Encouraging girls in STEM fields is excellent investment

The beginning of a new school year is a good time to reflect upon the educational and career challenges facing today’s youth.

As the head of an all-girls school, I am often asked why girls schools are necessary in a time when metrics show that girls are outperforming boys on standardized tests and that girls are going to college in much greater numbers than a generation or two ago.

I respond that although girls have made great strides, women today continue to be underrepresented in key areas of leadership in the corporate and political arenas, as well as in the worlds of finance, medicine and academia, including science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).

Today, only 17 percent of the nation’s congressional seats are held by women. Only 15 percent of top corporate positions in the nation and only 3 percent of the Fortune 500 CEO’s are women. Only 24 percent of full college professorships in the U.S. are held by women, and only six of our nation’s 50 governors are female.

Indeed, working women today still face frustrating obstacles and less-than-desirable choices. On average, a woman in Hawaii earns $9,934 less each year than her male counterpart.

Our girls still face unfavorable ratios in math and science: Only 21 percent of Advanced Placement calculus test takers in 2011 were female; 26 percent of INTEL Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) finalists in mathematics were female, and only 17 percent of ISEF finalists in computer science were female.

Test scores today confirm that America’s students are falling behind their international counterparts in the vital fields of science, technology, engineering and math. Girls, in particular, are entering the STEM fields in embarrassingly limited numbers. Common sense tells us that this unflattering metric deprives the country of talent and ingenuity that is critical to our nation’s long-term economic well being.

26 percent of the college-educated workforce in science and engineering. For America to remain competitive in the STEM fields, many more women need to be entering these career fields.

We need to change how millions of girls regard science, technology, engineering and math. Girls and boys do not display a significant difference in their abilities in math and science. Hence, the cause of the gender gap in STEM achievement can logically be attributed to social and environmental factors.

We know that confidence in STEM subjects for girls begins to wane at a very young age. But if girls believe they are capable, they can, indeed, succeed. We must foster girls’ interest in STEM by shaping an early positive attitude toward these fields by encouraging them to own their success. Interestingly, more than 500 public schools across the nation will offer single sex classes to girls in the STEM fields this coming academic year.

We must train our girls to think in a world without boundaries and to become engaged leaders in their communities and in the world. Encouraging a positive attitude about the STEM fields is one important part of soundly engaging them.

Interest and enthusiasm in STEM are fired up with exciting and intense robotics competitions, cyberspace safety exercises, program­- matic science projects and technology applications, especially with a persistent commitment from our business community mentors in the STEM fields. Such community interest, as exhibited by BAE Systems, HEI and Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard, is an excellent investment in education and provides a strong spark of interest in STEM careers.

The ultimate goal is to collectively move each young woman to a point where she recognizes her growing capabilities to achieve a STEM career should she so choose this path. Only then will teachers, who have traditionally asked young girls to draw a picture of a scientist, begin to receive pictures of fellow girl students in white lab coats in the ordinary course of a STEM day at school.