Our SCE SWE President, Caroline Spencer, had the opportunity to attend the 2024 SWE Conference in Chicago! Below is a summary of her two favorite education sessions. 

The State of Women in Engineering:

The Director of the SWE Research Team covered recent research on topics affecting women and girls in STEM. Here area few statics she shared about women in the STEM field:

26% of engineering degrees are earned by women and only 15% of engineers are women. Researchers have determined there is an issue with retaining women in the workplace and in engineering college programs.

Professional:

• Career advancement is one of the biggest reasons why women are leaving engineering.

  • Studies have shown women taking a break for family reasons overall make less money and are less likely to advance in their career.

• Areas SWE Researchers recommend focusing on for improvement to help improve retention in the field:

  • Create a supportive work environment

  • Advocate for career development and planning

  • Gender bias adjustment

• Company initiatives that include both men and women have been found to be the most effective.

Collegiate/Primary School:

• Half the women who start STEM degrees don’t complete the degree and/or switch majors due to the lack of female mentors and weed-out classes. Studies found college programs with more female professors have an increase in women graduating with engineering degrees from their program. Some schools have started mentor programs to help improve retention.

• The gender gap between male and female high school students’ math scores has increased since the pandemic. Overall, high school math scores for both male and female have decreased globally after the pandemic.

The Men Who Support Me: Stories from Male Advocates:

This was hosted by Georgia Pacific and was moderated by a female employee who was promoting two of her personal male advocates whom she’s worked with to share their stories of how they have supported their female supervisors, peers, and employees in male-dominated manufacturing and office environments. The goal of the session was to share stories of men who have provided great support, conversations, and tools to the women they work with and aimed to provide awareness to the male perspective of supporting women.

Four Questions discussed:

• Women sometimes may be intimated when raising a concern or challenging others in a discussion how do you encourage their voices being heard?

  • Call on others to get their opinion during a discussion

  • Prep with the individual ahead of time

  • Use data when challenging the idea, not the person

• Women may feel the need to overcompensate at work: In their workload, working hours, or while sharing technical information; What are some ways you’ve acknowledged this?

  • Each individual knowing their role responsibilities and expectations

  • Delegate and prioritize to prevent burnout

  • Partner with who you’re coaching (Ex. Mentor and Mentee took a class together on how to improve their data presentation)

• Personal life planning and career planning can be difficult for women to balance; What are things that you’ve done to promote thoughtful career and personal life planning conversations?

  • Individual Development Plan conversations

  • Explore Company benefits

• Advocating is one piece, empowering is another; How do you empower the women you’re advocating for?

  • Together we rise! Pay it forward and utilize professional development opportunities

  • Diverse interview panels

  • Have a presence in resolving conflicts

My favorite takeaway from this session: Seeing others advocate for women can inspire someone else to take action! There is still so much we can learn from each other on how to advocate for others even if you already consider yourself an advocate for that cause.