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Has using popular examples of women in STEM become a systemic barrier?
By Emma Guo, Staff Writer
Marie Curie, Ada Lovelace, and Rosalind Franklin are household names in STEM, exemplifying gender equity in these fields. Exposure to these role models contributed to the rapid growth of women entering into higher-level education and professional institutions. However, in the present day there seems to be a slower progression, according to data collected by UNESCO.
Why is that the case?
A review essay on the History and Philosophy of Women in Science brings up a good point: constantly using examples of Curie, Lovelace, and Franklin to demonstrate that women have impacted mainstream STEM fields may retain the “male norm as a measure of excellence.”
Instead of making STEM accessible to women, it reinforces the idea that to be a woman in STEM, you are required to be outstanding and nothing short of that. Rather than inspiring young women, could the constant use of these highly successful women as role models in the current education system be counterintuitive?
Attainability is a large factor in the efficacy of a role model, and its relationship with success is generally curvilinear, that is, a role model is most effective in influencing others when they are moderately successful. Even further, studies have proposed that a shared identity between the role model and aspirant can increase the perception of goal attainability for the aspirant themselves.
The importance of representation is highlighted by a report by the National Science Foundation National Centre for Science and Engineering Statistics (NSF NCSES). Underrepresented minorities occupy an underwhelming 9.16% of STEM undergraduates who finish their studies —half of the expected amount based on undergraduate enrolment. This striking statistic highlights the need for diverse role models to set an attainable level of achievement for women in STEM. Data from UNESCO’s 2024 report on the gender gap in science finds that countries of minority representation, such as Africa and Asia, have the lowest proportion of female researchers in science.
Taken together, this suggests that the highly successful and internationally recognized women in STEM may have a much lower motivational impact as previously expected. At our current progression of gender equity, maybe it’s time to switch our focus to equitable representation of women from all backgrounds to further global gender equity.
If we want to close the gender gap in STEM fields, maybe we need to shift our focus from iconic, well-known figures, to improving the visibility of women in STEM in our daily lives.
How can we provide better role models?
Ultimately, this isn’t to say that Lovelace, Curie, and Franklin are bad role models. Instead, this is a call to remove systemic barriers and increase female representation in daily life.
As Dr. Janin Bredehoeft, the CEO of Science in Australia Gender Equity, puts it, gender equity is like a life cycle. Men are more often promoted because they’re given opportunities to do so, not necessarily because they’re better or smarter than women. And, for example, men on average face less workplace harassment than women; therefore, they don’t experience as much retaliation as women receive from reporting cases of sexual harassment.
This life cycle also applies to the underrepresentation of female minorities in STEM. Without breaking the cycle, female and female minority representation in STEM fields will be constantly sidelined, hindering young aspiring women in STEM to view these pathways as accessible.
So how can we resolve these equity issues we face? According to Dr. Bredehoeft, the solution involves checking in with women at varying stages of their career trajectory and assisting them with three key things: attraction (do they apply and succeed?), retention (do they stay?), and promotion (can they progress?).
By implementing these three pillars, we move closer to the goal of creating a household name for women in STEM from all backgrounds and inspiring the next generation.
