With International Women’s Day this Sunday, I thought it would be worth my while finding some more academics to sit down with and discuss the sadly still-present issue of the leaky pipeline that is women in STEM. Whilst things are certainly improving – with the latest WISE statistics indicating that there are now double the number of women in the STEM workforce in the UK compared to ten years ago – there is still a way to go. Especially since that “doubling” works out at only 23% of the workforce.

However, much of the literature I’ve looked at so far – and the experiences I’ve listened to - have been incredibly Euro- (or UK-) centric. On the African continent, things are different. According to the 2019 UNESCO report, the continent on the whole sees far more women studying the core STEM fields compared to women in the UK (47% vs 31% in the UK), although those figures do of course, vary wildly country to country, with lower uptake seen in the Sub-Saharan region (30%). At the leadership level, however, things are bleaker. According to Bablola et al 2021, African men are three times more likely to hold senior research positions than women, attributed to cultural expectations of women that encourage them to marry early and leave their careers to raise a family (Founou et al, 2023).

Obviously, the African woman’s experience is not homogeneous, and will vary country to country, and person to person. I was therefore very fortunate that we had five of our distinguished Commonwealth Fellows (four of whom are women) visiting Lancaster to quiz about their own personal experiences of navigating the STEM field in their respective countries - Dr Nellie Longwe Kangwa, Dr Olayinka Omowunmi Adewumi, Dr Eva Assiimwe, Dr Mary Mwangi and Dr Frederick Otu-Larbi. The Commonwealth Fellowship programme has been running for ten years, funded by the Commonwealth Commission and in collaboration with our Centre for Global Eco-Innovation. The Fellows are leading academics and professionals from developing countries, and are visiting Lancaster in order to network, build connections, and embed eco-innovation, entrepreneurial thinking, and sustainable development into their own practices and institutions.

Hi all, thanks for joining me! First things first: would you mind telling me a little bit about yourselves, where you’re from, and your careers so far?

Olayinka: I’m Dr Olayinka Omowunmi Adewumi, from Nigeria, and I work in the University of Lagos within the Department of Mechanical Engineering. I’ve worked there for my whole career (the past 20 years or so), but I have also recently become the acting director of the Innovation and Technology Management Office. I am very interested in engineering education, connecting students with mentors and industrial partners, and generally linking what researchers are doing to what society really needs. I am also the treasurer of the Society of Women Engineers in Lagos, and staff advisor for the Association of Professional Women Engineers and Society of Women Engineers University of Lagos Collegiates in Nigeria!

Nellie: I’m Nellie Kwanga, and I’m from Zambia. I don’t work within a university setting, but instead I am the CEO of a company designed to connect industry and academia, creating career hubs at universities for students to access mentorship programmes, as well as connecting SMEs with academics. We have over 500 mentors from across disciplines who are designated to help students explore their career options.

Mary: I’m from Kenyatta University in Kenya. My area of research is Agricultural Biotechnology. My focus is agricultural biotechnology, working with stakeholders – specifically women farmers – to look at participatory selection for crops that enhance food security and employability. I’m also actively involved in STEM advocacy for women serving as deputy president of the International Network of Women Engineers and Scientists and founding member of the African Women in Science and Engineering organisation. We undertake programs to enhance the participation of women and girls in STEM at all levels. I am also the chair of the Gender Mainstreaming Technical Committee at my university, which oversees the institutionalisation of gender across all university functions, combats sexual and gender-based violence, and creates safe spaces for women.

Fred: I’m Fred, from the University of Energy and Natural Resources in Ghana. A lot of my research is looking into how the environment is affecting vegetation growth and productivity, and how vegetation might also impact the climate.

Eva: I’m from Uganda, and teach Electrical Engineering at Kampala International University. I specialise in telecommunication engineering, working on digitalising different sectors, such as health and agriculture. I am also working with women who have not had the opportunity to go to school for example by supporting them to study how to use digital platforms to market their produce, as well as working with the United Nations Office for South-South Cooperation (UNOSSC) to explore the “leaky pipeline” of women in engineering.

Who or what inspired you to get into the STEM fields in the first place?

Olayinka: My mum, definitely. She didn’t have the opportunity to go to university, but she did do A Levels in pure sciences. She was very keen on me and my siblings to go into the sciences, providing us with lots of tutoring and I found that it came very naturally to me. I initially wanted to study a mathematics course in the University, but my mum suggested that I look into how I could study a course which applied the sciences, and encouraged me to explore engineering. I also had a math teacher who saw a lot of potential in me, and was very supportive of me going into the STEM fields too.

Mary: Plants have always fascinated me from an early age – I would see a bean fall on the ground, germinate, and become food on the table, and that was just so thrilling! My mum had a kitchen-garden, and I would just sit there every day and watch the plants grow. I was also very lucky to go to a good high school where I had some really fantastic mentors who gave me such passion for the sciences.

Eva: I grew up in a family of only girls, so I was really inquisitive to know what it was the men were doing. I found out that engineering was dominated by men, and I wanted to know what was so different about that area compared to others! Back home, when we had career guidance, I was discouraged from exploring engineering as it “wasn’t for the ladies”, but that made me even more keen to know about it!

Did any of you face any barriers in entering into the STEM fields? How did you overcome them?

Olayinka: I went to an all-girls school, so I only really started encountering barriers at university. When I would tell people I was studying Mechanical Engineering, I would get funny looks, and people would ask me things like “do you even know how to hold a spanner?”!. Even those who were supportive would act as though I was some sort of superwoman for doing mechanical engineering, but I had met the same requirements as my male peers – why were they treating me as though I were different, or unique? It was meant to be a compliment but it all just made me feel very awkward, and that was something I definitely had to overcome – but I did also have a lot of support along the way too.

Nellie: As a mentor, I’ve seen a lot of young women in STEM fields feel like they have to change themselves to “fit in” with their peers: they have to become more “macho”, and change their personalities to be more masculine and more authoritative in order to belong, which makes me really sad, because you don’t have to change who you are in order to thrive in the sciences. I think there’s still a misconception that STEM is only meant for men, and a lot of women struggle to feel comfortable in their own skin, which still needs addressing.

That brings me nicely onto my next question! Do you think that these barriers still exist? What can we do to address them?

Nellie: Yes, definitely, it’s still an issue I’m seeing today. We need to do more to show women that they can be a woman who does science, and that the two aren’t mutually exclusive. We need to provide them with mentorship and build their confidence.

Mary: Yes, I think there are still many of these barriers, at all levels of the education system. We really need to be pushing programmes that ensure we don’t lose women in STEM, especially at higher levels; whilst at primary and high school, these sorts of programmes have ensured parity, the further you advance into education and the workforce, the fewer women there are at the top. As Nellie says, mentorship is key, as well as having women visible in leadership positions to serve as role models. It is also equally important to have men show up and support women in these programmes and initiatives!

Fred: Agreed, men definitely have their role to play in this, especially given the societal norms across Africa where men are often given priority when it comes to accessing resources such as education over their female siblings. We need to change this mindset, encourage equal educational opportunities for both girls and boys.

Mary: I’d also say that a lot of the issues stem from the way we talk about gender pedagogically – the way we teach children, and even the books we read to them enforce gender stereotypes. “John drives a truck”, but “Jane sews a dress”; it starts right from elementary school. This is why we need to create mainstream gender at all levels and develop address these problems in policy and get more people who are aware of the power of education tackling these issues.

Would you say that many of these barriers are global, or are they more on a local scale, and vary nation-to-nation?

Fred: I’d say that some of these issues are more local; in the UK, for instance, education is free up until university level, and even at university, there is access to loans and government subsidies available. In many African nations, however, that infrastructure isn’t necessarily there, and many parents will have to make a choice between who gets to go to school and who doesn’t. Of course, though, there are some global issues that face all women – including sexual harassment, and sexual violence – which need addressing wherever you go.

Eva: In my country, there’s definitely a conception that women who are at university might not necessarily “deserve” to be there. We have something called “affirmative action”, which was introduced to promote equity for women in education. It gives women a 1.5 point bonus to public university admissions, but that has led men to believe women maybe don’t have the same capacity for study as men, that they needed “help” to get where they are - that they are favoured in some way. And deconstructing that can be quite a challenge which many other nations may not face.

Olayinka: Yes, in Nigeria, we don’t have anything like affirmative action – it is the same requirements regardless of your circumstances. But we tend to forget that women and men often have very different experiences. I was five months pregnant when I started my career in the University, which made pursuing my PhD degree a lot more difficult! Many of my male colleagues could stay late on campus, as they had wives back home who would look after the family, especially the children. I couldn’t make that sort of choice, I had to be at home to look after my children after school. I could not compromise on this. It was a priority for me. We as women – and those of us who are mothers – have to make sacrifices that might not be the same for our male colleagues. And when it comes to promotions, we are still expected to meet the same requirements, (for example, the same number of papers published), regardless. There is equality for all, but not necessarily equity.

What role would you suggest Universities should play in addressing these barriers, and wider discrimination against women in society?

Olayinka: I think universities can provide women with support systems to help them tackle these sorts of issues. My university, for example, has schools within the campus that are easily accessible so that one can work and still be in the same environment with the children which is very safe.

Mary: I think universities are very well placed to overcome these barriers as they have a lot of influence. Globally, the statistics indicate that only 30% of women participate in STEM at all levels, so we need a sustained effort to address this. Women make up 50% of our total population, so we need to push to get the same parity at decision-making levels, in terms of employment, in terms of contributing to national development. I think a lot of this can only be addressed at a policy level, so establishing policies that address issues of equity not only at a gender level, but that cover other characteristics is very important, as is ensuring that this work is well-publicised not only so that people are aware of the support available to them, but so that other institutions take note.

Do you feel that there is still a long way to go before we reach gender equality – or equity- within the STEM fields?

Fred: I think there is still some way to go, particularly in terms of numbers. More boys go into STEM-related programmes, partly because of the perception that fields such as engineering are “hard” or require a “masculine strength”, which is of course, not true. This is why women empowerment programmes and mentorships are so useful and so important, because it’s hard to become what you can’t see. If a girl sees someone like Olayinka, a Professor in Mechanical Engineering, she will suddenly realise “Oh, if she can do it, I can do it too!”, and that is so important.

Finally: what would you say to a younger you when they were thinking about pursuing an education and a career in STEM?

Olayinka: I spent a lot of my youth feeling that I wasn’t good enough, so I would say: “You have what it takes. You deserve to be here, you got the grades. Believe in yourself.”

Nellie: Yes, I’d say something similar. I’d say “Nellie, you can do anything within your power, so long as you believe in yourself”.

Mary: I’d say “you have so much passion, you can do anything with it. You just have to try”.

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