Doctoral Education and the Faculty of the Future

14. Attracting and Retaining Women in Engineering

14 Attracting and Retaining Women in Engineering The Tufts University Experience Linda Abriola and Margery Davies In the United States, engineering is an academic field that has been, and continues to be, predominantly male. In recent years, only about one in five PhD recipients has been a woman. As the Congressional Commission on the Advancement of Women and Minorities in Science, Engineering and Technology Development notes, Now, more than ever, the nation needs to cultivate the scientific and technical talents of all its citizens, not just those from groups that have traditionally worked in SET [science, engineering, and technology] fields. Women, minorities , and persons with disabilities currently constitute more than two-thirds of the U.S. workforce. It is apparent that just when the U.S. economy requires more SET workers, the largest pool of potential workers continues to be isolated from SET careers.” (Congressional Commission on the Advancement of Women and Minorities in Science, Engineering and Technology Development 2000, 9) The relative absence of women from engineering also robs the field of the potential for additional perspectives and problem-solving approaches for a wide range of issues, and limits women’s access to employment opportunities . (For discussions of gender and science/engineering, see Schiebinger 1999; Xie and Shauman 2003.) Attracting and Retaining Women in Engineering 193 Tables 14.1 and 14.2 present data from the Tufts University School of Engineering (SOE) in Medford, Massachusetts. These data on women in engineering appear to deviate substantially from the national averages. While at all U.S. engineering schools women earned 19.5 percent of bachelor’s degrees in 2005, at Tufts women earned 26.8 percent of the degrees. Not only are the female undergraduates recruited and retained at Tufts SOE, they also do well academically—on average, better than TABLE 14.1 Women Receiving Engineering Degrees as a Percent of All Engineering Degree Recipients 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 Tufts University Bachelor’s degrees 23.2 (194) 30.1 (193) 33.3 (195) — 26.8 (164) Master’s degrees 45.1 (91) 31.7 (120) 31.7 (123) 32.5 (160) 21.9 (155) Doctoral degrees 50.0 (10) 63.6 (11) 35.0 (8) 55.6 (9) 50.0 (8) All Engineering Schools Bachelor’s degrees 20.1 20.9 20.4 18.2 19.5 Master’s degrees 22.1 22.2 22.3 21.9 22.7 Doctoral degrees 17.0 17.3 17.4 17.8 18.3 Source: American Society for Engineering Education, 2006. Note: Total number of degrees in parentheses. TABLE 14.2 Percentage of Faculty in Engineering Who Are Women Top 50 Departments in Selected Disciplines* School of Engineering, Tufts University** Assistant Professor Associate Professor Full Professor Assistant Professor Associate Professor Full Professor Engineering 16.94 11.17 3.68 50.0 (4 of 8) 6.3 (1 of 16) 8.0 (2 of 25) Biomedical — — — 100.0 (1 of 1) 0 (0 of 3) 0 (0 of 2) Chemical 21.38 19.19 4.37 0 (0 of 2) 0 (0 of 2) 25.0 (1 of 4) Civil 22.26 11.50 3.52 100.0 (1 of 1) 0 (0 of 6) 14.3 (1 of 7) Electrical 10.86 9.84 3.85 50.0 (1 of 2) 33.3 (1 of 3) 0 (0 of 4) Mechanical 15.65 8.89 3.17 50.0 (1 of 2) 0 (0 of 2) 0 (0 of 8) Computer science 10.82 14.41 8.33 0 (0 of 3) 42.9 (3 of 7) 100.0 (3 of 3) Sources: Handelsman et al., 2005; AS&E Office of Diversity Education and Development, 2006. *Data on faculty derived from the same “top 50” departments for each discipline; ranked by NSF according to research expenditures in that discipline. Faculty data are from 2002. **Data on SOE, Tufts University faculty come from the Faculty Retention Cohort Study. Data are from October 2005. 194 Doctoral Education and the Faculty of the Future their male counterparts. Combining the five graduating classes of 2001 through 20005, women made up 29.1 percent of a total of 973 graduates . The average grade point average (GPA) for women was 3.30, higher than the average GPA for men at 3.24. In addition to a strong record of female undergraduate enrollment and academic achievement, the Tufts SOE also has a strong record of faculty retention...