Elbow_Patches

Gosh, thanks for the lively discussion everyone; let's keep it civil and informative, please. Obviously this is an issue that needs to be discussed with tact, and perhaps that's why it isn't talked about enough. As a male, and fairly fresh teacher, I'm coming at the issue from a male perspective, so I really appreciate all of you giving your own perspective on the matter. A specific point someone raised was that the term 'woman' rather than 'female' with be preferred. I went with the more clinical term because it avoids needing to switch from the term 'girls' to 'women' at some predefined age limit. Do you think it would be better to refer to 'women' for all age groups? With regards to harassment, if girls are put off by boys in classes when they're younger, and they 'see' Physics as a mainly male subject leading to male dominated industries, I can see how that could discourage them from choosing it. We do find that girls in single sex schools are much more likely to study Physics. They could be considering sexism and the potential barriers in the field due to their gender, or it could be somewhat childish instincts. We do expect 16 year old's to make decisions that arguably set them on their whole career path. Despite attempts to open doors and provide female role-models over the last 25 or so years that 20% (of Physics students being girls) figure has remained fairly constant. I'm interested to know what a green Physics teacher on the ground can do to give those potential Physicists a fair chance. Thanks again for all of your comments. Please do share the survey link if you know someone who's like to contribute. EP

Hi Lord Antares, Thanks for the response. Can people still see the address and copy+paste the link to complete the survey? If so I'd really appreciate you giving a detailed answer. For instance, if it is that women are simply not as interested in it, I want to find out why not, how we could encourage them to be more interested, and whether or not that's important. Perhaps Physics just isn't for girls, perhaps it's to do with the way younger girls view Physics at school. The 20% I mentioned is for the UK and similar figures in the US, but that isn't the story across the globe. Societal factors certainly seem to come into play. I've tried to make the survey so that your opinions can be gathered and compared with others easily. Many thanks, EP

Hello everyone, I'm a Physics teacher in a secondary school and I'm doing a little research into why the number of females in Physics A level classes and undergraduate courses (only about 20%) is so low. If I could please take 5-10 minutes of your time by asking you to fill out this survey: https://www.quicksurveys.com/s/c6J3EnS I also encourage you to pass the link around to anyone you think may be interested in giving their opinions. It is anonymous and open to everyone, I just ask for your honest opinions. At this stage I will likely put out a second survey informed by the responses to this one, so if you'd like to suggest pertinent questions to be included or comments on the phrasing of the questions as they stand it would be appreciated. Many thanks, Elbow Patches