Science and Women Ministries seek to increase participation of girls and women in scientific programs
On International Day of Women and Girls in Science, officials highlighted the importance of making visible the gaps that exist in this area and announced initiatives to promote gender equity in science and engineering programs given that women represent just 20% of students in those fields.
Science Minister Andrés Couve, Science Undersecretary Carolina Torrealba and Women and Gender Equity Acting Minister Carolina Cuevas celebrated International Day of Women and Girls in Science with a breakfast at La Moneda Presidential Palace attended by young women and girls who are stand-outs in areas such as robotics, astronomy and programming.
On the day in which the international community seeks to inspire and encourage the participation of women and girls in science, the officials highlighted the gaps that persist in scientific programs. For example, in Chile only 20% of graduates of academic programs in the sciences are women, and that number stands at just 17% in the case of engineering.
“Our country needs much more and better science. We need to build diverse teams with gender equity because every girl’s talent is fundamental to our ability to make Chile a country that incorporates science into its imaginary,” Minister Couve said.
Acting Women and Gender Equity Minister Carolina Cuevas congratulated the institutions for supporting girls’ talent development in areas such as engineering, programming and robotics and highlighted how important it is for girls to study these fields. “Today we wanted to hear your stories. We have spent time together, and we want to recognize your efforts so that you can inspire others. We are particularly interested in taking the opportunity to inspire other young women who are making decisions about the future, who are entering higher education to follow their vocation. We want them to be confident about their talents and choose the sciences in order to contribute to Chile, to knowledge and to society as a whole.”
Science Undersecretary Carolina Torrealba mentioned the Roadmap for Gender Equity in Science, Technology, Knowledge and Innovation that the Science Ministry is developing. The initiative focuses on monitoring women’s participation in the scientific system, promoting cultural changes in order to combat stereotypes and improving women’s access to and participation in the knowledge production system in various disciplines.
“International Day of Women and Girls in Science is tremendously important to us because we want to make it clear that Chile’s situation is no different than that of the rest of the world. Only 30% of researchers are women, and we need more of them. We want to let our girls know that we are building a friendlier system that welcomes them to deploy all of their skills and knowledge in various fields,” the Undersecretary stated.
The officials announced that the National Research and Development Agency (ANID) will take steps to ensure gender equity in all of its programming as part of an effort to remedy these gaps in the scientific system. They also stated that the Science Ministry will coordinate with the Women’s Ministry and Higher Education Undersecretariat to work with universities on plans and protocols to promote safe spaces that are free from harassment for women in academia.