Challenges for women remain in STEM, PhDs and leadership

High female enrolment and graduation rates at institutions of higher learning in nine Southern African countries are not reflected in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields, postgraduate programmes and university leadership, as females remain under-represented in these areas, a new UNESCO report says.

The report titled, ‘Women’s Participation in Higher Education in Southern Africa: An exploration of STEM, leadership, and enrolment in institutions in Botswana, Eswatini, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Zambia, and Zimbabwe’, was launched on 9 May at the United Nations during the Ninth Multi-stakeholder Forum on Science, Technology and Innovation for the Sustainable Development Goals.

The study was commissioned by the UNESCO Regional Office for Southern Africa and the UNESCO International Institute for Higher Education in Latin America and the Caribbean (IESALC) to look into higher education and gender, as well as women’s participation in higher education institutions in the Southern African region, with a special focus on STEM in nine Southern African countries.

In the report’s foreword, Francesc Pedró, the director of UNESCO IESALC, said the latest report follows a global study released by UNESCO IESALC in 2021 that showed a noteworthy trend of larger numbers of women enrolling in higher education institutions compared to their male counterparts, but highlighted some persistent inequalities, such as gender disparities in STEM areas of study, research performance, as well as the inadequate representation of women in the tertiary education sector in Africa, raising the need for further exploratory research.

To this end, Pedró said, a pilot research project was launched to evaluate the participation of women in higher education in Kenya, South Sudan, and Uganda, and these yielded mixed results.

The current study, he added, representing the second assessment phase in nine countries, was conducted through an online survey between November 2022 and February 2023 to generate data on the representation of women at various levels in higher education as decision-makers, teachers, researchers, students and to look at some of their experiences in study programmes and employment.

The respondents were researchers, academic staff, and staff in other institutional positions; 58% of them being women, and 42% men.

The Director of the UNESCO Regional Office for Southern Africa, Nisha (one name), in her foreword, said focusing on STEM, it was clear from the report that there was a distinct shortage of females in these disciplines among students and faculty.

This was attributed to several factors, such as prevailing gender norms, attitudes of teachers and parents, institutional cultures, the relatively low number of young women progressing from school to university, and deficiencies in related policies.

Data collection

Nisha said a key point in the report is the importance of improving data collection on female participation in higher education as this helps to establish a stronger foundation for cooperation with governments and institutions to effectively advocate for transformative changes within the regional education systems.

She said the data also ensures that initiatives and recommendations were precisely aligned with the areas that require attention.

The UNESCO report said that, in terms of student enrolment and progression, the analysis shows that, across higher education institutions participating in the survey, women comprise the majority of students enrolled in and completing undergraduate and masters-level courses but, at the doctoral and postdoctoral levels, women continue to be in the minority.

“The data from the reporting higher education institutions in the nine SADC countries included in this study show some important trends. Despite the high numbers of women enrolled and graduating from these higher education institutions and the fact that some make it into senior management positions, women are still under-represented at many levels.

“This survey has highlighted this trend in university decision-making structures, in academic leadership positions and at the highest degree levels,” read the report.

“Most importantly, this data has shown that, even where positive progress has been made, it is not sufficiently reflected in the field of STEM, where the picture with regard to women’s participation at all levels within the reporting institutions did not change much between 2018 and 2021 and important inequalities remain.”

It said women still occupied significantly less than half of STEM faculty management positions.

Barriers to promotion

However, respondents agreed that there is no bias in the appointment of women to leadership positions in their respective institutions, including STEM faculty management positions, but noted the barriers to employment and promotion women face.

These include inadequate professional development programmes for women, cultural norms that position women primarily in caregiving and family roles, and unfair treatment or scrutiny of women in leadership roles.

According to UNESCO, in Sub-Saharan Africa, 76 women are, on average, enrolled for every 100 men in tertiary education institutions.

“However, men remain a majority in all the reporting institutions at doctoral and postdoctoral levels. These results are consistent with the global data, which shows that the Gender Parity Index (GPI) for the doctoral level is below one in all regions except for Latin America and Central Asia (UNESCO, 2021),” the report said.

It said the effects of the widely reported culture of sexual harassment and gender-based violence associated with higher education in many of the countries of the region shows that more research is required on these injustices and their effects.

“This survey shows that women comprise a minority of those in senior management positions within the reporting higher education institutions. This pattern is evident, not just in these institutions from these countries, but reflects a global trend.”

According to the report, there are still significant barriers around women leading universities in Africa.

Recommendations

The report recommends further investigation of some issues. For example, it said consistent and regular collecting, synthesising and analysing of enrolment, progression and completion data for men and women, within different fields of study at institution and national level, was needed.

Improved data collection, in particular about women’s participation in research, said the report, “will enhance accountability in higher education institutions and provide policymakers with a better understanding of the existing gaps and limitations in research funding in order to develop targeted programmes”.

It also stated the data from this study suggest that there were institutional and societal barriers that continued to restrict women’s progression within academic hierarchies, especially within some disciplines, also showing the need for more research to investigate barriers in context and to facilitate insights across contexts.

The UNESCO report said more policy interventions were needed to improve women’s participation in higher education.

Interventions could include campaigns focused on enhancing women enrolment in STEM-related fields among secondary-school girls that challenge gender stereotypes, and science fairs, workshops, guest lectures and mentorship programmes, in collaboration with local communities, industry and schools.

It said that there was also a need for financial support of women students at all levels, including gender-based scholarships and grants, as well as institutional policies to avoid biased recruitment.

There was also the need for gender-awareness campaigns within institutions challenging cultures of gender-based violence and cultivating a safe and supportive environment.

Gender-responsive training and mentorship programmes that enable women to build confidence and navigate the challenges they may face in their academic and administrative careers, and that support women into and through PhD programmes, were also recommended.

Another recommendation was the adoption of specific measures to promote co-responsibility in childcare and supporting benefits for mothers and fathers that address social and economic barriers that prevent fathers and mothers from taking leave.