‘I don't think I would be good at it': Gen Z girls far less likely than boys to feel they belong in STEM

Gen Z boys and girls say they're getting equal opportunities to learn about STEM topics in school, but girls report feeling far less supported to pursue it as a career, according to a new report.

Equal shares of male and female students, roughly 7 in 10, say their middle or high school encouraged them to pursue STEM careers, gave them opportunities to learn about STEM jobs, and provided extra-curriculars like a science or robotics club to learn more.

Despite similar levels of access, boys (85%) are much more likely to say they're interested in STEM topics than girls (63%), according to a September survey of 2,000 Gen Zers between 12 to 26 years old from Gallup and the Walton Family Foundation.

That can become a pipeline problem as students think about their college careers and beyond. A majority of Gen Z girls and young women say they're not interested in a STEM career because they don't enjoy the topic (61%) or they don't think they'd be good at it (57%).

Just 38% of boys don't believe they'd be successful in a STEM career.

The discrepancy may come down to how girls feel they'll be perceived for trying something they have no experience doing, compared with a perhaps "irrational confidence young men have in things they've never done before," says Zach Hrynowski, a senior education researcher with Gallup.

Girls are more likely than boys to say they don't have the time to go to school for STEM careers and because those careers "are not accepting of people like me." 

Girls are less likely to learn about in-demand STEM skills

It's both "surprising" and "frustrating" to see "the gap persist among the youngest members of the workforce" despite growing awareness and efforts to close the gender gap in STEM, Hyrnowski says.

The survey specifically dug into who's learning about emerging skills that are increasingly important for the U.S. economy and national security, Hyrnowski says.

While 54% of Gen Z boys and young men say they learn about computer programming and coding in school, just 39% of girls and young women report the same thing. Girls lag in being exposed to lessons about electrical circuits, robotics, 3-D design, hydraulics and rockets. 

These skills feed into jobs involving artificial intelligence, semiconductors, and cybersecurity that are "rapidly expanding and relevant to national security," Hyrnowski says, "and we're trying to figure out, is the workforce of tomorrow interested in these types of jobs? And more importantly, do they have the foundation from school to pursue them?"

The only STEM topic where girls outpace boys in learning is in the environmental sciences. Eighty-three percent of girls and 81% of boys say they learn about that in school.

One big caveat: The survey did not consider gaps in interest or learning access for health care jobs, where women are more likely to want to work and are overrepresented in some disciplines.

The problem with only teaching STEM through electives

One major reason for the gap could be because while school curriculums have guidelines for teaching traditional STEM topics like biology and algebra, fewer have standards for requiring emerging topics like in computer science or robotics. In many cases, such topics are taught as electives that girls don't opt into as much as boys do.

Further, schools are more likely to be under-resourced in emerging STEM topics, Hyrnowski says. Teachers may not be equipped to understand the ways different types of students learn these topics, or the messaging they need to receive in order to feel they can actually pursue them.

That goes for creating an inclusive environment for girls in STEM as well as for other marginalized or underrepresented students, such as those who are low-income or Black, Hyrnowski says.

That's why groups like Girls Who Code, Black Girls Code, Million Women Mentors and others are important to offer STEM learning outside the classroom. It's useful for girls and young women to see mentors who look like them succeed in their careers, he adds.

"If you don't see yourself reflected in the industry, or a mentor who looks like you encouraging you to pursue these careers, young women are opting out and saying, "I don't want to take a coding class because I don't think I'd be good at it.'"

'College is too late'

Encouraging interest at a young age is key. The top reasons Gen Zers say they want to pursue a career in STEM is because it's their passion (42%) or because they enjoyed learning about it in school (18%).

A robust and inclusive STEM education by middle and high school could be key to closing the gender gap, Hyrnowski says: "College is too late."

Women are becoming the majority at four-year colleges and are a growing share of the workforce, "so if you are potentially excluding conservatively half of your college-going population and about half of your workforce, that's not good as you start to see the number of openings for these emerging technologies expand," Hyrnowski says.

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