The Gender Gap in Graduate Degree Awards in Engineering

Last week, WIAReport posted an article on the widening gender gap in bachelor’s degree awards in engineering. This week, we take a look at the gender gap in graduate degrees in engineering.

A report from the American Society for Engineering Education shows that in 2013, women earned 23.9 percent of all master’s degrees in engineering. This is an increase from 21.9 percent in 2004. San Jose State University in California had the highest percentage of women among its master’s degree recipients in engineering of any university that awarded at least 35 degrees in the discipline. There, 34.6 percent of all master’s degrees were earned by women. Duke University and Tufts University were the only other educational institutions where women earned at least one third of all master’s degrees in engineering.

In 2013, women earned 22.4 percent of all doctoral degrees awarded in engineering. In 2004, women earned 17.8 percent of all doctoral degrees in engineering. At the University of Texas at El Paso, women earned 40.5 percent of all doctoral degrees awarded in engineering, the highest percentage of any university that awarded 25 or more doctorates in the field. Other universities where women earned at least one third of all doctoral degrees in engineering were the University of Illinois, the New Jersey Institute of Technology, the University of California Riverside, Vanderbilt University, the University of Maryland Baltimore County, and Yale University

The full report, Engineering by the Numbers by Brian L. Yoder, may be downloaded by clicking here.