Why do more girls need to be engineers?

Question: Why do more girls need to be engineers?
- Keywords:
  female
Asked by Kizzy to Andres, Andy, Emma, Shahil, Sheryl, Zoe on 10 Mar 2017.
- Andres Rivero answered on 10 Mar 2017:
  
  Hi Kizzy,
  
  I think we need more girls in engineering because, as you probably know, the female-to-male ration in STEM is not balanced. And this may not be because companies don’t want to hire women or because universities don’t want girls to study STEM subjects, it is because girls are being, in one way or the other, discouraged to pursue a career in science and engineering. This may be because some may feel intimidating or because they think the job is too demanding and would prevent them from doing personal things, that traditionally (and wrongly, in my opinion), have been assumed to be women’s responsibility, like raising children and taking care of a household.
  
  Our society needs to start ‘splitting up’ responsibilities between men and women, and also give men the right to, for example, take paternity leave so women can start working earlier. If more women get in to STEM, then engineering companies will feel more pressure to take all these measures to make it more feasible for women in STEM to work in that sector, and for men in STEM to also take more active role in their families. So, in general, getting more women into STEM will help pushing women’s right in the STEM sector in general. That would have a positive impact in closing the salary gap in general, and a lot more benefits.
  
  Andres
- Andy Woods answered on 10 Mar 2017:
  
  There is a problem taht if everyone thinks the same you might not get the best answer to a problem. Engineering at the minute is mainly men (like me) and we may all think the same way because we have similar experiences. By getting more women and other types of people (not like me) we can use their experiences to help us come up with different, better answers.
  
  We need more different types of people with different experiences to get different answers which can be better.
- Emma Ryan answered on 11 Mar 2017:
  
  Girls don’t need to be engineers; people can do whatever they want to do.
  
  However, lots of girls choose not to do engineering because they don’t think they can, not because they don’t want to. This is the problem. They think of engineering as a male subject but it’s not, engineering is for anyone who wants to do engineering and solve problems and really make a difference to the way the world works.
  
  People sometimes ask me how I feel being a woman in a man’s world (about my job in engineering) and I tell them I’m not a woman in a man’s world, I’m an engineer in an engineer’s world.
  
  Anyone can do anything if they want to do it and they work hard.
- Sheryl Williams answered on 12 Mar 2017:
  
  Hi Kizzy,
  
  Currently only 9% of the engineering workforce in the UK are female. We definitely need more girls in engineering mainly because the problems of our society need everyone to input in the solutions.
  
  Females have unique ways of thinking , designing and solving problems which is very useful in engineering and this is sometimes underestimated.
  
  The problem is that many girls don’t choose engineering for several different reasons and our job is to help more girls understand that engineering is something that they can do and be very good at it.
  
  I fell into engineering myself and it has been my mission to inspire more girls to choose engineering from as early as possible.
  
  if engineering is what you want to do then go for it work hard and all do your best!!
  Sheryl

Question: Why do more girls need to be engineers?

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