exercises were tracked and measured against a control group who used only a conventional textbook. Both groups answered survey questions at the beginning and end of the semester aimed at capturing their attitudes toward engineering and their confidence in their own ability to become successful engineers. short, targeted questionnaires after key assignments captured students’ attitudes toward computer-based and textbook-based problems. Analysis of retention and performance statistics for students in the two groups compared them to baseline data, and examined differences in the experimental and control groups including those related to gender and race, with the following results:

1. Students in the control group who used the textbook demonstrated a pattern matching approach to problem solving. they attempted to map qualities in a homework problem to patterns in an example problem in the textbook, often relying on superficial resemblances.

2. Students in the experimental group who were exposed to the computer-based intervention reported focusing less on the solution and more on learning the method, by relying on the hints and immediate feedback they received from the computer-based tool. they reported that they valued the feedback within the homework situation where they had privacy to make errors and where they would not otherwise have access to expert advice.

3. Students in the experimental group also indicated that the software helped them to visualize the problem, which made the problem more comprehensible to them.

4. 85% of students achieved successful problem completion in the computer-based exercises.

26

suE V. rossEr

Engagement with the project appeared to increase the confi dence of the participants that digital media could be used to create exercises that connected engineering with real world settings and events. Not only was social context emphasized in the problems, but the use of the digital software addresses common student errors with the Free Body Diagram. Students in the experimental group using the software had a higher problem completion rate and reported greater understanding of the process of thinking like an engineer than their peers who only used the textbook.

5

Analysisofretentionandperformancestatisticsforstudentsinthetwogroups,comparedthemto

baselinedata,andexamineddifferencesintheexperimentalandcontrolgroupsincludingthoserelated

togenderandrace,withthefollowingresults:

1. Studentsinthecontrolgroupwhousedthetextbookdemonstratedapatternmatching

approachtoproblemsolving.Theyattemptedtomapqualitiesinahomeworkproblemto

patternsinanexampleprobleminthetextbook,oftenrelyingonsuperficialresemblances.

2. Studentsintheexperimentalgroupwhowereexposedtothecomputer‐basedintervention

reportedfocusinglessonthesolutionandmoreonlearningthemethod,byrelyingonthehints

andimmediatefeedbacktheyreceivedfromthecomputer‐basedtool.Theyreportedthatthey

valuedthefeedbackwithinthehomeworksituationwheretheyhadprivacytomakeerrorsand

wheretheywouldnototherwisehaveaccesstoexpertadvice.

3. Studentsintheexperimentalgroupalsoindicatedthatthesoftwarehelpedthemtovisualize

theproblem,whichmadetheproblemmorecomprehensibletothem.

4. 85%ofstudentsachievedsuccessfulproblemcompletioninthecomputer‐basedexercises.

Engagementwiththeprojectappearedtoincreasetheconfidenceoftheparticipantsthatdigitalmedia

couldbeusedtocreateexercisesthatconnectedengineeringwithrealworldsettingsandevents.Not

onlywassocialcontextemphasizedintheproblems,buttheuseofthedigitalsoftwareaddresses

commonstudenterrorswiththeFreeBodyDiagram.Studentsintheexperimentalgroupusingthe

softwarehadahigherproblemcompletionrateandreportedgreaterunderstandingoftheprocessof

thinkinglikeanengineerthantheirpeerswhoonlyusedthetextbook.

Equilibrium:TowerofPisaDistributedLoad:NewOrleansLeveeTruss:MinneapolisBridge

WomenintheAcademicWorkforceinScienceandEngineering

UntilmoreoftheprojectssuchasInTELsucceedinattractinglargernumbersofwomento

receivedegreesincomputerscienceandengineering,thescienceandengineeringworkforcewill

remainlargelywhiteandmale.Minoritywomenrepresentlessthanone‐tenthoftheemployed

Equilibrium: Tower of Pisa Distributed Load: New Orleans Levee

Truss: Minneapolis Bridge

WomEn In tHE acadEmIc WorKforcE In scIEncE and EnGInEErInG

until more of the projects such as IntEl succeed in attracting larger numbers of women to receive degrees in computer science and engineering, the science and engineering workforce will remain largely white and male. minority women represent less than one-tenth of the employed scientists and engineers. Women’s participation in the stEm workforce is half of what it is in the u.s. workforce as a whole and is concentrated in traditionally female occupations such as nursing. Women’s participation is low in engineering and mathematical/computer science (nsf 2011).

the small numbers of women receiving degrees in science and engineering translate to small percentages of women in academia. attrition occurs at each level of rank and promotion, resulting in very small percentages of women holding leadership positions in engineering and computer science.

scientistsandengineers.Women'sparticipationintheSTEMworkforceishalfofwhatitisintheU.S.

workforceasawholeandisconcentratedintraditionallyfemaleoccupationssuchasnursing.Women's

participationislowinengineeringandmathematical/computerscience(NSF2011).

Thesmallnumbersofwomenreceivingdegreesinscienceandengineeringtranslatetosmall

percentagesofwomeninacademia.Attritionoccursateachlevelofrankandpromotion,resultingin

verysmallpercentagesofwomenholdingleadershippositionsinengineeringandcomputerscience.

Table2PercentageofWomenDoctoralScientistsandEngineersinAcademicInstitutionsbyFieldandRankin2006

AllScience

&


Social

Sciences

Biology/

Life

Sciences

Physical

Sciences Engineering

Math&

Statistics

Computer

Science

AssistantProfessor 40.2 62.7 50.5 40.8 28.1 18.9 38.9 20.8

AssociateProfessor 31.2 60.7 37.1 29.0 23.9 13.7 23.1 17.4

FullProfessor 16.2 29.7 19.4 20.7 9.6 4.1 10.9 10.7

Total(includes

Instructor/Lecturer)

32.6 54.8 35.6 35.3 18.8 11.9 15.1 16.7

Source:CalculatedbyauthorfromdatainNSF,2010.Women,minorities,andpersonswithdisabilities,TableH‐25.

The National Science foundation (NSF) created the ADVANCE initiative in 2001 to encourage

retention and promotion of women in STEM in academia, with initial funding of $17 million.

Since 2001, over $130 million has been awarded to more than 40 institutions in four cohorts with

a goal of advancing women to senior positions through transforming the structures of institutions

(ADVANCE 2011).

Table 2. Percentage of Women Doctoral Scientists and Engineers in Academic Institutions by Field and Rank in 2006.

27


the national science foundation (nsf) created the adVancE initiative in 2001 to encourage retention and promotion of women in stEm in academia, with initial funding of $17 million. since 2001, over $130 million has been awarded to more than 40 institutions in four cohorts with a goal of advancing women to senior positions through transforming the structures of institutions (adVancE 2011).

6

verysmallpercentagesofwomenholdingleadershippositionsinengineeringandcomputerscience.

Table2PercentageofWomenDoctoralScientistsandEngineersinAcademicInstitutionsbyFieldandRankin2006

AllScience

&


Social

Sciences

Biology/

Life

Sciences

Physical

Sciences Engineering

Math&

Statistics

Computer

Science

AssistantProfessor 40.2 62.7 50.5 40.8 28.1 18.9 38.9 20.8

AssociateProfessor 31.2 60.7 37.1 29.0 23.9 13.7 23.1 17.4

FullProfessor 16.2 29.7 19.4 20.7 9.6 4.1 10.9 10.7

Total(includes

Instructor/Lecturer)

32.6 54.8 35.6 35.3 18.8 11.9 15.1 16.7

Source:CalculatedbyauthorfromdatainNSF,2010.Women,minorities,andpersonswithdisabilities,TableH‐25.

The National Science foundation (NSF) created the ADVANCE initiative in 2001 to encourage

retention and promotion of women in STEM in academia, with initial funding of $17 million.

Since 2001, over $130 million has been awarded to more than 40 institutions in four cohorts with

a goal of advancing women to senior positions through transforming the structures of institutions

(ADVANCE 2011).

Inadditiontotransformationofpoliciesandpracticessuchasmentoring,datacollection,stop‐the‐

tenureclock,recruitment,andentrepreneurialtraining,tobemoresupportiveofwomen,most

ADVANCEprojectsincludeanovel,signatureinitiativethatservesasamodelforotheruniversities

seekinginstitutionaltransformation.Forexample,GeorgiaTech'sADVANCEprojectincludedthe

followingfivegoals:

1)Anetworkoftermedprofessorshipsestablishedtomentorwomenfaculty:Onetenuredwomanfull

professorineachoffourcollegeswithdisciplinesfundedbyNSFbecamethedesignatedADVANCE

professor.Thetitleandfundsof$60,000peryearforfiveyearswereequivalenttothoseofother

endowedchairsandpermittedtheADVANCEProfessortosustainherresearchproductivitywhile

developingandnurturingmentoringnetworksforthewomenfacultyinhercollege.

2)Aseriesofleadershipretreatswithwomenfacultyandseniorinstitutionalleaders:Becauseof

researchfindingthatwomenfacultytendtohavelessaccessandfeweropportunitiesthantheirmale

colleaguestospeakwiththedecisionmakersandinstitutionalleaders(Rosser,2004),thesemini‐

retreatsfacilitatedaccesstodecisionmakersfortenure‐trackwomenfacultyinSTEMandprovided

informalconversationsanddiscussionontopicsofmutualinterest.

3)Family‐friendlypoliciesandpractices:Studiesdocumentthatbalancingcareerandfamilyconstitutes

themajordifficultyfortenure‐trackwomeningeneral(MasonandEkman2007)andwomenscience

In addition to transformation of policies and practices such as mentoring, data collection, stop-the-tenure clock, recruitment, and entrepreneurial training, to be more supportive of women, most adVancE projects include a novel, signature initiative that serves as a model for other universities seeking institutional transformation. for example, Georgia Tech’s ADVANCE project included the following fi ve goals:

1. A network of termed professorships established to mentor women faculty: one tenured woman full professor in each of four colleges with disciplines funded by nsf became the designated adVancE professor. the title and funds of $60,000 per year for fi ve years were equivalent to those of other endowed chairs and permitted the adVancE professor to sustain her research productivity while developing and nurturing mentoring networks for the women faculty in her college.

28

suE V. rossEr

2. A series of leadership retreats with women faculty and senior institutional leaders: Because of research finding that women faculty tend to have less access and fewer opportunities than their male colleagues to speak with the decision makers and institutional leaders (rosser, 2004), these mini-retreats facilitated access to decision makers for tenure-track women faculty in stEm and provided informal conversations and discussion on topics of mutual interest.

3. Family-friendly policies and practices: studies document that balancing career and family constitutes the major difficulty for tenure-track women in general (mason and Ekman 2007) and women science and engineering faculty in particular (Rosser 2004; Xie and Shaumann 2003) in the U.S. Under the adVancE initiative, Georgia tech was able to institute the following family friendly policies and practices, not formerly available to tenure-track faculty as state employees: stoppage of the tenure clock and active service--modified duties at the birth or adoption of a child, lactation stations for nursing mothers, and day care (http://www.advance.gatech.edu).

4. Data gathering and interviews to develop MIT-like Report to chart equity progress: to assess whether advancement of women really occurs during and after institutional transformation undertaken through adVancE, data on faculty appointment type, rank, tenure, promotion, years in rank, time at institution, administrative positions, professorships and chairs, membership in tenure and promotion committees, salaries, space, and start-up packages were compared for matched pairs of male and female faculty.

5. A formal tenure and promotion training process to remove subtle gender, racial, and other biases: close involvement with the promotion and tenure process provides insight into subtle ways in which unintended biases might influence decisions on promotion and tenure, such as expecting an additional year’s worth of publications, when the tenure clock has been stopped for a year because of childbirth. after one year of studying the research documenting possible biases due to gender, race or ethnicity, ability status, as well as interdisciplinarity, a faculty committee developed nine case studies with accompanying sample curriculum vitae; each case illustrated one or more issues of potential bias. computer science colleagues used the cases studies as the basis to develop an interactive web-based instrument, awareness of decisions in Evaluating promotion and tenure (adEpt) where individuals could participate in a virtual promotion and tenure meeting; depending upon their response, the meeting takes different directions and generates different outcomes in promotions and tenure (www.adept.gatech.edu). adEpt represents the signature initiative of Georgia tech’s adVancE project (rosser and chameau 2006).

29


tHE GEndEr Gap In patEntInG

adVancE does seem to be improving institutional climate, culture, and retention for stEm women in academia, at least in the short term. a caution comes from data suggesting that women may have lower participation in the newer heavily funded areas of translational science and technology transfer, especially in information technology (It), nanotechnology and biotechnology (national science board 2011).

Both in the U.S. and internationally, the focus for scientific research has shifted from basic to applied research and innovation, for which one of the primary indicators is patents granted. If women scientists and engineers are not obtaining patents at rates comparable to their participation in the STEM workforce and at significantly lower rates than their male peers, then women are not participating in the new areas and directions for science and technology. this hurts women scientists and engineers who are left out of the leading edge work in innovation. Women are then not seen as leaders in their field which hurts women financially and in their professional advancement. Commercialization of science can be extremely lucrative, if the patent results in a product that is developed, brought to market, and successful. since patents “count” as a marker of success, similar to publications, and may even be required for some bonuses and “fellow” status in some industries, women’s small percentages of patents also inhibit their professional advancement. although men dominate patenting in all fields, some relative gender differences in fields of patents exist (Rosser 2009).

Quantifying gender and patents becomes a difficult exercise, fraught with problems. many patents bear the names of several individuals, often including lawyers and other individuals who work for the company but who have little to do with the invention itself. some counts include all patents with at least one woman inventor. For example, a 2007 study from the National Center for Women and Information Technology reported that from 1980-2005, approximately 9% of U.S.-invented It patents had at least one female inventor. others use fractional counts. When the fraction of the patent that can be counted as female is calculated, the overall percentage of female u.s.-invented It patents drops to 4.7%, although the fractional percentage has increased from 1.7% in 1980 to 6.1% in 2005 (ashcraft and breitzman 2007). this positive increase in percentage of patents by women occurred during a period when the percentage of women employed in It decreased slightly from 32% in 1983 to 27% in 2005 (ashcraft and breitzman 2007). nonetheless, these data underline that 93.9% of u.s. origin patents come from men who constitute around 70% of the u.s. It workforce. the percentage of u.s. origin patents obtained by women in It ranks well below their percentage in the It workforce.

although women are closer to parity in numbers and percentages in the life sciences, a similar gender gap pattern found in other fields with regard to patenting appears to occur in the life sciences (ding, murray and stuart 2006). a study of over 1,000 recipients of nIH training grants in cellular and molecular biology revealed

30

suE V. rossEr

that 30% of men compared to 14% of women recipients had patented (bunker Whittington and smith-doerr 2005). In contrast, this same study revealed that women’s patents are more frequently cited than those of the men, suggesting a similar pattern to that found in earlier studies of publication rates in which men published more than women but that women’s publications were cited more frequently (Long 1993). Citation, in both patents and publications, reflects the significance or importance of the work and how much other scientists or engineers use it as a basis for reference for their work.

a study restricted to a sample of 4,227 life science faculty found that 5.65% of the women while 13.0% of the men held at least one patent, despite no significant differences in publication patterns (thursby and thursby 2005). the lower percentage of women obtaining patents appears to hold across sectors of government, academia and industry, (Stephan and El-Ganainy 2007; U.S. Patent and Trademark Office 2003) with the exception of science-based network firms in the biotechnology industry (Whittington and smith-doerr 2008) where women are equally as likely as men to become involved in patenting, but still do not patent as frequently as men.

Women also tend to have lower publication rates than men, but the gender disparities in publication rates are not as significant as those for patents. For the United States, Yu Xie and Kimberlee Shauman (2003) document that women publish at about 70% to 80% of the rate of men, based on 1988 and 1993 data bases. In her study of tenured or tenure-track faculty in doctoral granting departments in computer science, chemistry, electrical engineering, microbiology and physics in 1993-1994, Mary Frank Fox (2005) found that men are twice as likely as women to publish 20 or more papers, while women are almost twice as likely as men to publish zero or one paper. fiona murray and leslie Graham (2007) found that men at “big school” had higher total publication counts (82 vs 55) and higher publication counts per year (3.7 vs 2.6) than women, although these were not statistically significant; however, the citation counts per paper were very similar (42 for men vs. 41 for women). the significant difference between men and women was that men published 16% of their publications jointly with industry, while women published only 6% jointly with industry (murray and Graham 2007).

31


unfortunately, the gender gap also appears to hold internationally. since patent offices do not record the gender of inventors for each patent (Ashcraft and Breitzman 2007), relying on names makes determination of gender difficult in some instances, particularly for gender-ambiguous names (chris) or for names commonly applied to women in some countries and men in others (Jean in the u.s. compared to france). using complicated and labor-intensive techniques, researchers have evolved methodologies to match gender with patents for large databases internationally. this reliance on names constitutes a further complication to studying the gender gap in patents. catherine ashcraft and anthony breitzman (2007) compared female It patenting rates in the united states and Japan. fulvio naldi and Ilaria prenti (2002) used large data bases to study gender differences in patenting and publications in the united Kingdom, france, Germany, Italy, spain, and sweden in biology, biomedical research, chemistry, clinical medicine, earth and space, engineering, mathematics, and physics. frietsch et al (2007) studied gender differences in patenting and publications in those same fields and in those same six countries plus eight others: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Ireland, New Zealand, Switzerland, and the united states.

using the scopus database that covers more than 15,000 peer-reviewed journals in the life sciences, health sciences, physical sciences, and social sciences, rainer freitsch (2007) found that the share of female authors varied by country between 21.5% (switzerland) through 28.3% (u.s.) to 38.6% (Italy). He also found considerable variation by field, with biology (33.9%), bio-medicine (32.2%) and medicine (28.3%) having the largest share of female authors, while engineering (20.4%), physics (18.1%) and mathematics (16.3%) had the least. chemistry (25.3%) and geosciences (21.8%) were intermediate. His data of share of female authors by discipline and country, suggest that women publish somewhat less than men in each field but that women’s publication rates are significantly higher than their patenting rates in all countries and all fields.

all these studies document that in all of these countries in all of the different areas, the percentage of women obtaining patents is significantly lower than that of their male counterparts. Considerable variation exists among the technological fields with pharmaceutical (24.1%) and basic chemicals (12.5%) tending to have higher percentages of patents obtained by women and machine-tools (2.3%) and energy machinery (1.9%) having lower percentages in 2001 (frietsch et al 2007). Within the It industry, some variation occurred among subcategories, with women obtaining about 8% (fractional count) of the computer software patents in the u.s. and about 6% (fractional count) of patents in other fields such as hardware, semiconductors, communications, and peripherals. relatively the same subcategory distributions held for Japanese women, but at lower percentages overall, since Japanese women obtained about 3.0-3.6% (fractional count) of patents overall but 5.6% (fractional count) of the software patents.

as suggested by the comparison of u.s. and Japanese women in It, considerable differences in the percentage of women obtaining patents occur among countries.

32

suE V. rossEr

the study of patenting in 14 countries (frietsch et al. 2007) documented that in general the percentage of women’s patenting has increased during the past decade in all countries. However, substantial variations exist among countries, even within Europe. Australia (13.7%), Spain (17.5%), and New Zealand (14.0%) rank highest; switzerland (7.4%), Germany (5.9%) and austria (4.5%) rank lowest. the u.s. (11.1%), sweden (9.3%), and denmark (11.4%) rank somewhere in the middle with regard to percentage of women obtaining patents (frietsch, et al. 2007). In all countries, the percentage of women obtaining patents is less than the percentage of women in the stEm workforce.

Issues surrounding quantification, quality, and association of some names with a particular gender might raise doubts if the gender gap in patents were small or not evident in all sectors, disciplines, or countries. but the gap is substantial. In short, in all countries across all sectors and in all fields, the percentage of women obtaining patents is not only less than their male counterparts but it is less than the percentage of women in STEM in the field in the country. This raises the questions of what are the impacts and nature of the gender gap?

stephan and El-Ganainy (2007) provide evidence from various studies to suggest the following explanations in addition to employment at doctoral research extensive institutions for the gap:

• Women are more risk averse than men regarding financial decisions and may have less interest in money and a lower comfort level with financial transactions.

• Women dislike competition more than men, and commercial science is perceived as competitive.

• Women are less comfortable selling themselves and their science in the entrepreneurial manner needed for commercialization.

• Women are less likely to seek out opportunities to participate in commercial science.

• Women may choose areas for research less compatible with commercialization. • Women have fewer characteristics such as high productivity and a “title” that

venture capitalists like. • Compared to men, women have more family constraints which they perceive as

a tradeoff with their entrepreneurial activities. • Women faculty may be less likely to be located in one of the three

commercialization geographic “hot spots” in california, massachusetts, or north carolina.

• Women tend to have fewer peers involved in commercialization, partly because their collegial networks are likely to include more women than those of men. Women scientists may have fewer graduate students and post-docs than men and less diverse networks than men.

If the percentage of patents awarded to women remains far lower than the percentage of women scientists and engineers in the science, engineering, technology,

33


and mathematics (STEM) workforce, this may represent an example of old wine in new bottles. Does exclusion of women from these leading-edge fields in innovation simply represent the 21st century version of the mid-20th century phenomenon of women not holding major leadership positions in big science? Such exclusion represents a major loss, since women scientists have focused on different problems, used new approaches, and produced new theoretical perspectives that have benefitted science, technology and society.

conclusIon

although the percentages and numbers of women in stEm overall have been increasing during the last decades in the united states, recently they have been decreasing in computer science and Engineering, particularly at the bachelor’s degree level. In an attempt to counter this decrease, researchers have focused on a number of initiatives to attract women to STEM fields. Since studies have documented that focus on social context and working with living beings attracts women to STEM, some faculty have incorporated social context in innovations in Engineering curriculum. the IntEl project, funded by the national science foundation (nsf), uses properties of digital media to create interactive exercises to support model-based reasoning in the Statics course through an emphasis on social context in the problems. through its adVancE initiative, nsf has also supported transformation at more than 40 institutions to retain women scientists and engineers and encouraged them to assume senior positions such as professor, department chair, dean, provost and president in academia. despite these positive increases and initiatives for women in stEm, some warning signs for equity emerge from data that indicate that women may not be participating at the same rates as their male counterparts in new directions of science and “hot” areas of technology transfer such as information technology and nanotechnology.

rEfErEncEs

adVancE. 2011. http://www.nsf.gov/funding/pgm.summ.jsp?pims_id=5383. retrieved July 11, 2011.ashcraft, catherine and anthony breitzman. 2007 Who invents IT? An analysis of women’s parti-

cipation in information technology patenting. boulder, co: national center for Women in technology (ncWIt).

bunker Whittington, Kjersten and laurel smith-doerr. 2005. “Gender and commercial science: Wo-men’s patenting in the life sciences.” Journal of Technology Transfer, 30: 355-370.

ding, Waverly, fiona murray, and toby stuart. 2006. “Gender differences in patenting in the acade-mic life sciences”. Science, 313 (5787)p. 665-667.

Engineers dedicated to a better tomorrow. 2006a. “Improving Engineering’s public Image--ten Gui-ding principles”. D-E Communications--Critical Issues Series.

Engineers dedicated to a better tomorrow. 2006b. “minorities in Engineering and related fields - diversity analysis of students Earning bachelor’s degrees.” D-E Communications--Critical issues Se-ries.

Fox, Mary Frank. 2005. “Gender, family characteristics, and publication productivity among Scien-tists.” Social Studies of Science, 35(1): 131-150.

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Frietsch, Rainer, Inna Haller, Melanie Vrohlings, and Hariolf Grupp. 2007. “Battle of the sexes? Main areas of gender-specific technological and scientific activities in industrialized countries”. Unpublished paper presented at Georgia tech, october 16, 2007.

long, scott. 1993. “Women in science. part 1. the productivity puzzle”. Essays of an Information Scientist, 15, p. 248.

margolis, Jane and alan fisher. 2002. Unlocking the clubhouse. cambridge, ma: mIt press.mason, mary a. and Eve m. Ekman. 2007. Mothers on the fast track. Oxford: Oxford University

press.Murray, Fiona and L. Graham. 2007. “Buying and selling science: Gender stratification in commercial

science.” Industrial and Corporate Change Special Issue on Technology Transfer 16(4): 657-689.naldi, fulvio and Ilaria Vannini prenti. 2002. Scientific and Technological Performance by Gender. A

feasibility study on patents and biometric indicators. Luxembourg: European Union Commission.national academy of Engineering. 2004. The Engineer of 2020: Visions of Engineering in the New

Century. Washington, d.c.: national academies press.national science board. 2011. Science and Engineering Indicators. www.nsf.gov/sbe/srs/seind11/

retrieved may 19, 2011.national science foundation. 2011. Women, Minorities, and Persons with Disabilities. Washington,

dc: national science foundation. http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/women. retrieved June 16, 2011.rosser, sue V. 1997. Re-Engineering Female Friendly Science. new york: teachers college press,

columbia university.rosser, sue V. 2009. “the Gender Gap in patenting: Is technology transfer a feminist Issue?” NWSA

Journal 21(2): 65-84. rosser, sue. V. 2001. “Will Ec 2000 make Engineering more female friendly?” Women’s Studies

Quarterly, XXIX(3-4): 164-186.rosser, sue V. 2004. The science glass ceiling: Academic women scientists and the struggle to suc-

ceed. new york: routledge.rosser, sue V. 2009. “the Gender Gap in patenting: Is technology transfer a feminist Issue?” NWSA

Journal 21(2): 65-84. rosser, sue V. and chameau, Jean-lou. 2006. “Institutionalization, sustainability, and repeatability

of adVancE for Institutional transformation”, Journal of Technology Transfer, 32,: 331-340.Stephan, Paula and El-Ganainy, Asmaa. (2007). “The entrepreneurial puzzle: Explaining the gender

gap”. Journal of Technology Transfer 32: 475-487.thursby, Jerry and marie thursby. 2005. “Gender patterns of research and licensing activity of scien-

ce and engineering faculty.” Journal of Technology Transfer 30: 343-353.U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. (2003). U.S. Patenting by women. Washington, d.c.: u.s. patent

and Trademark Office.Whittington, Kristin B. and Laurel Smith-Doerr. 2008. “Women inventors in context: Disparities in

patenting across academia and industry”. Gender and Society 22: 194.Xie, Yu and Kimberlee Shauman. 2003. Women in science. boston: Harvard university press.

Sue V. Rosser

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A vISIon for thE futurE of EuropEAn EnGInEErInG: GrEAtEr GEndEr EquAlIty

And thE utIlISAtIon of thE SkIllS And tAlEntS of All of SoCIEty

abstract

despite sustained efforts to promote engineering education and careers to young women it remains the most male dominated academic discipline. this paper will briefly set the scene by considering the European wide statistical data on women and technology. It will then report and analyse research on why women do (or do not) study engineering in Higher Education, and then proceed to explore the issues and problems they may confront in an engineering career. It will be argued that these two areas of research are intrinsically linked and that there is a need to take a long-term, holistic approach to reaching a more equitable distribution of engineering across the two genders. It is proposed that the areas that need tackling are: gender stereotyping and self stereotyping by girls and women; family, friends and the media reinforcing of stereotyping; school options and qualifications; careers education and advice; Higher Education & training environments & pedagogy; employment policies and practices; Professional Institutes, membership bodies and networks; and last but not least Government legislation and policy. underpinning the whole paper is the belief that greater gender-equality could enhance both the education and the profession of engineering, as a desirable aim in principle, but also that women represent an under-utilised resource in the field.

IntroductIon

In the face of sustained efforts to promote engineering careers to young women it remains the most male dominated academic discipline, both in terms of numbers and culture. Women’s access to higher education has significantly increased since the 1970s, and this has impacted on the numbers of women in all subject areas at university. despite the general trend towards more women in higher education subject choice is still marked by gender – there are subjects in which women are the clear majority; education, in subjects allied to medicine, languages, linguistics, classics and related. In comparison, engineering women remain in the minority.


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over the past decades, numerous initiatives have attempted to redress the under-representation of women in sEt, but their impact has been limited. modest increases in the proportion of women studying sEt have failed to translate into an equivalent increase in sEt professionals. some of these initiatives had several serious limitations which reduced their potential effectiveness. they were fragmented, they lacked strategic coherence and a clear overview of their own effectiveness. so there was considerable duplication of effort in relation to the occupational areas and sEt activities they covered. second, as awareness campaigns, targeted at women and girls, they framed the problem as a lack of women’s awareness of the possibilities open to them. because these measures were aimed principally at plugging skills gaps, their ambitions were restricted to bringing more women into scientific and technological work, but not addressing the conditions of the work, the nature of scientific or technical education and its delivery, or the wider social factors which inhibit women’s entry to SET in the first place.

statIstIcal EVIdEncE

despite the fact that the greater proportion of higher education students are women, engineering is far from reaching parity with regards to numbers. Europe-wide the situation is similar; in most European countries the engineering, manufacturing and construction disciplines demonstrate the greatest level of gender disparity in research activity (she figures, 2009). thus, it is evident that in engineering gender differentiation by discipline remains despite women’s access to higher education.

In the Government sector, across the Eu-27, while there are equivalent numbers of women and men working in the field of Humanities, only 27% of researchers in Engineering and technology are female.

In the Eu-27, 45% of all phd graduates were women, whilst they equal or outnumber men in all broad fields of study, except for science, mathematics and computing (41%), and engineering, manufacturing and construction (25%). In the EU-27 they account for 52% in the Humanities & Arts but only less than half that proportion in Engineering, manufacturing and construction (25%).

The under-representation of women is striking in the field of science and engineering: the proportion of women increases from just 31% of the student population at the first level to 36% of PhD students and graduates but then falls back again to 33% of academic grade c staff, 22% at grade b and just 11% at grade a. the lack of appeal of science and engineering studies for girls is particularly problematic at the earliest stage of a typical academic career in this field, as women tend to be better represented among phd students and graduates. the proportion of women among full professors is highest in the humanities and the social sciences (respectively 27.0% and 18.6%) and lowest in engineering and technology, at 7.2%.

When comparing the degree of masculinisation of engineering, manufacturing and construction cross-nationally, it appears that less than one in five PhD holders in this field is a woman in Germany (14%). On the contrary, in Estonia, engineering

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a VIsIon for tHE futurE of EuropEan EnGInEErInG

appears to be a feminised field of study, with 59% of female PhD graduates. Estonia is clearly an exceptional case. Nevertheless, the smallest relative degrees of masculinisation of this field (>35% of female PhDs) were observed in Italy, Portugal, latvia, lithuania, croatia, and turkey.

on average throughout the Eu-27, 13% of institutions in the Higher Education sector are headed by women. this proportion varies between 32% and 0%. the countries where it is highest (above 18%) are sweden, finland, Italy and Estonia. by contrast, it is the lowest (under 7%) in Austria, Luxembourg, Denmark and Slovakia. this situation of female under-representation at the head of institutions is even more pronounced when only universities are taken into account, meaning only institutions able to award phd degrees. on average throughout the Eu-27, just 9% of universities have a female head. the highest shares of female rectors are observed in sweden, and Finland. In contrast, in Denmark, Cyprus, Lithuania, Luxembourg and Hungary, no single university is headed by a woman. Women’s proportion of rectors is very low (7% at most) in a further eight countries: romania, austria, slovakia, Italy, the netherlands, the czech republic, belgium and Germany.K

Key factors It is understood that there are many reasons for this disparity and the decision to

study engineering (or not) is influenced by many factors:

For example: • Early differential socialisation of girls and boys, including school teaching and

experiences• Self image and gender identity• Poor or inadequate careers advice at school• Lack of support from family, friends and professional engineers • Information about engineering being available and knowledge of the subject• Direct ‘contact’ with engineering via family members• Perceptions about engineering; image has been tough, heavy and dirty and

associated with machinery ; gendered by its association with these traditionally masculine values that it is a ‘man’s subject’; that it is more difficult than other subjects; hard, intellect-based, complex, concerned with things rather than people’; it is for ‘geeks’ or ‘nerds’; that it does not offer a pathway to an interesting or lucrative career, especially for women

• Gendered nature of HE culture and curriculum• Cultural and structural barriers in engineering occupations and organisations• Country specific social context, how far society perceives engineering to be an

option for young women, and in turn how far women themselves opt for this path, for example, in Serbia women account for 35% of engineering students, in Spain the figure is 22%

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problEms for WomEn studEnts In HIGHEr EducatIon

the answer to the problem of the under-representation of women in engineering is more complex than just a need to increase the numbers of women. There have been theories put forward that all that is needed is a critical mass of women to change the culture and success rate of women, but can the strategy of critical mass really work in the engineering sector as it stands. a number of issues prohibit the theory of critical mass. Women engineers have been seen to either share the values and attitudes of their male colleagues or on embarking on an engineering career, women assimilate to the engineering culture, failing to challenge the dominant masculine discourse. Either way, it suggests that a critical mass of women, to instigate cultural change, is unlikely to be achieved, because the women in engineering will act as gatekeepers, deterring other women from entering, or because the women who do succeed in ‘‘getting in’’ will also reinforce the existing culture, through their assimilation. These arguments point to both the necessity, and difficulties, of transforming the engineering culture to ensure the engineering professions are a place where women cannot only survive but also thrive. they suggest that it is time to seek new strategies for changing the engineering culture, rather than relying on introducing more women into the industry in order to change the culture (and attract even more women). It is essential that men are drawn into the argument, and that focusing on men’s activities as well as women’s, is critical for further constructive progress. men need to be part of the process of change, if attempts at change are to be accepted.

Engineering education is dominated by a masculine culture characterised by a particular set of beliefs, behaviours and assumptions. this can present a ‘chilly climate’ for women students. unhappy or uncomfortable students will not achieve as well as they might in a more supportive environment, and they may even leave the course.

some of the features of the ‘chilly climate’ include:• Unfounded assumptions by lecturers that all students have prior ‘tinkering’

experience, need for ‘hands on’ experience and practical work• Lack of excitement in the content or presentation of the course • Apparent lack of relevance of the curriculum content• Teaching methods that are appropriate for only a very limited range of learning

styles, gender-exclusive curriculum, with bias in language, assumptions, curriculum design, classroom interactions, and teaching and assessment methods.

• Disruptive behaviour of majority groups • Classroom atmosphere uncomfortable for some students because of racism,

sexism, or similar attitudes• Special treatment, such as additional help from male lecturers, which may lead

to resentment from male peers

Improved teaching is particularly relevant to women, as research has shown that men are less affected by poor teaching, poor organization of course material and by dull course content (sagebiel, 2003). disillusionment among students has arisen

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through excessive maths and quantitative content, narrowness and the abstraction of the curriculum, lack of relevance to the ‘outside’ world, too early specialization and the need to conform to rigid rules, without the opportunity to challenge them. this has led to passive learning, acceptance of facts on trust, and frustration. In terms of the learning context and curriculum, Greed (2000) describes the impersonal and indifferent atmosphere of science and technology departments. this is manifested, for example, in formal teaching methods and the interpretation of professionalism in masculine terms. teaching styles in science and technology are instrumental and non-negotiable. as a result of these methods of teaching there is little debate, interaction or concern for the aesthetic.

Feminist pedagogy in E&T is beginning to emerge as a way of tackling the masculine nature of teaching and learning. However, such approaches are far from widespread and further research and evaluation is necessary to address their impact and success.

problEms for profEssIonal WomEn EnGInEErs

these are both cultural and structural and the interaction of the two. occupations have their own ideologies, which are conveyed through the interaction of their members. Workplace cultures are the medium in which gender behaviours fundamentally interact with the opportunities created by organisational structure. Women face a series of gender related barriers to success in engineering careers, despite recent advances. Indeed, while some of their male contemporaries view female engineers as ‘‘honorary men’’, others see them as ‘‘flawed women’’ for attempting to participate in a traditionally male realm. numerous other research studies also indicate that women who seek entry into male-dominated cultures either have to act like men in order to be successful, or leave if they are not adaptable to the culture, or they can remain in the industry without behaving like men but maintaining unimportant positions.

long hours culTure

long hours culture is prevalent in engineering, which can act as a major deterrent for women pursuing careers in these roles. carter and Kirkup (1990) found that because engineering work is often task-oriented rather than time-oriented, there is often pressure to work long hours and for work to spill over into private time. While this pressure is likely to be felt by all employees, it can be particularly significant for women, who often have more domestic responsibilities than men.

family Versus work

It is with regards to maternity leave and the return to work that the family/work conflict becomes particularly problematic for women in engineering professions.

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childcare responsibilities are perceived to undermine career commitment regardless of the differences between women; non-mothers are conceptualised as a ‘risk’ and mothers as a ‘problem’. Women still experience clear discrimination surrounding the issue of maternity leave and the return to work; requests for part-time contracts are often agreed alongside some kind of demotion of position within the company. this lack of flexibility in the organisation of contracts has long-term effects on women’s career progression.

gender sTereoTyping

Women are perceived as unsuitable for technical careers because of the dominant association between traditional notions of masculinity and technology. It is claimed they are better communicators and directed towards the ‘soft’ side of engineering sEt professions, such as sales, personnel, and desk-based work. Women in engineering professions are, in most cases, reluctant to openly question the stereotype of the association between traditional notions of masculinity and technology, despite the clear paradox their existence in the sector poses. In engineering, there are clear distinctions made between ‘real’ engineering (technicist) and other work in the sector (faulkner, 2005a).

occupaTional socialisaTion and gender idenTiTy

faulkner (2005a) suggests that the socialisation processes that women (and men) experience communicates a clear way of ‘becoming and belonging’ as an engineer that often brings to the fore the question of gender authenticity that hangs over women engineers. miller (2002) suggests that the strategies women develop to survive often involve adapting to the dominant masculine cultures, rather than trying to change or challenge it. Dryburgh (1999) terms this ‘professionalisation’; internalising the values, norms and symbols of the professional cultures. However, miller highlights the fact that while women can learn masculine rules and behaviours, they cannot directly mirror them. thus, while the coping strategies adopted by women may be extremely successful on a short term, individual basis, they serve to reinforce the gendered system, leaving little hope for long-term change (miller, 2002). bagilhole (2002) found that women face a series of gender related barriers to success in careers dominated by men. they are typically viewed as ‘honorary men’ or ‘flawed women’ for attempting to participate in a traditionally man’s realm

gendered neTworking and The career ladder

Despite the need to ‘fit in’ with traditionally masculine workplace cultures informal networks within engineering organisations make this difficult for women. Wilson-Kovacs et al. (2006) found that women lack the support network that men have. social networks often revolved around traditionally masculine activities such

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as sport or drinking, spheres. The existence of ‘old boys networks’ is not unusual, based upon self-promotion, ‘game-playing’ and unwritten rules constructed by men (singh et al., 2002: 77).

eVoluTion

In the past, Fox (1998) suggests the problem of the ‘nature’ of women (conceptualised as distinctly different from men) was focused upon, and so change within women’s behaviour and attitudes is seen as the solution to inequality. Wajcman (1991) suggests this is part of the ‘deficit model’, which locates the problem of engineering and women in the women themselves, and ultimately fails to challenge the gendering of science as masculine.

therefore, more recently, research has moved attention away from concentrating on increasing the supply of women to the impact of gendered institutional structures, systems and cultures. The problematic experiences of women in the engineering professions are a common concern for academic researchers. research such as the Etan report (European commission, 2000) have moved attention on from just increasing the supply of women in sEt sectors to the impact of institutional structures, cultures and systems that disadvantage women. studies have shown, for example, that women are not driven away from technology because of their lack of ability, but rather because of ‘an atmosphere of dominant masculinity’ (sagebiel, 2003). thus although women can cope with the actual engineering work, they are likely to find it much more difficult to cope with engineering values, systems and performance criteria which have been established by men for men, and not for women (Evetts, 1998, bagilhole, 2002).

Ways forWard Into tHE futurE?

An example of good practice within the UK may suggest a way forward. In 2004, when central government finally acknowledged and committed itself to act on the persistent problem of women’s under-representation in sEt, it established the uK resource centre for Women in science, Engineering and technology (uKrc) to serve as the key institution working on the problem for government. With a substantial remit and significant central government funding, the UKRC developed interventions in many areas: in education and higher education, with employers, with women sEt professionals, with professional associations, and with nGos and campaigning organisations in this field. This was much better resourced and more comprehensive than the disparate initiatives that were pursued during the 1980s and 1990s

UKRC proposed an alternative to the ‘leaky pipeline’ model; an holistic conceptual approach to the problem of women’s under-representation in sEt, with its emphasis on the interconnectedness of the different problem areas. the uKrc’s most significant achievements have not been in directly increasing the numbers of women participating in sEt education or employment. Instead, it has been effective in two

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more indirect ways. first, it has developed a holistic understanding of the scarcity of women in sEt, which moves beyond the ‘leaky pipeline’ approach and has informed its approach to sEt educators, employers, and other organisations. second, it has promoted and supported cultural change within educational institutions and employing organisations.

the uKrc was driven by feminist activists whose framework for change departed from that of most previous interventions, in the sense that it was not based on the central premise that women’s enduring absence from sEt was primarily a matter of women being unaware of the sEt career options available to them. rather, their overall approach drew on the tradition of socialist feminist scholarship which highlights the structural and institutional arrangements, and the entrenched gendered culture, of SET education and employment, and identifies the ways in which these combined structures and cultures act as obstacles to women entering sEt. rather than locating the problem solely in the supply side of sEt labour - women’s lack of awareness of potential sEt careers - this perspective emphasises the ways in which the demand side operates in setting the conditions and culture of sEt education and employment. many women actively and knowingly reject sEt pathways because they are only too aware of these conditions (while others actively embrace sEt work because they are comfortable with the gender culture of sEt work). structural barriers operate to prevent women from entering and remaining in sEt work, in the formation and maintenance of gender stereotypes, the organisation and delivery of education, the organisation of work, and the accreditation and recognition of skills (Wajcman 1991). In other words, changing the gender balance of sEt is not simply a question of adding more women but also of changing the institutional and organisational arrangements of sEt education and employment.

uKrc’s holistic model for change meant that they attempted to tackle all of the following areas:

• Gender stereotyping & self stereotyping by girls & women• Family, friends & the media reinforce stereotyping• School/options/ qualifications• Careers education & advice• Higher Education & training environments & pedagogy• Employment policies & practices• Professional Institutes/ membership bodies/networks• Government legislation & policy

these areas of intervention are treated as interconnected. the model recognises the complex barriers and the shared responsibility for overcoming occupational segregation, and that It is not sufficient to address one area alone, and an intervention in one of these has to be complemented and supported by interventions in other areas. the philosophy is that it is likely to be ineffective to tackle gender stereotyping of girls in school if the overall role of the media and wider social institutions are not

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also addressed. so interventions in different areas, and by different actors, are necessary in order to dismantle these complex barriers.

The following are two examples of the UKRC interventions, one with employers and one with women engineers themsleves.

ukrc serVices for employers

the uKrc’s work with employers was developed around a comprehensive set of services and activities, centring on advice and guidance, awards and recognition schemes:

• A cultural analysis tool for employers to assess their internal equality cultures• Good practice guides• Gender equality training• Employer liaison• Recognition scheme and ‘Kite Mark’ for good quality SET employers• UKRC Award for Diversity and Inclusion

ukrc serVices for employees and reTurners To seT

uKrc services for women employees and sEt returners are also comprehensive and interconnected. they are designed to dovetail with one another through a returner’s job search process, effectively taking the lifecycle of sEt returners and addressing each stage of the cycle with specialist services. services for returners include:

• Provision of an online course delivered through the Open University which provides

• returners with job seeking skills• CV support and review• Mentoring support and peer mentoring support• Networking events• Placement services to employers through Year In Industry – an industrial

placement• service• One-to-one support and career advice

conclusIon

therefore it has to be acknowledged that the strategy to gain more gender equity in engineering is a complex and difficult one, which is difficult to pursue. However, it is important to maintain this type of holistic strategy because greater gender-equality could enhance both the education and the profession of engineering, and women represent an under-utilised resource in the field.

barbara baGIlHolE

rEfErEncEs

bagilhole, b. (2002), Women in non-traditional occupations: Challenging Men, palgrave macmillan, london.

bagilhole, b. and White, K. (2011) Gender, Power and Management: A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Higher Education, palgrave macmillan, london.

carter, r. and Kirkup, G. (1990) Women in Engineering: A good place to be? basingstoke: mac-millan.

dryburgh, H. (1999) Work Hard, play Hard: Women and professionalisation in engineering – adapting to the culture, Gender and Society, 13 (5): 664-82.

European Commission (2000) Science Policies in the European Union: Promoting excellence through mainstreaming gender equality. A Report from the ETAN Expert Working Group on Women and Science. Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities. Available at: ftp://ftp.cordis.europa.eu/pub/improving/docs/g_wo_etan_en_200101.pdf

Evetts, J. (1998) managing the technology but not the organization: women and career in engineering. Women in Management Review, 13 (8): 283-90.

faulkner, W. (2005a) becoming and belonging: Gendered processes in Engineering, pp. 15-25. In: J. archibald, J. Emms, f. Grundy, J. payne and E. turner (Eds.) The Gender Politics of ICT. Middlesex, Middlesex University Press.

Fox, M. F. (1998) Women in Science and Engineering: Theory, Practice, and Policy in Programs. Signs 24(1): 201-25.

Greed, c. (2000) Women in the construction professions: achieving critical mass. Gender, Work and Organisation, 7(3): 181-95.

miller, G.E. (2002) the frontier, Entrepreneurialism and Engineers: Women coping with a web of masculinities in an organisational culture. Culture and Organisation, 8 (2): 145-60.

sagebiel, f. (2003) Masculinities in organisational cultures in engineering: Study of departments in institutions of Higher Education and perspectives for social change. presented at Gender and power in the new Europe, 5th European feminist research conference, 20-24 august, lund, sweden.

she figures (2009) Statistics and Indicators on Gender Equality in Science, Luxembourg: Publica-tions Office of the European Union,

singh, V., s. Kumra and s. Vinnicombe (2002) Gender and Impression management: playing the promotion Game, Journal of Business Ethics 37(1): 77-89.

Wajcman, J. (1991) Feminism Confronts Technology. cambridge: polity press.Wilson-Kovacs, d. m., m. ryan and a. Haslam (2006) the Glass-cliff: Women’s career paths in the

uK private It sector. Equal Opportunities International 25(8): 674-687.

Barbara BagilholeDepartment of Social SciencesLoughborough University, [email protected] www.lboro.ac.uk/departments/ss/staff/bagilhole.html

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