Post 9- Solutions
The main and first solution to help alleviate the issue of discrimination against women in STEM education and professions is for women to get more involved in the STEM curriculum. I think women should continue to fight to be part of the STEM workforce no matter their struggles. I feel like the more women that continue to get involved in STEM and not allow men to discourage them, the more the STEM fields will have to alter to accommodate the women in STEM education and professions. For those women who actually become successful in the STEM professional field, they should return at some point to help educate the STEM women of the next generation. Recall that STEM is a masculine field that doesn’t account for the presence of women very much. Women in STEM education and profession were viewed as minorities because there aren’t many women part of the field. By successful STEM women returning to teach classes, female STEM students may be more encouraged to stick with the STEM degree and follow through with a STEM career because they are becoming more accommodated for.
In addition to avoiding the response of assimilation to discrimination of women by men, I believe that women should also avoid turning to avoidance. When a women uses avoidance as a tactic to respond to discrimination, that women is helping to silence to the problem of discrimination against women in STEM. By contributing to the silencing of the discrimination, these women are helping to protect the behavior of these men, and allow the discrimination to continue. In order for discrimination in the STEM fields to diminish, women must address the oppression head on and struggle with it. If women give in to the discrimination, continue to give in, the struggle will never be alleviated.
Another solution that may help alleviate the discrimination against women in STEM is for women to stop choosing to assimilate when being faced with discrimination by men. By assimilation into the masculine culture surrounded by STEM, women are supporting the masculine culture. This masculine structure needs to be altered into a bisexual culture as a means to take into considerations of both sexes rather than just one. In assimilating, women are surrendering their femininity. By choosing to surrender their femininity, they are creating a setback for other women in STEM who don’t want to sacrifice their femininity, but would rather be accepted as a female professional of STEM.