The UK Resource Centre for Women in Science, Engineering and Technology

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About the Organisation

The UK Resource Centre for Women in Science, Engineering and Technology (UKRC) welcomes the endeavors of the London Engineering Project (LEP) to ensure that gender inclusive practices are incorporated throughout the activities of the LEP partnership. Despite girls’ and women’s high achievements in STEM subjects at GCSE and A level, women make up only 14.6% of engineering and technology graduates[1].

The LEP provides an exciting opportunity to bring about a significant shift in the numbers of girls and women studying and pursuing careers in engineering. Not only are there potential benefits to be gained by women from a career in this field, but there is increasing recognition of the business benefits resulting from a more diverse engineering community. At a time when the UK is facing an increasing shortage of engineers and unprecedented global competition, it is essential for industry to have an understanding of all potential customers and to make use of all available female and male talent. The significance of this is summed up by the Baroness Susan Greenfield CBE: The under-representation of women in SET threatens, above all, our global competitiveness[2].

LEP involvement

The role of the UKRC within the partnership is to work with partners and project beneficiaries to ensure that gender issues are understood and that actions to address these issues are incorporated into all aspects of the project. This input is creating culture change with a gender-inclusive approach being built into creating resources and activities, and their delivery.

Their approach to developing gender-inclusive practice include:

Devising and delivering bespoke Gender Equality training for partner organisations, including their marketing departments, student ambassadors and teachers
Creating gender equality guidelines to enable fieldworkers to assess their materials and activities
Devising strategies to ensure all LEP activities have equal participation of girls and supporting the fieldworkers to implement these strategies
Working with the Higher Education Institutes to develop guidance and a checklist aimed at developing inclusive engineering curricula.

The LEP works with schools, students, parents, higher education institutes and employers as well as those who are seeking to raise the profile of science, engineering and technology. Our aim is that the good practice we have developed in the LEP will impact across these groups and cause significant change along the career pathway to ensure greater recruitment, retention and progression of girls and women to engineering.

For information about UKRC please visit their website www.ukrc4setwomen.org/

[1] HESA (2008) Higher Education student enrolments and qualifications obtained at HE institutions in the UK for the academic year 2006/2007, Cheltenham, HESA

[2] SETFAIR, The Greenfield Report on Women in SET, DTI, 2002.