MEASURES TO INCREASE GENDER EQUALITY THROUGH THE IMPROVEMENT OF WOMEN'S PARTICIPATION IN STEM STUDIES

Nowadays more and more companies need tech professionals, so there is a growing demand for the degrees related to technology. According to the latest studies, STEM, that is, the degrees belonging to the fields of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics are the studies that offer better job perspectives. Even with this prospect, they are degrees that, today, are more chosen by men than women. So much so that according to the latest report “Científicas en Cifras (2015)” only 26% of those enrolled in the branch of Engineering and Architecture at the Spanish university, are women. In addition, according to statistics compiled in 2016 by the European Institute for Gender Equality, only 18% of students enrolled in degrees related to Information and Communication Technologies in the European Union are women. For all this, measures that implement equal opportunities and ensure the inclusion of women in this niche of the labor market are necessary.

In this context, the Polytechnic School and the University of Alicante, where the rate of female students in these degrees does not exceed 20%, have organized four editions of a tech campus, whose objective is to increase the visibility of the field of ICT among girls who attend secondary school. The activities carried out in this campus focus, on the one hand, on making these studies known in a different way, exclusively playful, with different activities aimed at discovering the intrinsic creativity of this exciting discipline. On the other hand, they intend to awaken their interest in the world of ICT, break stereotypes and guide their subsequent choice of studies.

The participation of women in university studies related to Information and Communication Technologies is analysed in this paper. In addition, it presents the activities carried out, the opinions of the participants analysing the surveys in different editions. And, finally, first results are presented since the participants of the first edition have joined this year at the university.