Study Examines the Hiring and Retention Rates of Women Faculty in STEM Disciplines

A new study led by Marcia Gumpertz, a professor of statistics and assistant vice provost for faculty diversity at North Carolina State University in Raleigh, took a snapshot of faculty diversity in STEM fields at four large land grant universities. The study looked at faculty diversity in engineering, physical and mathematical sciences, agricultural sciences and natural resources, and biological and biomedical sciences.

For female candidates as a whole, the study found very few differences in promotion or retention outcomes, although there were variances between disciplines: female engineering faculty who started as assistant professors were more likely to leave than men, and left without tenure more frequently than men. Time to promotion from associate to full professor took one to two years longer, on average, for women in biological, biomedical and agricultural fields, but this was not the case in engineering or physical and mathematical sciences.

The full study,”Retention and Promotion of Women and Underrepresented Minority Faculty in Science and Engineering at Four Large Land Grant Institutions” was published on the PLOS One website. It may be accessed here.