21 Aug 2024
In the modern age, we have many areas of study across secondary school, sixth form and university. However, some are valued more highly in our society than others. A common pattern in this is with STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) subjects being valued higher than subjects such as arts and humanities. Can this pattern be proved, or are we making connections that aren’t there?
One piece of evidence for STEM subjects being valued higher than non-STEM subjects is the fields of work that as a society we are now pushing young women to join.
As someone who has been attending a girls’ school for five years, I have attended many talks encouraging women into work places that historically they have been forced away from. 90% of these talks have been about women joining STEM. In fact, last International Women’s Day, we had three talks from women who either had been or were about to be going into the world of work. All three speakers were talking about their careers in science, such as working with AI.
However, there are many other areas where the percentages of men to women are highly unequal, favouring men. Politics is one of these areas. There have been no female presidents in the United States and the first female vice president did not come to power until January of 2021.
In UK politics, there have been three female prime ministers, all of whom have been perceived to have some sort of negativity during their time in office.
In a conversation with a Year 11 student currently attending a girl’s school, she said: “With all the women in STEM initiatives, surely there are also fewer women (especially women of colour) in politics.”
She later added: “The only people in Parliament that I often hear about that are women of colour are Suella Braverman and Priti Patel, and they are not people I aspire to be.”
She did say that she is “sure there are probably more women of colour behind the scenes that we do not hear about and those are the stories that need to be heard to inspire the next generation”.
This shows that teenage girls are not seeing themselves in areas such as politics, and yet are still being told time and time again to pursue a career in STEM.
They are not seeing people like them succeed in non-STEM areas, even when there may be some, due to the campaign that STEM is one of the main and important fields lacking women, when that is simply not the case.
In academics, just 28% of professors are women, according to Research Professional News. An article by The Drinks’ Business from 2023 says women make up just 18.5% of professional chefs in the UK. These facts show many areas in the workplace that are male-dominated, and yet there is still only a push for women to go into STEM in further and higher education
This shows STEM careers being valued higher than non-STEM careers as the only proper campaigns for putting women in workplaces that historically they have been barred from are STEM based, despite other clear areas where there is a clear male dominance.
Our higher education is also proof of STEM being valued higher than non-STEM subjects in our society.
According to a 2023 Stastista Chart, STEM students make up 26% of UK graduates. In a 2021 HEPI report, humanities students only made up around 8% of students.
Humanities is often seen as the equivalent to STEM, so to see over three times as many students taking STEM shows a favouring to those subjects.
Due to this inequity, there are a larger amount of scholarships for these subjects.
Using data from Study UK, there are 359 scholarships from 88 institutions available for applied and pure sciences, compared to 225 scholarships across 51 institutions for humanities at a masters level.
There are 76 scholarships across 37 institutions for applied and pure sciences, compared to 44 across 23 institutions for humanities at a doctorate level.
At undergraduate level, the same source shows 275 applied and pure science scholarships over 71 institutions, compared to 146 scholarships over 33 institutions.
It should be noted that for applied and pure sciences, Study UK does not include scholarships for Health and Medicine, which for undergraduate study adds an additional 164 scholarships over 52 institutions, as well as many postgraduate scholarships.
This funding across multiple different institutions gives students more opportunities to study in the field of science, compared to fields such as humanities.
This causes even fewer students to want to go into non-STEM subjects, as they cannot fund a degree, particularly one that is often socially believed to be “less valuable”, so even fewer go into these fields, so less funding goes into them.
It is a constant, vicious cycle that ends up with eventually many students looking to have STEM-based degrees, and only middle-upper class young adults in any other field. Whilst there is currently a clear gap in the student ratios, in the future this gap will become a chasm.
These differences between how society treats STEM subjects and non-STEM subjects can clearly be seen. STEM subjects are pushed, whilst non-STEM seems to be forced into a back seat. They are seen as only to provide “soft skills” or are viewed as simply not as not as prestigious.
Of course, there are some exceptions to this, such as business, finance and law, however a few exceptions cannot be used to argue against societies current neglect of the majority of non-STEM subjects.
Whilst we should be encouraging women into all areas that they have historically been banned, we almost exclusively encourage STEM.
Due to a societal force for STEM, more students study science at university, and therefore there is seemingly a monetary priority towards these subjects. Non-STEM subjects are undervalued, and its students feel inadequate and underappreciated.
Written by Olivia Thompson, 16, of Marshalswick Lane, St Albans, until recently a pupil at St Albans High School for Girls and joining St Albans School in September.
