International Day of Women and Girls in Science

Building on the African Union's 2024 theme, Educate an African fit for the 21st century , UNESCO and the African Union Commission (AUC), and key continental organizations are co-organizing this three-day conference to forge a continent-wide strategic partnership to build a transformative Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) ecosystem . This comprehensive approach, with a focus on addressing gender equality in STEM access and representation, coupled with strong collaboration among stakeholders, aims to position Africa as an equal player in the future of STEM education, innovation, entrepreneurship, and engineering. This conference aims to identify the root causes of challenges hindering STEM education, research, innovation, and entrepreneurship in Africa , and to develop effective strategies to overcome them and unlock the continent's development potential. This conference , organized by UNESCO and the African Union Commission with partners, aims to build ...

This is the second in this year’s series of posts by PhD students on the job market. Despite continuous efforts to promote gender equality, women’s representation in STEM jobs remains low worldwide at only 29% ( Gender Gap Report 2023 ). The gender gap in high-paying STEM careers contributes to the overall gender wage gap ( Blau & Kahn 2017 ). Educational institutions often implement affirmative action (AA) to address these disparities and to increase minority representation in both education and the labor force. While such policies can improve diversity and outcomes of the beneficiaries ( Bagde et al 2016 ; Khanna 2020 ), they may also reinforce negative stereotypes ( Coate & Loury 1993 ). Specifically, gender-based AA policies that lower admission standards at top STEM colleges to boost female representation may shift firms' perceptions of women’s average ability, potentially increasing statistical discrimination by gender and widening labor market gender gaps. My job mar...