Women everywhere are underrepresented in science and engineering in higher education. In South Korea, 2022 figures from the Korea Foundation for Women in Science, Engineering and Technology (WISET) show that women make up only 21.17% of total students majoring in science and engineering in higher education. This is an increase on the 2011 figure of 16.9%, but still shows a need for more progress.
In the summer of 2023, we engaged in a one-week exploratory research study in Seoul, South Korea, to explore gender equality in engineering, with a focus on both institutional level efforts and individual experiences of engineering stakeholders.
During this time, we met with stakeholders from two major organisations for projects and programmes related to science, technology, engineering and mathematics or STEM: WISET and the Korea Foundation for the Advancement of Science & Creativity (KOFAC).
WISET is a non-profit foundation launched in 2011 that specifically supports women in STEM. KOFAC, a government-affiliated institute established in 1967, makes programmes and policies to promote science and technology culture and to cultivate human talent with the Ministry of Science and ICT (information and communications technology) and the Ministry of Education. Additionally, we engaged in semi-structured interviews with five engineering women students and two engineering faculty at a private university.
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