Broader Cultural Influences

• Author: McNally, Sandra
• Pages: 29-30

29

There have been recent studies that consider th e effect of a cur riculum reform

in high school using a convincing empirical strategy in Denmark, the UK and Germany

respectively. The studies for D enmark an d the UK examine reforms t hat aff ect hi gh-

ability students onl y, whereas th e studies for Germany affect the whole student body.

In Denmark, Joensen and Nielsen (2016) find that a reform which makes the high school

curriculum less restrictive (specifically enabling individuals to combine advanced maths

with chemistry rather than just physics) had a large effect on girls and strongly increased

their relative probability of choosing health sciences and techn ical sciences in tertiary

education. In the UK, De Phili ppis (2016) evaluates a reform which enabled individuals

to take advanced ( or ‘triple’) science f rom age 14 (i.e. one full qualification in physics,

chemistry and biology) as opposed to taking less advanc ed options. She finds that this

had an equal effect on boys and girls in secondary school but only induced boys to enrol

in STEM at the tertiary level. However, she does find an effect on girls’ propensi ty to

study medi cine. In Germany, several studies have examined a reform in the state of

Baden-Wurttemberg that made advanced maths compulsory in the last two years of

high school. These include Gorlitz and Gravert (2018) and Biewen and Schwerter

(2019). About 20 per cent of students volun tarily took this opti on prior to the reform

(and hence effects are identified for the other 80 per cent). The reform is found to

increase the university enrolment rate for both boys and girls but only affected STEM

among boys (Gorlitz and Gravert, 2018). Biewen and Schwerte r (2019) finds that the

reform affected boys through a positive effect on the probabi lity of completing tertiary

education in engineering and computer science, which was to some extent counteracted

by a negative effect on maths and physics. For girls, there was no such positive effect

and a slightly negative effect on the probability of completing maths and physics

degrees. These studies suggest that the specifics of the curriculum reform and who it

affects (e.g. high-ability or average student) are important for how such changes affect

the gender gap in ST EM tertiary education, alth ough all the curriculum reforms

considered here do increase overall enrolment in STEM at tertiary level (i.e. if we do not

break this down by gender). Therefore, although curriculum reforms that facilitate more

students to become STEM ready have achieved this objective, they have not always

narrowed the gender gap in STEM at the tertiary level.

One of the explanations for the gender gap in the review by Cheryan et al. (2017)

is insuffi cient early (i.e pre-college) experience in computer science, e ngineering an d

physics, compared to biology, chemistry and maths. While the latter are widely offered

in US high schools, m ost do not provide oppor tunities for students to learn computer

programming, and physics is only taught in 63 per cent of US high schools.17 They argue

that efforts to offer students STEM experience can increase interest for both groups but

do little to diminish gender gap s in participation if broader cultural factors, such as the

masculine cultures of these fields, are not addressed. A large international project “The

Relevance of Science Education” (the ROSE project) suggests that females might be

prepared for STEM edu cation if comprehensive educati on programs wisely exploited

knowledge about differences in the interests of girls and boys when designing school

curricula (Sjøberg and Schreiner, 2010).18

8. Broader Cultural Influences

Cheryan et al. (2017) define a masculine culture in STEM fields as being “a social

and structural environment that signals a greater sense of belonging to men than

women” (Cheryan et al., 2017). They explain that aspects of this masculine culture

17 Statistics cited in Cheryan et al., (2017) from the US Department of Education (2014).

18 For example, boys were found to be interested in explosives and engines, whereas girls were more

interested in the environment and healthy living: https://www.seproject.no/publications/english-pub.html