Lack of women ‘Stem’ students has led to gender ‘digital divide’

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Lack of women ‘Stem’ students has led to gender ‘digital divide’[size=0.8em]By Valentina Romei in London
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A lack of women and girls studying “Stem” subjects in schools and universities has led to a “gender digital divide” among inventors and software developers in developed economies, according to a new report from the OECD.

The report — “Bridging the Digital Gender Divide” — offers the first comprehensive analysis of gender differences in patents filed in the “IP5” intellectual property offices in the US, Europe, Japan, South Korea and China. It found that between 2010 and 2015, fewer than nine in 100 patents in the G20 countries were granted to inventions by women. The proportion dropped to just seven in 100 patents for information and communication technology inventions.

While the share of patents granted to women’s inventions in the G20 rose from 5.6 per cent in 1994 to 8.4 per cent in 2014, the report’s author, Mariagrazia Squicciarini, warned that at the current rate, “some gender parity in innovation will be reached only in 2080”.

Dr Squicciarini, a senior economist at the OECD, and her co-authors found that women-only inventors’ teams in the G20 were even more rare, accounting for just 4 per cent of patents granted between 2010 and 2015. More than three-quarters of inventors’ teams were composed of only male inventors during the same period.

The OECD also examined diversity in the software industry, finding that more than three-quarters of R-based open source software packages for data analysis developed between October 2012 and December 2017 were produced by all-male teams.

The report’s authors argued that the “digital divide” had its roots in people’s schooling and university studies.

According to the OECD, in G20 countries, women account for only one in four university graduates in “Stem” subjects, spanning science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

Dr Squicciarini said that of graduates in those subjects, “fewer women progress to a related career than men”.

But the gap in interest is apparent at a much younger age.

The report’s authors said that in OECD countries, 15-year-old boys tended to aspire to a career in ICT more than girls, regardless of their academic performance. Across the 35 OECD countries, only 0.5 per cent of 15-year-old girls said they wanted to become ICT professionals, compared with 5 per cent of boys the same age, according to the latest OECD’s Programme for International Students Assessment.

“Parents and teachers do not tend to push girls as much boys into studying Stem subjects for a variety of reasons” said Dr Squicciarini.

“For girls, parents’ might aspire for a career that can be better balanced with family duties, which are largely expected to fall on women shoulders” she added.

Some countries have introduced official policies intended to encourage more girls to study Stem subjects. In 2011, the Dutch government funded a project called “Talent Viewer” to educate students between the ages of 9 and 12 about Stem professions. In Mexico, the “NiñaSTEM Pueden” network promotes Stem careers to young female students, while in Europe, the EU-funded “Mind the Gap” project aims to improve girls’ learning in Stem subjects.

“Narrowing the digital gender divide and fostering the greater inclusion of women is good not only for women themselves, but also for those that are around them, including their children, families and communities,” said Gabriela Ramos, OECD chief of staff and sherpa to the G20.

“This ultimately leads to less inequality, enhanced societal wellbeing and stronger economic growth.”

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