Women In MathOver the past 20 years the number of women in the fields of math, science andengineering have grown at astronomical rate.
The number of women which holdpositions in these fields has more than doubled. In post secondary educationwomen are filling up the lecture halls and labs where in the past where it wasrare to see a woman at all. If a woman was able withstand the pressure that wasput on her it was more than likely that she wouldn’t even be hired. Many organizations have been established to help young women to prosue carriersin either math, science and engineering. A few examples of these organizationsare, AWM (Association for Women in Mathematics), WISE (Women In Sience andEngineering), ASEM (Advocates for Women in Science, Engineering and Mathematics)and many others. Many young women do not prosue carriers in math for one or more key reasons.
One is that they have no female role models to look up to or any famous femalesin that field to inspire them. Another is that they are often disgouraged byothers, usually family members, ” Why don’t you be like your mother and stayhome and raise the children. ” is a common line used. This is most likelybecause the parents don’t want to see their daughter go out and fall flat on herface when she doesn’t make it. There is little support from others if a womanwants to go into these fields.
Equal opportunities is also a large factor inthis, either as a decision maker wether to go into the field or not or cold hardfacts. Facts like 90 percent of engineering, math and science position are heldby men, this means that they don’t hire very many women. Another reason is that the maybe lacking the self-esteem within their self. This could be because of the scary numbers that are related to women and math,science and engineering positions.
Or that they could be struggling in thatarea. Another factor could be that they fear that hiring opportunities are verysexist and male shovenistic. Measures have been taken to help ensure that women have a equal if not betterchance to prosue a career in math, science or engineering. Special funds,programs and organizations have been setup to ecourage and assists women to goafter the field they wish to work in.
With these steps taken it helps to getthe ball rolling so that women can be pioneers and break into the math, scienceand engineering fields and hopefully become role models or heros for futuregenerations.
