Mar 16, 2018 05:37 PM
http://www.sciencemag.org/careers/2018/0...undergrads
EXCERPT: It’s no secret that STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) fields have a problem retaining women and racial minorities. Now, a new study provides quantitative evidence that the same problem applies to some sexual minorities—a group that anecdotally has been known to experience challenges in STEM but has eluded thorough examination owing to a lack of data. But there’s a twist: Retention is lower for men who identify as LGBQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer), while LGBQ women are actually more likely to persist in STEM than their heterosexual peers.
“We’ve known for a long time that sexual minorities experience marginalization and devaluation in fields like engineering,” says Erin Cech, an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor who wasn’t involved in the new research but has interviewed lesbian, gay, and bisexual students about their experiences in engineering. That’s especially true for LGBQ men because there’s “a strong devaluation of femininity in STEM,” and gay men encounter discrimination that heterosexual men—and oftentimes lesbians—don’t have to deal with, she adds.
Now there are numbers to back up those experiences....
MORE: http://www.sciencemag.org/careers/2018/0...undergrads
EXCERPT: It’s no secret that STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) fields have a problem retaining women and racial minorities. Now, a new study provides quantitative evidence that the same problem applies to some sexual minorities—a group that anecdotally has been known to experience challenges in STEM but has eluded thorough examination owing to a lack of data. But there’s a twist: Retention is lower for men who identify as LGBQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer), while LGBQ women are actually more likely to persist in STEM than their heterosexual peers.
“We’ve known for a long time that sexual minorities experience marginalization and devaluation in fields like engineering,” says Erin Cech, an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor who wasn’t involved in the new research but has interviewed lesbian, gay, and bisexual students about their experiences in engineering. That’s especially true for LGBQ men because there’s “a strong devaluation of femininity in STEM,” and gay men encounter discrimination that heterosexual men—and oftentimes lesbians—don’t have to deal with, she adds.
Now there are numbers to back up those experiences....
MORE: http://www.sciencemag.org/careers/2018/0...undergrads