More top universities headed by women but social media abuse a barrier
Women are underrepresented in STEM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) at universities with UN Women stressing that this remains a major barrier to women’s participation in tech design and governance. The majority of university leaders are men but there is a slight improvement. New statistics from Times Higher Education shows that close to a quarter (48) of the world’s 200 top universities are headed by women.
But despite progress, women are disproportionately addicted by hostile public discourse and systematic barriers to greater leadership equality, Phil Baty, Chief Global Affairs Officer, Times Higher Education, writes in a blog post for World Economic Forum.
Today, women lead almost a quarter (48) of the world’s top 200 universities and that’s 12% more than last year (43).
“While there is still a long way to go until we reach parity, today’s figure is 41% higher than five years ago, when only 34 of the world’s best universities were led by women.”
Despite progress in recent years, there are still significant gaps to equality in higher education leadership. Of the 27 countries that featured universities in the world’s top 200, 12 countries do not have any female leaders.
“The US and Germany have led the improvement in female representation at the helm of the world’s leading institutions, but there have also been key breakthroughs in East Asia and the Middle East.”
“The data shows that 16 of the US’s 58 world top 200 ranked universities have women presidents, compared to 13 last year, led by Sally A Kornbluth, the new president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). In Germany, five of the leading universities are now led by women, up from just two last year, as three women broke centuries of male leadership in 2022.”
In East Asia, Nancy Ip is the first female president of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology in 2022, and in the Middle East, Saudi Arabia’s King Abdulziz University saw Hana Abdullah Al-Nuaim take over as interim president.
Despite progress in recent years, there are still significant gaps to equality in higher education leadership. Of the 27 countries that featured universities in the world’s top 200, 12 countries do not have any female leaders.
Baty quotes Louise Richardson, who before stepping down as the leader of Oxford University, highlighted the problem with the pipeline of female talent in higher education globally.
“This is a problem that needs to be tackled internationally,” she said. “In the US, in 2018, women represented 53% of assistant Professors, and 46% of associate Professors, but accounted for only 34% of full Professors. Women of colour remain worryingly underrepresented in academia, though there are signs of positive movement on this issue.”
One challenge, among many, cited by Richardson, was the rise of social media abuse, which disproportionately affects high-profile women.
“There are real challenges in the brave new world of university leadership,” she said. “One of them is the increasing pressure of social media threats (to harass, assault, even rape), death-wishes, jibes, crude slurs on personal appearance, and other forms of abuse that are disproportionately levelled at women and which can actively dissuade any person – particularly if they come from an underrepresented group – from voicing strong opinions or being the public face of areas of scholarship, and other initiatives that provoke opposition.”
Top ten universities lead by women 2023 according to Times Higher Education:
1.University of Oxford
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- University of California, Berkeley
- University of Pennsylvania
- Cornell University
- University of Washington
- London School of Economics and Political Science
- University of British Columbia
- Monash University
- University of Queensland
Women in tech is one focus for the 2023 International Women’s Day on March 8. A persistent gender gap in digital access keeps women from unlocking technology’s full potential, UN Women says.
“Their underrepresentation in STEM education and careers remains a major barrier to their participation in tech design and governance. And the pervasive threat of online gender-based violence—coupled with a lack of legal recourse—too often forces them out of the digital spaces they do occupy.”
“Innovation and technological change, and education in the digital age for achieving gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls” is the theme for a meeting with United Nations’ commission on the statutes for women on March 6-17. And the focus is for sure needed as data shows it is a long way to go for better gender balance:
- Women make up only 22% of artificial intelligence workers globally.
- A global analysis of 133 AI systems across industries found that 44.2% demonstrate gender bias.
- The progress towards global gender parity in general is stalling and the risk of reversal is intensifying, the World Economic Forum Global Gender Gap 2022 report shows.
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