The Gender Gap in Engineering Education During The COVID-19 Lockdown: A Study Case

Borja Bordel Sánchez,Ramón Alcarria,Diego Martin,Tomás Robles

doi:10.3991/ijep.v11i6.24945

Borja Bordel Sánchez, Ramón Alcarria + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3991/ijep.v11i6.24945

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Abstract

Higher education in Spain, especially in Madrid, was suddenly and unex-pectedly shut down on March 9th 2020 because of the beginning of the COVID-19 first wave emergency. In engineering education, where practical laboratories are a relevant part of the educational process, professors followed different approaches (sometimes concurrently), designed after only three or five days of discussions. Although, globally, the obtained results are ac-ceptable considering the situation, after informally analyzing the data and observing the post-lockdown students’ profile, it emerges clearly that some collectives have suffered a higher impact than other. The objective of this work is to analyze if the performance of women in engineering courses, spe-cifically in computer engineering, is different from male students. The study case is carried out at Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, particularly, in the computer engineering degree. Furthermore, if a statistically relevant differ-ence is discovered, the final causes of this worrying situation will be studied. Official academic results were analyzed. Besides, more than one hundred surveys among students were developed. Results clearly show a deterioration in all indicators for all collectives and students, comparing the performance during the lockdown and the performance of previous years. However, this impact is not homogenous, and results also show how there is, actually, a gender gap placing women in engineering education during the lockdown (an after) in a disadvantaged situation

Highlights

Technical universities in Spain have a long tradition of fully presential classes, laboratories, and other similar activities [1]
In February 2020 the first cases of COVID-19 were detected in Madrid [5]
In some institutions more than three different tools for online meetings were employed, different policies about online classes and videos were stablished, and evaluation methods, many times, were transformed regardless the social situation and the schedule and changes proposed in other coincident subjects

Summary

Introduction

Technical universities in Spain have a long tradition of fully presential classes, laboratories, and other similar activities [1]. With permanent effects, as those female students will have a lot of obstacles to return to the University and finish their degrees This difference in the dropout rate is one of the main traditional challenges in terms of technology, education and gender gap [27], this fast increase caused by COVID cannot be ignored. As a final and global discussion, results clearly show a deterioration in all indicators for all collectives and students, comparing the performance during the lockdown and the performance of previous years This impact is not homogenous, and results show how there is, a gender gap placing women in engineering education during the lockdown (an after) in a disadvantaged situation. We found out the gender gap in engineering courses has increased during lockdown

Conclusions

Findings

Authors