Women Engineering the Future – What Will Close the STEM Gap?

Efforts to bring more women into politics have revealed that our systems, from public spaces to decision-making arenas, have long been designed without the perspectives of women, people of color, queer people, disabled people, and working-class communities.

The same is true in science, engineering, mathematics and technology. STEM determines how our cities function, how data is collected, and how safety is built into everyday life. Yet women persistently ‘leak out’ and remain underrepresented; women make up just 35% of STEM students and 28% of researchers according to UNESCO.

The result is not only unequal opportunities for women but also missed innovation, weaker economies, and products that fail to serve half the population.

Why, in a world full of bright girls and talented women, does this gap persist?

A growing body of evidence points to a quiet culprit that girls are raised to be perfect, while boys are raised to be brave.

From a young age, most girls are encouraged to color inside the lines – be polite, be careful, be accurate. Success is rewarded when it looks flawless. Boys, meanwhile, are more often encouraged to test limits, take risks, climb higher, jump farther. By adulthood, these childhood patterns form a deep internal script. Whether negotiating a raise or applying for a job, men are habituated to try, even if they fail, while women are expected to meet every requirement before stepping forward.

We gravitate into careers and professions that we know we’re going to be great in, that we are going to be perfect in. As Rashma Saujani, founder of Girls Who Code, put it:

“Women are losing out because we are not raising them to be brave, and the bravery deficit is why women are underrepresented in STEAM, in boardrooms, in politics, and pretty much everywhere you look.”

Psychologist Carol Dweck’s research illustrates how early this difference takes root. In her study, Dweck found that high-achieving girls often backed away from assignments that were too difficult for them, interpreting struggle as a sign they weren’t smart enough. High-achieving boys, by contrast, tended to see difficult tasks as a challenge worth pursuing. Boys were more likely to believe ability grows with effort; girls were more likely to internalize perfection as proof of intelligence. This mindset shapes how young people approach subjects like math and science, fields where trial, error, and experimentation are essential. Notably, this isn’t about ability. Girls actually outperformed boys in every subject, including STEM. The divide emerges not from talent but from how young people learn to interpret challenge and whether they are taught that failure is part of growth.

These patterns carry into adulthood. Harvard Business School Associate Professor Katherine B. Coffman showed that men apply for a job when they meet only 60% of the qualifications, but women apply only if they meet 100% of them. Women are less likely to apply for jobs unless they meet every single qualification – the lasting damage of a lifetime of gender stereotypes. A conditioning to avoid imperfection, to believe one must be exceptional simply to belong.

It’s not about confidence, it’s evidence that women have been socialised to aspire to perfection.

Fixing the ‘Leaky Pipeline’

The consequences are visible throughout the so-called “leaky pipeline”. Leaky pipeline talks to the phenomenon where women drop out of their STEM studies or are leaking out of the career ladder. Women hold fewer than 26% of senior STEM leadership roles. The higher the ladder, the fewer the women.

But the world pays a price for every woman lost to this pipeline. When women leave STEM, we lose life-saving discoveries, fresh perspectives, and innovations shaped by lived experiences too often overlooked. Think of Marie Curie’s pioneering work in radiation therapy, Jane Cooke Wright’s breakthroughs in chemotherapy, Anne Szarewski’s contributions to the HPV vaccine, or Dr. Priscilla Brastianos’ advances in understanding rare brain tumors. These women are exceptional, but they shouldn’t have had to be exceptional just to participate.

To truly innovate, we cannot keep leaving behind half the population. And we cannot wait another generation to act.

The FEMSTEM project

This urgency is what led universities and civil society organizations from Spain, Greece, Cyprus, and Lithuania to launch FEMSTEM, an initiative we are part of, that aims at reimagining how higher education supports women in STEM. FEMSTEM focuses not only on skills but on structures. The systems, mindsets, and networks that help women persist, grow, and take risks.

Through the project we developed industry-informed curricula, highlighted women’s success stories, and created digital tools for students and educators. Just as importantly, we built direct bridges between young women, academia, and the STEM industry. Through mentorship programs, workshops, work-shadowing opportunities, and the FEMSTEM conference, students gained a clearer sense of what STEM careers actually look like, and what support exists to help them navigate challenges.

In Spain, the Bridge Camp workshops brought together ten STEM professionals to speak candidly about leadership, impostor syndrome, teamwork, and career pathways. One student reflected on how transformative this was: “The persistent sense that my successes are due to luck, and not taking credit for my achievements, is one of the biggest struggles I’ve had during university”. Programs like FEMSTEM help disrupt this narrative by normalizing imperfection, embracing experimentation, and showing young women that ambition is not something to hide

When girls and women are encouraged to take risks, push boundaries, and experiment, they don’t just thrive individually. They build technologies, systems, and ideas that make life better for all of us.

So, the question is no longer whether girls can excel in STEM. They already do. The question is: when will we create environments that reward their bravery as much as their accuracy?

Find out more about FEMSTEM

Website: https://femstemproject.eu/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/femstem-project-eu

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/femstem23/