AUGUST VOLUME 13 D NUMBER 8

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It's about time Three or four years from now, the chances of your work-ing side-by-side with a female engineer will have in-creased dramatically. Then, women engineers will be entering the work force in numbers worthy of note and comment. Those of our male colleagues who remain convinced that a woman's place is either in the home, or in occupations more traditionally "feminine," are duly forewarned. As for the rest of us, we can only welcome the change as long overdue.

One reason we may expect the numbers of women en-gineers in the U.S. to exceed the traditional 1 percent (or less) is that freshman class enrollments of women last year were between 10 and 11 percent. (In 1969, the figure was 1.6 percent.) A second reason is that the myths as-sociated with women and mathematics are beginning to be debunked. And a third is that women will begin to have available more role models than they previously had.

Recent women engineering graduates (all degree levels) were snapped up promptly by employers while substan-tial numbers of their male counterparts were without jobs on graduation day. Such was not the case for nonengi-neering graduates; recent life, behavioral, social, and physical science graduates found the employment picture bleak at graduation time, and women graduates fared somewhat worse than the men.

What are the reasons for the improved employment situation for women engineering graduates? Lest the doubters believe that corporate personnel departments see women engineers as sources of "cheap" labor, such can hardly be substantiated by the facts—salary offers to women engineering graduates equal or slightly exceed those made to men. This is in contrast to other fields, such as science, and is also counter to tradition in engineering, itself. Betty Vetter of the Scientific Manpower Com-mission observes that the salary differential between men and women, as we might expect, is highest in the older age groups. Yet, except in the case of engineering, it persists even among new graduates. Starting salaries offered to women baccalaureate graduates in chemistry and in mathematics in the 1974-1975 recruiting year averaged $216 below offers to men; in the biological sciences, $768 less; and in the other physical and earth sciences, $1332 less.

Another barrier to women in science and engineering that may be weakening is that related to mathematics. Women are told, and many, evidently, are convinced, that mathematics is not "feminine," and that women are "poor at figures." John Ernest, mathematics professor at the University of California at Santa Barbara, notes that in most homes it is the father who will help with the math homework, while the mother will help with most other

subjects. In a small sample of elementary and high school teachers, Prof. Ernest says almost half believed that boys are better in math than girls, while not even one felt girls did better than boys. "I'm not good in math" is a com-monly expressed opinion of female students. In a survey, however, Prof. Ernest found no differences between the sexes in regard to liking mathematics. He conjectures that men take more math courses, not because they like math more than women, but because they are prerequi-sites to future occupations, such as engineering, that men envision for themselves.

The results of such attitudes and stereotypes, largely erroneous, are reflected, at least partially, in the numbers of women earning advanced degrees in mathematically oriented disciplines. In recent years, the number of Ph.D.s earned by women is generally below 10 percent in as-tronomy, economics, mathematics, computer science, physics, and engineering; whereas it is generally over 25 percent in romance languages, comparative literature, English, psychology, and sociology.

A serious lack in the past, and one that is likely to continue for some time, has been that of role models or mentors. The career-role model is more readily available to the male than to the female. The role model, a "hero" of sorts, is, almost by definition, of the same sex as the "student-apprentice." On the other hand, the mentor— one who treats a "comer" as his protege—might be of the same or opposite sex, yet there seem to be few instances of male mentors for female scientists or engineers. The latter may be linked, partially at least, to a cultural tra-dition involving sex role expectations and discriminatory practices—expectations and practices that are slowly changing. Ms. Vetter notes that "science remains a man's world, dominated by a male fellowship in which only a few women have an opportunity to participate fully." (There are, too, undoubtedly, hazards in the male-female mentor relationship, some of which are treated by author Gail Sheehy in her recent book.1)

Despite the likelihood that the barriers to women in engineering will not come crashing down en masse, the profession is moving in the right direction. Ms. Vetter observes that affirmative action efforts will, in some in-stances, favor women, who will demand and ultimately get their share of the rewarding opportunities in science and technology. The change will be accelerated as the demand for scientists and engineers increases.

Donald Christiansen, Editor

1. Sheehy, Gail, Passages: Predictable Crises of Adult Life. New York: E. P. Dutton & Co., Inc., 1976.

IEEE spectrum AUGUST 1976