Women have made important progress in historically male dominated fields , such as law and business over the past two decades. However , when it comes to technology and engineering,

progress is being made at much a slower rate.



Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) are key disciplines towards tackling the challenges related to Sustainable Developmet.

As stated by the United Nations Women section , increasing the no. of women studying and working in STEM fields is fundamental towards achieving better solutions to the global challenges, since the potential for innovation is larger.



Almost every woman at some point in her life has heard that “Girls aren’t good at math.” Whatever ,

if we believe these stereotypes or not , the truth of the matter is that they have an impact. Today, women still are not well represented in many STEM fields . Beginning in early childhood and

throughout middle and high school, girls and young women are exposed to stereotypes that inform ideas about their identity , abilities and interest in STEM fields.

By the age of five, children are already

demonstrating gender stereotyped knowledge about being male or female They are just beginning to take in these stereotype and ingrain them, perhaps shifting their life paths in unseen direction .



The impact of gender stereotypes can be well seen in various fields . As like in Mathematics, Women’s representation in Mathematics and Statistics has reached more than 40% at the Bachelor and Master levels (National Science Foundation ,2017) . But at higher level of education , we see a gender divide ,

with female representation in Mathematics at the Doctoral level remaining below 30%( National

Science Foundation,2017).



The fact is inevitable that the underrepresentation of women persists despite policies and programmes that aims to provide access to and opportunities for women in these fields . To fully understand the culture of STEM that continues to prevent women from identifying with these fields, one first has to understand the history of women in STEM and the role that feminism has played.