Issue 1 Spring 2022

Women
in
STEM:
Perspectives on Gender Bias
Written By: Matthew Barotz and Simone Glajchen
Designed By: Olivia Liu
Ms. Yokana, the sole female teacher in the design and
engineering department at Scarsdale High School, has felt
the burden of being a woman in a male-dominated field
her whole life. As a child, she loved working with her dad, a
mechanical engineer, on soldering and woodworking
projects. However, when she decided to major in
engineering, she was told that “girls don’t do that.” Since
then, society has seemingly turned a new leaf, with Twitter
feeds and New York Times articles filled with buzzwords
like “Women in STEM” and “girl-boss”. The topic has
become so widely discussed that it no longer feels like an
issue. Has gender inequality in STEM actually dissipated,
or is it just masquerading itself in different ways than it
was 30 years ago?
Statistics reveal that gender inequality in STEM is still
quite prevalent. A 2021 UNESCO report found that only
28% of engineering graduates are women, with an even
greater gap existing in developed countries such as the US
(20.4%) and Japan (14.0%). STEM faculties are also
horribly unbalanced — a 2014 study found that women
make up only 15.7% of engineering faculty. The proportion
of research published by women has grown substantially
from 12% since 1960, but it has only reached a peak of
35%, never coming close to true equality.
While these numbers are striking, for Scarsdale
graduate and Columbia biomedical engineering student
Emma Glajchen, gender inequality hasn’t been a significant
obstacle to her education. Although “only about 15% of
[her] professors throughout college have been female”,
having predominantly male instructors hasn’t negatively
impacted her learning. None of her professors have
treated her differently, and they have all been “extremely
kind and supportive.” Columbia itself is unusual in that its
engineering student body is evenly split, but attracting
female researchers and professors has been a challenge—
especially because of the small number of women to
receive doctorate degrees in science from previous
generations.
The progress in gender inequality in STEM specialties
has been experienced at SHS too. Ms. Yokana remembers
that when the STEM department first started, boys would
tend to choose courses like computer science or electrical
engineering, while girls would gravitate towards designbased
classes. However, in the six years since its
founding, she says that “many young women are now
being empowered” to pursue their passions, even if they
are greatly outnumbered by men.
Alexandra Simon ’23 spoke about her experience as
the only girl in her robotics class, and she explains that
“[aside from] when certain stereotypical boy jokes are
made, it’s been really fun working with my classmates
and we do have a really great environment.” Her
comments differ from what many people believe: that
male-dominated groups create negative environments for
girls to thrive in. Instead, she says that she hasn’t felt
excluded in class and isn’t treated differently because of
her gender.
Now, this is not to say that gender inequality has
completely disappeared in Scarsdale either. Girls are still
heavily underrepresented in many STEM electives, with
some robotics and app design classes having no girls this
year. And students are not the only ones affected. Ms.
Yokana recalls that when the design lab was being built,
her opinion was ignored by the architects, despite being
the resident “makerspace expert”. Despite the progress
that has been achieved, there is still much work to be
done in Scarsdale to make girls in STEM truly equal.
Luckily, there are a plethora of programs designed to
encourage young women to pursue STEM careers. The
Girls Who Code Club, for example, teaches Scarsdale high
school’s female students the basics of computer science.
The GEMS club also introduces girls to science from a
young age, performing science experiments—such as
harvesting strawberry DNA and making chromatography
butterflies —with girls at Scarsdale elementary schools.
SHS and the global community at large are making
important strides toward achieving gender equality in
STEM specialties, something the world needs. Ms.
Yokana says it perfectly: “[what is] so important about
design and engineering is that you need different
perspectives. You need different voices.”
9