ANP Girls learned to weld today at Gasunie during Girls’ Day
NOS Nieuws•vandaag, 17:56
Counselors and mentors advise girls less often to choose a technical profile or profession than boys. This has emerged from research by VHTO, expertise center for gender diversity in science, technology & IT. As a result, according to VHTO, typical male and female occupations are maintained.
166 education professionals were asked to give advice to a fictional student who is unsure about a technical profile. In half of the cases the pupil was called Anouk, in the other half Thomas. Thomas received a positive advice for a technical choice almost twice as often.
According to the research, the chance that a woman in the Netherlands will work in science, technology or IT is only 16 percent, while in the care and welfare sectors about 70 percent of the employees are women.
Stubborn prejudices
“We all have stubborn prejudices that we unconsciously take with us,” says project leader at the VHTO Andju Soekhai. “Deans and mentors can also have a bias in this and they take that into account in their advice,” she says in the NOS Radio 1 Journaal.
She herself was once advised to choose the Culture and Society profile. “I indicated to the dean that I was interested in technology and wanted to develop it further.
Send unconsciously
“I’m a bit shocked by it. I’m glad this research is here,” says Minette van den Bemd, dean and policy officer of the sector organization for career orientation and guidance. Van den Bemd believes that education professionals sometimes unknowingly direct their advice and is pleased that this report helps to raise awareness of this.
“The tests that are administered are often also quite stereotyped. So it is good to see how we can raise awareness of this again,” says Van den Bemd.
Soekhai emphasizes that it is important that technology is for everyone: “Every student should be given a chance to discover and develop it for themselves.”
Today that was possible during Girls’ Day. More than 9000 girls aged 10 to 15 went on a company visit to see what is happening in technical companies. The aim was to stimulate their interest in the technical sector. “And give them the confidence to go into engineering,” Soekhai says.
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