Shrinking gender gaps in STEM persistence: a ten-year comparison of the stability and volatility of STEM career interest in high school by gender

Abstract

To keep abreast with recent developments in young persons’ STEM career interests and to anticipate the gender representation in the future workforce, we need to periodically update cohort comparisons of the persistence in STEM career interest among male and female youth. Using two national U.S. samples of first-year college students, collected a decade apart in 2007 and 2017, we found that, at the end of high school, the gender gap in STEM career interest still existed, but had shrunk considerably during the decade. Both genders were more likely to transition into STEM from non-STEM career interests during the high school years in the 2017 cohort than in the 2007 cohort, with females experiencing a steeper increase. Furthermore, females who were initially interested in a STEM career were more likely to persist in a STEM career interest in the 2017 cohort than in the 2007 cohort, whereas males’ persistence rates remained the same between cohorts.