Students discuss their experiences with gender disparities in STEM field at U.

Women reportedly make up less than a third of those employed in STEM careers, a disparity that is frequently linked to the lack of women majoring in STEM-related fields. Amid this climate, women and nonbinary STEM students at Rutgers discussed their academic experiences.

Emma Acosta, a School of Arts and Sciences first-year, said that while she has not experienced any setbacks in her STEM classes due to being a woman, she can still sense the gender disparity that may exist in courses she will have to take in the future.

"Often, when you go into STEM majors there's a lot of guys," she said. "They already have this preconceived idea about you, which makes it kind of intimidating … Sometimes it’s hard to find your community."

Acosta said she had a difficult time meeting other women in STEM at Rutgers because many of the University’s extracurricular STEM-based clubs tend to have a high saturation of men.

She said a way that this gender disparity could be addressed is by advertising its woman-focused STEM clubs, which can easily go unrecognized due to the number of extracurriculars at Rutgers.

Victoria He, a School of Arts and Sciences first-year, said she has noticed that professors in her classes often will call on women to speak more frequently than men in her classes.

She said she believes that the difference in treatment between genders might occur because professors have the expectation that women will not speak out as much as their peers who are men.

Though, He also said she has noticed that a majority of her STEM professors have been men, and she believes this lack of gender diversity can prevent students from making stronger connections with their educators.

"Even at an entry level, it’s obvious that a lot of the professors are male," she said. "And looking at higher level classes, most professors are male, as well. I think this may be an obstacle for building relationships with my professors later on."

Similarly, Francesca Lofaro, a School of Arts and Sciences Ph.D. student, said she has noticed the disparity between staff members of different genders, especially in higher education.

"I was fortunate enough to have a Black, female computer science advisor — which is incredible but also unheard of," she said.

Lofaro said she thinks a more diverse group of leaders in STEM would improve her experience. She also said she believes that men constitute a majority of staff members in her program of study, and as a result, she purposely went out of her way to select an advisor who is a woman to give herself a more positive experience.

"Certain people in higher powers get very focused on the side of work that is not the student side," Lofaro said. "They get stuck in this one point of view of, 'No, this is the way it’s always been done.'"

Bella Yheaulon, a School of Environmental and Biological Sciences first-year, said she has not particularly noticed any gender discrimination in her STEM courses and that she appreciates the diversity that Rutgers offers.

"In the classes I’m taking currently, at least, there (are) women and men of all different races from all different backgrounds," Yheaulon said. "It’s pretty evenly distributed."

On the other hand, Jay Travis, a School of Arts and Sciences first-year, identifies as nonbinary and said students having more access to gender and sexuality theory and sensitivity training can raise awareness to address the issues women and non-binary students face.

They said they have witnessed men interrupt women while they are speaking during class and that they think students having more exposure to gender and sexuality studies allowed them to understand social dynamics better.

"In my (gender and media) class, we read these articles about different kinds of sexism and being non-accepting of queerness and not fitting gender norms," Travis said. "I feel like just reading those articles, even if you're not doing something ... just being aware of it (helps solve these issues)."