On National Women in Engineering Day, the Institution of Civil Engineers is warning that the UK has the lowest percentage of female engineers in Europe, at less than 10% across all engineering disciplines. Meanwhile, Latvia, Bulgaria and Cyprus lead with nearly 30%.
It also cites a report from Engineering UK suggesting that the engineering sector will need to double its annual intake of graduates and apprentices every year until 2022.
But the pool of potential female recruits is undersized: only 51% of female STEM graduates actually go on to work in STEM roles, compared with more than 68% of male STEM graduates.
"The reality is that there are still more male than female engineers, so we must do more, and collaboration between industry and institutions is critical to success."
Nick Baveystock, ICE
ICE director general Nick Baveystock said: “Women represent 10% of ICE’s total membership and female applications to ICE are slowly rising, with graduate numbers at 18%. This is encouraging, but the reality is that there are still more male than female engineers, so we must do more, and collaboration between industry and institutions is critical to success.
“Engineering solutions are best delivered by multi-disciplinary teams of men and women working creatively together, so there is a commercial as well as a social imperative to right the imbalance, and industry must make its case. Schools also have a duty to lead the drive in overcoming outdated perceptions about careers in engineering and ensure they are accessible to all.”
At HS2, the day will be marked by a group of female engineers meeting pupils at a The Cavendish School in Hemel Hempstead to talk about opportunties in the industry.
Students will mix with the engineers in “speed networking” where they will get the opportunity to find out how our engineers got where they are today, and what their daily work involves. The students will also take part in practical activities that allow them to start thinking like engineers and understand the real-life applications of engineering.
Beth West, HS2 Ltd commercial director, said: “HS2 is a 21st century project and we want to lead by example on diversity. We strongly believe in the value of women in the workforce and currently a third of our engineers and our executive team are female. We will build on that along with the wider industry, where only 6% of the engineering workforce is female.”
Meanwhile, WSP | Parsons Brinckerhoff said it has a better than avergae representation of women, who make up more than 20% of our engineering workforce and represent 33% of its technical workforce at graduate entrant level.
Its internal survey of female engineers found that 49% think that educating teachers and careers advisers about engineering as a career will attract young girls into an engineering career, and 65% say their gender does not limit their career progression.
