POSITION PAPER -- Why Girls Participate Less in Science, Engineering and Mathematics and What Can Be Done to Change This

Josephine G. Mendoza

Computer Science Department

California State University, San Bernardino

5500 University Parkway

San Bernardino, CA 92407

(909) 880-5331 FAX: (909) 880-7004

email: jmendoza@csci.csusb.edu

WHY GIRLS PARTICIPATION LESS IN SCIENCE, ENGINEERING & MATHEMATICS?

Girls and boys appear to do equally well in science and mathematics in elementary school. Once courses become optional in secondary school, girls enroll less frequently in mathematics and physical science and attain lower achievement scores and show less interest. [Blosser, 1990] Why? The bodies of research [Klein, 1985; Chipman, Brush and Wilson, 1985; Oakes, 1990; Fennema and Leder, 1990; Tsuji and Ziegler, 1990; Spertus, 1991] identify several contributing factors. Adolescent girls, experiencing conflict between interests in mathematics and science and desire for popularity, may forego mathematics achievement to avoid male disapproval or think a career would interfere with family responsibilities. Parental stereotyping of careers affects girls' perception of the usefulness of mathematics. Parents have lower expectations for daughters than sons and attribute their daughter's success in math and science more to effort than ability. Counselors sometimes discourage girls from selecting advanced math or science courses because of stereotypes of quantitative fields. Teachers' perceptions and beliefs can affect students' goals and perception of their own ability. Teacher encouragement has a positive influence on females' mathematics participation, but teachers tend to treat boys and girls differently, often to the detriment of girls' mathematics achievement. Tracking has a detrimental effect on females' participation in mathematics. Students in lower tracks learn less mathematics and take fewer advanced courses. Teachers recommend high-ability girls less often than high-ability males for advanced placement . Junior high school girls are unaware of career options and the educational requirements involved. Thus, they tend to avoid taking the advanced mathematics necessary for science and engineering careers.

WHAT CAN BE DONE TO IMPROVE THE SITUATION?

Intervention programs are needed! Preventive strategies, stressing awareness of career opportunities, development of SEM knowledge and skills, and the importance of continued enrollment in mathematics and science, must reach students, parents, teachers or counselors. Remedial intervention programs can target students who did not pursue advanced math and science in high school. Intervention strategies vary and must be designed to appeal to students at one or more levels: cognitive, affective, and ability or achievement. Those at the cognitive level are designed to provide information, to increase awareness; while interventions at the affective level may be focused on increasing self-confidence or relieving anxiety. Those at the ability or achievement level are designed to result in increased ability, leading to improved achievement. Research indicates that changes at the affective and achievement levels have more effect on enrollment than those aimed at cognitive beliefs.[Tsuji and Ziegler, 1990]. Training for spatial ability, which appears to have an experiential base, has been especially effective [Linn and Hyde, 1989]. Cognitive intervention increases awareness but does not affect behavior [Lantz, in Chipman, Brush, and Wilson, 1985].

Davis and Humphreys [1985] lists five categories of intervention programs: short-term, audiovisual and printed products, experiential learning, long-term, and teacher education. Short-term programs serve to raise awareness and change attitudes. They may consist of a speakers series, one-day conferences, or workshops. One-day events often stress negative aspects, do not involve active participation and rarely address the reasons females do not take advanced courses [Lantz, in Chipman, Brush, and Wilson, 1985]. Audiovisual and printed products are used as interventions to raise awareness, change attitudes, or increase knowledge. Films, filmstrips, videotapes, books, puzzles, exhibits, videodiscs, and career posters may be used to provide information about science careers in a concise manner. Experiential learning is used to give participants a hands-on experience in science or a science-related field. Long range programs consist of courses and curricula. They are designed to

increase learning and are more effective in changing attitudes. Teacher education intervention programs may consist of summer institutes or inservice programs. Their purpose is to modify teachers' behaviors and improve their skills so that, ultimately, the learning and attitudes of their students are improved [Davis and Humphreys, 1985].

The most effective age for intervention activities is pre-adolescence, before negative attitudes appear. The number of students considering careers in technical fields increases very little after ninth grade [Berryman, in Oakes, 1990].

Peers and older students are effective communicators to young girls, as are adult males supportive of females' interest in mathematical careers. Students sometimes have difficulty identifying with women conference speakers; however, exposure to women in scientific careers over longer periods of time, as teachers or through

internships, does develop role models and results in positive attitude changes [Tsuji and Ziegler, 1990].

Interventions aimed at students' parents, teachers, and counselors are effective in changing attitudes [Oakes, 1990]. Instruction in creating gender-equitable classroom environments is an especially effective form of teacher education

intervention.

There is some support in the literature for sex-segregated classes in mathematics and science, but Fox and colleagues [in Chipman, Brush, and Wilson, 1985] think programs that maintain a "critical mass" of female students effectively encourage participation. Studies have shown that females at single-sex schools study more science and mathematics than those in co-educational schools [Kelly 1982], are more likely to continue in science [Ferry et al, 1982] and are disproportionately successful compared to other women [Gilbert et al, 1983]

Research indicates instructional techniques that reduce emphasis on competitivenessare conducive to female achievement in mathematics [Tsuji and Ziegler, 1990]. Damarin [1990] recommends curriculum intervention involving cooperative learning, hands-on activities, and solution of personally defined problems. She urges teachers to confront sex bias directly through classroom discussions.

Persons interested in reforming science education are advocating measures that Oakes considers beneficial to all students - therefore, such moves should help increase the number of women considering science-related careers. Reformers advocate the abolition of tracking because track placements in curriculum tend to be fixed and long-term. Although tracking may be done to accommodate differences in student ability, it exacerbates differences among students by limiting opportunities to learn. Lower-track science courses may actually limit students' opportunities to learn the subject because of restricted content and diminished outcomes. Reformers are urging that science curricula focus on personal needs, create career awareness, and include the study of science-technology-society in terms of problems and issues found in the community or discussed through the media. Reformers also advocate that more hands-on activities be used in science, preferably in a cooperative learning situation. Girls benefit from such instructional tactics. If, as some research data imply, current teaching strategies have led to early gender differences in attitudes, which then lead to differences in participation, changing teaching methods as well as revising the curriculum should help to decrease this trend.

Klein [1990] advocates for the following goals -- making science curricula personally meaningful; arranging for meaningful science role models; supporting enriching science education opportunities rather than ineffective remedial science education programs; increasing cultural sensitivity in instructional materials and classroom interactions; and increasing support for science achievement from parents, peers and the community .

REFERENCES

Blosser, P.E. (1990). Procedures to increase the entry of women in science-related

careers. ERIC Digest [Online] http://www.ed.gov/databases/ERIC_Digests/ed321977.html

Chipman, Susan F.; Lorelei R. Brush; and Donna M. Wilson, eds. Women and

Mathematics: Balancing the Equation. Lawrence Erlbaum, Hillsdale, NJ, 1985.

Davis, Barbara G. and Sheila Humphreys. Evaluating Intervention Programs:

Applications from Women's Programs on Math and Science. Teachers College

Press, Columbia University, New York, 1985. ED 266 944.

Damarin, Suzanne. "Teaching Mathematics: A Feminist Perspective," Chapter 17 in

Teaching and Learning: Mathematics in the 1990s, Thomas Cooney and Christian

Hirsch, eds., National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, Reston, VA, 1990.

Dunham, P.H. (1990). Procedures to increase the entry of women in

mathematics-related careers. ERIC Digest [On-line]. Available:

http://www.ed.gov/databases/ERIC_Digests/ed324195.html

Fennema, Elizabeth and Gilah Leder, eds. Mathematics and Gender. Teachers

College Press, Columbia University, New York, 1990.

Klein, Susan S. The Role of Research in Identifying the "Common Ground" Goals

To Promote Sex Equity in Science and Technology Education. Draft, February 18,

1990. (Based on a Paper Presented at the annual meeting of the American

Educational Research Association, Special Interest Group: Research on Women

and Education, San Diego, CA, 1989).

Linn, Marcia and Janet Hyde. "Gender, Mathematics, and Science." Educational

Researcher, 18(8), 17-19, 22-27, 1989.

Oakes, Jeannie. Lost Talent - The Underparticipation of Women, Minorities, and

Disabled Persons in Science. Rand Corporation, Santa Monica, CA, 1990. SE

051 394.

Spartus, Ellen. AI Lab Technical Report 1315, August 1991, 112 pages. [On-line]

http://www.ai.mit.edu/people/ellens/gender.html

Tsuji, Gerry and Suzanne Ziegler, "What Research Says About Increasing the

Numbers of Female Students Taking Math and Science in Secondary School,"

SCOPE 4(4): 1-4. February, 1990.