Technological employment is rising, digitization is progressing and STEM profiles – science, generation, engineering and arithmetic – have transform one of the crucial maximum wanted within the exertions marketplace. Those are fields with strong jobs, above-average salaries and long term potentialities which can be exhausting to check. On the other hand, the presence of ladies in those research and professions continues to be very low.
In a up to date learn about, we showed that this inequality does now not get up nowadays of activity seek: it begins a lot previous, in class and right through the selection of learn about, and follows ladies right through their skilled profession. We will have to now not be shocked via the truth that the salary hole nonetheless exists if we have a look at how girls and boys are allotted within the phases of coaching.
When instructional possible choices restrict the longer term
Vocational coaching (VET), now a key path to employment, obviously displays this inequality. Lately, simplest about 9% of number one and secondary STEM FP scholars are ladies, and in upper stage STEM FP, that determine is set 15%.
If we expand the focal point, the trend is much more hanging: out of each hundred ladies enrolled in VET, just a minority (about 10%) make a choice skilled STEM households. Which means that financial actions with higher alternatives – business, generation, automation, digitization… – have only a few feminine representatives from the bottom. And this is a state of affairs that, in spite of the efforts made, has infrequently modified within the remaining 4 years.
Share of FPI STEM alternatives via gender in educational years 2019-2020 and 2023-2024, classes during which there used to be virtually no variation. Yolanda Gonzalez-Arechavala in accordance with statistics of vocational schooling scholars (MEFD, 2025b). Electrical energy and production, boy stuff?
The distance is accentuated in skilled households comparable to set up and upkeep, electric power and electronics or mechanical production, the place the presence of ladies slightly reaches between 2% and six%. Those environments, masculinized for many years, put across an implicit message that influences possible choices: even these days, many younger ladies don’t see themselves in those professions as a result of they don’t in finding references or really feel recognized with the surroundings.
Those choices have penalties that remaining for years. If ladies don’t get right of entry to research that result in probably the most dynamic and best-paid sectors, their place at the exertions marketplace is conditioned from the start. It isn’t skill, however a device that subtly however constantly guides men and women down other paths.
The pay hole begins in the school room
Salary inequality between women and men isn’t only defined via direct discrimination in corporations. It has deeper roots: if most girls educate in disciplines with decrease wage reputation and less alternatives for development, they’ll in the end pay attention in decrease paying sectors. And if males dominate technical fields, with upper call for and higher salaries, the distance widens.
Unequal get right of entry to to STEM research explains a just right a part of the ensuing salary hole. Era professions be offering speedy hiring, strong contracts and better salaries, however the underrepresentation of ladies in those levels reduces their alternatives to get right of entry to those positions.
Even if they do make it to STEM professions, they’re frequently within the minority. This isolation impacts self-confidence, sturdiness and alternatives for development. For plenty of, which means they undergo their skilled careers in an atmosphere the place the paintings tradition continues to be designed via males and for them.
College: inequality that persists with nuance
On the college, the image is rather extra advanced. In maximum medical research – biology, chemistry, biotechnology, marine science or meals science and generation – the gender hole isn’t very noticeable. Even, in sure classes, ladies had been the bulk for many years.
Time evolution via gender in levels within the department of science. Yolanda Gonzalez-Arechavala in accordance with UNIVBASE historic collection (MCIU, 2025a).
The issue is targeted, above all, within the department of engineering and structure. In maximum fields of engineering, males nonetheless make up a transparent majority. In ICT engineering – IT, computer systems, video video games… – the proportion of ladies is round 15% and to some degree stays decrease, even if the whole choice of scholars is rising.
Time evolution via gender in levels within the department of engineering and structure. I. Gonzalez-Arechavala in accordance with UNIVBASE historic collection (MCIU, 2025a).
The case of pc engineering is especially hanging: within the eighties, when the self-discipline used to be nonetheless in its infancy, ladies represented a top share (over 30%), in line with Univbase information. Over the years, the consolidation of male stereotypes related to generation has ended in a drastic lower on this share, achieving very low ranges in fresh a long time.
Time evolution via gender in pc engineering levels. I. Gonzalez-Arechavala in accordance with UNIVBASE historic collection (MCIU, 2025a).
There are exceptions that assist to know this phenomenon: Biomedical engineering is likely one of the few engineering levels the place ladies aren’t simplest the bulk, however expanding yr via yr. What units this breed with the exception of others? Its connection to well being and care, fields which can be culturally related to the female. The distinction presentations that the distance isn’t because of other talents, however to deep-rooted social expectancies.
Why is it so tricky to near this hole?
The endurance of those inequalities has many reasons: stereotypes about what’s “fair” for boys and girls, loss of visual feminine function fashions, biased instructional orientation, organizational tradition of technological sectors or the belief that sure environments are nonetheless antagonistic to ladies. Those elements beef up every different and create a cycle this is tricky to damage.
The excellent news is that there’s room for motion. Selling medical careers from adolescence, making references visual, coaching lecturers, difficult prejudices in educational orientation, bettering the tradition of coaching facilities and dignified technical vocational coaching could have an actual have an effect on. It isn’t sufficient to inspire women to review engineering: the areas and narratives surrounding those disciplines wish to be remodeled.
A possibility that the rustic will have to now not leave out
The gender hole in STEM is not only an equality factor. It’s an financial drawback. Spain wishes extra technological and medical professionals. Bridging the distance is not only about increasing alternatives for girls: it’s about making sure that the rustic faces its personal technological long term and that the variety of our society is taken into consideration.
If we wish an even, aggressive and leading edge exertions marketplace, it can be crucial to begin the place all of it starts: within the study rooms, the place the chances of the following day are constructed – or restricted -.
Carmen Fernandez Herrero, a 1st-year Grasp of Commercial Applied sciences pupil at Universidad Pontificia Comillas, and Blanca Diaz Cirera, a 2d-year Grasp of Commercial Applied sciences and Trade Management pupil at Universidad Pontificia Comillas, collaborated within the preparation of this text.
