Why would girls study Stem if they have no career path afterwards?

Long years on part-time contracts will not encourage young women into this area

Despite decades of concern about attracting girls into science, technology, engineering and maths (Stem), there is still no clear career path to encourage them to do so. Typically, researchers in these areas can expect a long period on temporary contracts involving high levels of dependence on predominantly male permanent academics. Ireland’s Research and Innovation Strategy: Impact 2030 says that only a minority will remain in academia: but there is no data on where they have gone in the past or whether the investment in their Stem careers benefited them career-wise. The brief of the Advisory Group on Gender Balance in Stem did not take into account that lack of gender balance might reflect the absence of a clear career path.

The route to a research career in science, technology, engineering and maths (Stem) typically involves an undergraduate degree, followed by a doctorate degree and periods as a post-doctoral researcher (post-doc) under a principal investigator (typically a permanent academic at professorial level).

Science Foundation Ireland (SFI), which is the largest funding organisation in Ireland, tends to allocate competitive project funding to a principal investigator (PI) to enable him/her to recruit his/her own research team, typically employing them on fixed-term contracts. SFI does not have any information on the total number or gender profile of post-docs recruited to these positions, the total length of time spent in them, nor their career aspirations.

In Ireland, 41 per cent of those graduating with a PhD in science, mathematics and computing are women — lower than in the EU, but nevertheless within a 60/40 definition of gender balance. That disappears when we look at those who are permanent Stem academics (only 35 per cent of whom are women, compared with roughly half in the EU). The picture becomes even more unbalanced at full professorial level. Evidence from universities in Northern Ireland suggest that, even including more female-dominated areas such as medicine, women were much less likely to be at full professorial level in Stem (19 per cent) than in other areas (31 per cent). That information is not available in the South.

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Post-docs have been identified internationally as one of the most productive groups in research terms. There is also international evidence that they contribute substantially to furthering the academic careers of the PIs who recruited them — doing their lab work, informally supervising their doctorate students, teaching their undergraduate courses and so on. Their economic and social dependence on the PI is extensive for future contracts, references, contacts, inclusion on peer-reviewed journal articles and so on. This facilitates the existence and the obscuring of gender-based violence and harassment, which has emerged as an issue in highly prestigious research contexts in the EU and the US. It is unlikely to be any different here.

Traditionally these post-docs could expect to get an academic position three to five years after their doctorate. Now the length of time on fixed-term contracts appears to be considerably longer globally, and the possibility of accessing a permanent academic position after that is considerably less. Only 15-20 per cent of post-docs in the US get academic positions, falling to under 11 per cent in science and engineering. The situation is even worse in the UK, where only 3.5 per cent of those with science doctorates become permanent. Thus, the period of social and financial dependency on the PI is getting longer, while the possibilities for a permanent position are diminishing — an issue flagged by the OECD in 2021.

The Interdepartmental Committee on Science, Technology and Innovation (2015) required the Higher Education Authority and Science Foundation Ireland “to establish improved system-wide tracking of researcher mobility into industry” by 2017. No attempt has been made to do this. The Strategy for Science, Technology and Innovation 2006-2013 recognised the need to develop “attractive career paths for post-docs”. One of the key performance indicators of SFIs Strategy to 2025, produced in 2021, was a target of 65 per cent of the post-docs “departing to positions outside of academia after six years”. This implicitly suggests that fewer than this do so now. We have no idea what happens to any of them.

The SFI-IRC Pathway Programme involving a total of 40 positions, half earmarked for women and half in Stem, is the first indication of interest in post-docs moving on to lead a research programme or have an academic career. It seems likely that this 40 constitute a tiny proportion of all the Stem post-docs and the career options of the rest are unknown. Neither Science Foundation Ireland nor the Higher Educational Authority appear interested in this.

Since these 40 positions are targeted at those who are two years after their doctorate degree, having had short contracts totalling three years and are themselves four years in duration, SFI implicitly envisages that even this small group of elite post-docs will spend at least nine years on temporary contracts after at least three years doing a doctorate and four years as an undergraduate, ie a total of 16 years after their Leaving Certificates. For many women this period in their 30s is one of intense child-bearing and -rearing — further complicating their potential eventual access to a permanent academic position.

Girls in Ireland as elsewhere are doing better academically than boys. Whose interests are served by encouraging them to have a research career in Stem under these conditions?

Prof Pat O’Connor is professor emeritus of sociology and social policy, University of Limerick — and visiting full professor, Geary Institute, University College Dublin