Women in STEM, past and present

These teaching notes contain more information on the following topics:

• Historical women in STEM
• Celebrate women and girls in your classroom
• Eunice Foote and the greenhouse effect
• United Nations actions for a healthy planet
• BC Hydro’s electrification plan
• Women and girls in STEM today

Historical women in STEM 

Check out the following links to learn about the historical achievements of women in STEM:

• 10 women in STEAM who changed the world
• The untold history of women in science and technology
• Women scientists whose discoveries were credited to men

According to Viterbi Conversations in Ethics, a forum for discussing engineering ethics published by the Viterbi School of Engineering at the University of Southern California, some examples of women’s work being credited to men include:

• Lise Meitner discovered what is now known at the Auger effect, two years before the same effect was discovered by Pierre Victor Auger. She also worked with Otto Hahn to discover nuclear fission, for which Hahn won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1944.
• In the 1970s, Vera Rubin discovered dark matter, but her work was claimed by her coworker Kent Ford. 
• Alice Ball discovered the cure for leprosy, but her work was not recognized for almost 90 years. 

According to “Erasing women from science? It is called the Matilda Effect” accessed on JSTOR Daily, a publication that provides analysis on current events, research and ideas:

• Marie Curie was rare in the sense that she was one of few women whose accomplishments were recognized in her time. 
• For many women, claiming credit for their inventions was difficult, because of limited social and financial ability meant that they could rarely reap the benefits of their work or fully exercise their inventive powers. 

Here is a list of what the History Channel calls Nine Groundbreaking Women Inventors: 

• 1880, Maria E Beasley, the life raft
• 1885, Sarah E. Goode, fold-out bed
• 1886, Josephine G. Cochran, dishwasher
• 1893, Margaret A. Wilcox, car heater
• 1948, Bessie Virgina Blount, feeding tube
• 1966, Stephanie L. Kwolek, Kevlar
• 1969, Marie Van Brittan Brown, home security system
• 1988, Patrica E. Bath, cataract treatment
• 1991, Ann Tsukamoto, stem cell isolation

Celebrate Women and Girls in your classrooms:

• February 11 is International Day of Women and Girls in Science
• March 8 is United Nations International Women’s Day to celebrate the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women.

Eunice Foote and greenhouse effect

According to the American Physical Society, in 1856 Eunice Newton Foote concluded that carbon dioxide could warm the atmosphere, three years before John Tyndall did.  In 1856, Foote conducted a series of experiments, using cylinders each with a thermometer inside, and each filled with different gases and gaseous mixtures — moist air, dry air, carbon dioxide, oxygen, and hydrogen, then placed them in the sun and charted how the gases warmed. The cylinder containing carbon dioxide warmed the most, she noted, and stayed at its high temperature for a long time after she took it out of the sun.

United Nations: Actions for a healthy planet

1. Save energy at home
2. Change your home's source of energy
3. Walk, bike or take public transport
4. Switch to an electric vehicle
5. Consider your travel
6. Reduce, reuse, repair and recycle
7. Eat more vegetables
8. Throw away less food
9. Plant native species
10. Clean up your environment
11. Make your money count
12. Speak up

BC Hydro’s Electrification Plan

B.C. is powered by water

In B.C., we have a unique advantage. The province’s natural landscape has allowed us to generate and deliver clean, renewable power to our customers for decades. And as we look to the future, we have an ambitious goal to do more. 

Our plan to electrify B.C.

We’ll be instrumental in building a sustainable economy in B.C. We’ll continue to support conservation efforts, while also offering new programs and incentives to help British Columbians make the switch from fossil fuels to clean hydroelectricity to power their homes, businesses, and vehicles. We’ll also help to attract new energy-intensive industries to B.C. and offer programs to reduce the time and costs for new customers to get connected to our grid. 

Our goal is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the province by 900,000 tonnes per year by April 2026 – that’s around the same as taking 200,000 gas-powered cars off the road for one year. Our Electrification Plan outlines how we’ll get there.

Women and girls in STEM today

International Day of Women and Girls in Science 

According to the United Nations, women are typically given smaller research grants than their male colleagues and, while they represent 33.3% of all researchers, only 12% of members of national science academies are women.

• In cutting edge fields such as artificial intelligence, only one in five professionals (22%) is a woman.
• Despite a shortage of skills in most of the technological fields driving the Fourth Industrial Revolution, women still account for only 28% of engineering graduates and 40% of graduates in computer science and informatics.
• Female researchers tend to have shorter, less well-paid careers. Their work is underrepresented in high-profile journals and they are often passed over for promotion.

According to Randstad, one of the top employment agencies in Canada, here is a look at women in STEM careers in 2023:

• Women make up less than 25% of people employed in STEM careers. According to Statistics Canada, 34% of Canadians with a STEM degree are women. They make up only 23% of Canadians working in science and technology.
• As of 2019, there are over 6.3 million women scientists and engineers in the European Union, representing 43% of STEM employees.
• According to research conducted by the United Nations:
  • Less than 30% of the world’s researchers are women.
  • Nearly 22,000 more women are working as science and engineering technicians than in 2016. However, women still only make up 27% of the total workforce.
  • Women make up 42% of the total number of science professionals.
  • Women only make up 15% of the total management roles in science, engineering, and technology.

UN Secretary-General Guterres calls for more empowerment for women and girls:

• Fewer than 30% of the world’s scientific researchers are women
• “Science and innovation can bring life-changing benefits, especially for those who are furthest behind – such as women and girls living in remote areas, the elderly and people with disabilities.”
• According to the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), women in science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) are published less, paid less for their research and do not advance as far as men in their careers.

The STEMforGIRLS site is a resource for educators and students including featuring many female role models working in STEM fields.