‘Science and Technology as Feminine’: raising awareness about and reducing the gender gap in STEM careers

Abstract

ABSTRACT This paper examines the issue of the low participation of women in STEM careers and contributes to work on the gender gap in STEM in two ways. First, we propose a theoretical framework that integrates the factors influencing girls’ participation in STEM, proposed by UNESCO in 2017, and the concepts of cultural, identity and gender stereotypes. Second, we apply this framework to assess the contribution of the project Science and Technology as Feminine, promoted by the Spanish Association of Science and Technology Parks (APTE), to raising awareness about the low participation of girls in STEM and encouraging girls’ participation in scientific and technology careers in Spain. The APTE project has attracted media attention in Spain and the project results suggest that it should be possible to reduce the gender gap in the future career choices of young students, through the design of a set of activities addressed to the individual student, the students’ families and peers, schools and society at large, aimed at changing the habitus, which for many years has steered women away from STEM.