Although the U.S. is a STEM world leader, classroom engagement barriers remain for girls, low-income students and those of color.
STEM engagement is closely connected to career and economic mobility, as U.S. workers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics earn over $100,000 a year, compared to the overall wage average of $46,000.
“This is not only an economic issue but a civil rights issue for the low-income students, those of color and girls who don’t have access to STEM courses and support programs, and so are underrepresented in STEM careers,” said Dr. Louis Freedberg, interim CEO of EdSource.
STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) careers include physical, life and earth sciences; engineering and architecture; computing and math; and health-related jobs, including health providers and technicians.
While these jobs are projected to grow nearly twice as fast as other U.S. jobs in the next decade, roughly 43% of U.S. STEM workers come from abroad.
The sector’s workforce is closely tied to higher education.
STEM workers are twice as likely as others to have a bachelor’s degree or higher — 67% compared to 34%. Furthermore, about three quarters of U.S. workers with a higher degree hold one in a STEM field.
“Early interest in math and science is a key indicator of whether students pursue STEM,” continued Freedberg. “By high school, there’s disproportionate enrollment in advanced or even basic STEM classes. We have to start addressing these gaps early … We have to show students that what they’re learning in the classroom is relevant to their careers, that it’s not just abstract.”
A success story in Compton
Compton Unified School District (CUSD), in southern Los Angeles County, has pioneered a breakthrough model in having students excel in STEM.
The portion of its heavily low-income, over 98% Black and Latino student body choosing STEM careers has more than doubled from 24% to 52% over the last decade, while the district graduation rate has soared over 90% — above the national average of 87%.
Black and Latino or Hispanic workers are particularly underrepresented in STEM careers.
Among employed adults aged 25 and older, Black workers represent 9% of all STEM jobs against 11% of all jobs, while Hispanic workers represent 8% of STEM jobs against 17% of all jobs, according to 2021 Pew data.
In comparison, Asian workers represent 13% of STEM jobs against 6% of all jobs, and White workers represent 67% of STEM jobs against 63% of all jobs.
“A decade ago, we decided there should not be any reason why students coming out of Compton should not have the opportunities that students have in wealthier districts,” said Dr. Darin Brawley, CUSD Superintendent since 2012. “So we joined the Digital Promise League of Innovative Schools and implemented STEM opportunities that exceed any public school district around.”
These opportunities include preschool and grade school Lego robotics; middle and high school coding, math and video game design projects; courses in 3D printing, drone aviation, e-sports, circuitry design, podcasting, engineering, VR and AI; STEM teacher training; and vocational training and early certification for students through partnerships with companies including IBM, Verizon, Boeing, RTX and Apple.
“We’re laying to rest the old adage from businesses that schools are not preparing their students for the jobs out there, for the global economy,” said Brawley.
“Can this be replicated? Yes,” he continued. “It’s crucial that students are interested in multiple areas, like coding, drones and e-Sports … Also, 98% of our parents want their students to have STEM access. It’s crucial that the parents love what’s happening.”
“Growing up, everybody in my family would steer me towards another career than STEM … I didn’t really think I would have been able to make it here, but here I am, doing what I want to do, as the first in my generation to go to college,” said Isis Cadena Nuñez, a graduate of Compton Early College High School (CECHS) and a UC Santa Cruz freshman double majoring in marine biology and environmental science.
She added that CECHS prepared her for her current path in environmental conservation through programs like dual-enrollment associate’s degree courses; leadership boot camps like Change Agents and Science Cafe; and networking, career fair and job interview prep events with women STEM workers and those of color from major universities.
“What surprised me was how many people within free events outside of school were White,” said Nuñez. “I wondered, ‘Why am I the only one like me here?’ I knew 10 other people that would love these programs, but the access is so closed off. A lot of what Compton offered was the support that came from teachers to push the students beyond, regardless of where they came from.”
Overcoming barriers
“You can’t be what you can’t see,” added Daniel Voloch, chief program officer of Girls Who Code. “Early role models and early access works for underserved students. We’re proof.”
Although women represent 50% of STEM workers, slightly higher than their 47% share in the workforce overall, this representation varies dramatically across fields.
While women represent 74% of health practitioners and technicians, for instance, they represent 15% of engineers and architects and 25% of computer workers.
Latina women represent only 5% of computer workers.
Since 2012, Girls Who Code has helped over half a million girls — over half being low-income or of color — through free coding and tech mentorship programs, from third grade beyond high school.
As a result, the international nonprofit’s students have earned computer science and related degrees at seven times the national average — nine times for those low-income or of color — “and we’re on track to achieve gender parity in entry-level computing jobs by 2030,” said Voloch.
“The future of technology depends on those who are developing it … and we still see so many of our students saying that they are the only, or one of the only, women of color in their computer science classrooms,” he added.
“Noone is immune from implicit bias, and girls and students of color are constantly receiving messages that certain gender or racial groups possess higher mathematical ability than them,” said Dr. Yasemin Copur-Gencturk, associate professor of teacher education at the University of Southern California (USC).
With a team of USC colleagues, Copur-Gencturk studied whether real differences in student math performance — particularly along racial lines — owes to actual student differences or implicit teacher bias.
“We addressed performance differences by creating experimental situations with no such differences among students, then gathering data from students asked to solve math problems,” she explained.
“We then randomly assigned gender- and race-specific names or images to this identical work,” she added. “Teachers didn’t know that they were evaluating the same responses under different names, so any variation in evaluations could be explained by implicit bias.”
Consistently, no bias was found in teachers’ evaluations of student work; students received similar grades regardless of gender or race.
However, teachers perceived that students with male or white-sounding names as having higher mathematical ability than students with female-, Black- or Latino- sounding names, with the most bias directed towards girls of color.
“This suggests that even when teachers acknowledge no difference in student performance, they still perceive differences in potential,” said Copur-Gencturk. “We also found that math teachers who believed that gender equity had already been achieved tended to contribute more to gender bias.”
“To combat barriers against STEM students of color and girls, we need to address the underlying inequities that uphold these barriers,” she added. “Often, it starts with disbelief that these students face inequity at all.”
