The Participation and Inclusion of Women in STEM Education

Science and Technology is been labeled as one of the fast-growing fields in America today and noticed that women do not seem to want to fall under that field. IT and Engineering is one of the top fields in the technology industry not only that it pays its workers extremely well. It said that women fill half of the U.S economy, but about less than 25 percent of women are not filling the STEM job opportunities. Women are more likely to choose jobs that fall in the health field or education because STEM seen as a male-dominated occupation. The reason being is because of the level of difficulty that comes with engineering. Women are more likely to drop out of STEM majors than Men into a non-stem major because of the low mathematical confidence and poor academic ability in which they have after taking calculus one at the beginning of their freshman year. The reason why these students leave stem to another non-stem major is because of the curricular other majors have to offer. In STEM fields lack of female representation mostly in the minority group, underpay, and rigorous math courses make it a bit challenging for women and It also prohibits younger females from going to the field. Engineering is a very diverse field that is in deep need of women to take on this field. The reason why engineering companies are in search of women in this field is because of the diversity benefit that makes the company look attractive and valuable but that seems to fall usable because kids younger than 5 in elementary school feel discouraged to take technology when they get older because they feel that they do not fit the societal perception. The perception that women should not be seen doing a man’s job and also their decisions can come from their family also letting the girls not to do a man's work.

Another reason is the difficulties, little or no guidance, being unprepared for the career field and language barriers all this are what prevents one from joining stem majors. Recent studies have suggested that to enable the student to be able to choose if they want to be in STEM or not they need to have an environment whereby they see people who represent them in the field also stem need to be started in the secondary school level. The higher institute should also be able to support the student in college so together they can contribute to the student's decision. They are not mentally or physically prepared when they Female's in this field feel isolated when they go to their various classes because of the less representation, having difficulties in developing a strong relationship with their male supervisors and also professors who discourages them not to go into engineering field. More recent work suggests that a combination of student-level variables such as youth STEM-interest, student demographics, identity, socioeconomic status, and secondary school preparation, instructor-level variables such as pedagogy and teacher-student relationships, and institution level variables such like student support once in college together contribute to a student's decision to persist in STEM or not (Ellis Jessica, Bailey Fordick and Chris Rasmussen 1). It said that new graduate students who enter college and pursue STEM drop out from that field after the first half of the semester because of the rigorous curriculum that is given, women, unfortunately, fall in this situation because they are not encouraged to do more than the boys. The issues that link to this is the theoretical difficulties, Lack of resources, poor preparation, and language barriers. There was a graphical study that was conducted it showed that about 17 percent of women intended to pursue a STEM degree in their freshman year which seems below average and imagine if these particular people drop out of their major because of their low confidence they have in their mathematical anxiety will reduce the possibilities of them getting into technology (3).

“Internal exploration and perceptions of external limitations, such as perceived masculinity or femininity of certain careers or anticipated stereotypes or discrimination...shapes adolescents perceptions of their work options”(Grossman Jennifer and Michelle v. porche 699). Women like to switch to biology because it is a female-dominated field and they are more women represented in that career, unlike Engineering that has a dull, uncreative, touch and heavy use of machinery. Women are also paid unfairly than men when it comes to working in the same engineering field as men. Men in engineering are seen as more hardworking and ready to work hands on than women who are not usually taken seriously. A survey was been conducted and it showed that nearly half of the women who were surveyed said they left their job because of working conditions, too much travel, and lack of advancement or low salary and a third of the women left because they did not like the workplace climate, their boss or the organization’s culture (Brink, Marieke Van Den 189). Women of color are still face obstacles when they try to transfer into a 4 year institute. Research shows that the problem could be link to financial setbacks, unlike 4 year institute 2 years colleges help in providing affordable tuition, flexible scheduling, and small class size.Women of color are often the first in their family to attend college,while managing family and social responsibilities and yet they will face backlash for their gender. Instead of this unwanted backlash women need to be encouraged to participate in this new found evolution of technology and there are so many different ways in which different companies, organization, social media and schools are trying to recruit women to join engineering and mathematics.

There are two particular challenges that falls in place when it comes to the increase of women in science, technology, engineering, and mathatics (STEM), first they need to safe keep those women who are till in the STEM field and the ways they could go about that is if they design an interventional program that could help break the negative steorotypes that causes women to underperform and feel disstisfied with their feild of work. Secondly, the recuritment of women that are needed to enter this field needs to be increased. The effort of recuiting more women into STEM is if they put more female role models in classrooms, there are even companies like the National Academy of Engineering who helps in runing a camp that only targeted at exposing girls into computer science and engineering (Millgram Donna 3). There need to be atleast female professors in the mathematical department which could helps in inproving a females mathmatical confidence that they lack. Networking through social media has a very huge impact it helps to bring together future and current engineers and also it helps in persuading young minds into doing engineering.