U-Multirank launches its second analysis of gender balance in higher education institutions | Traditional patterns of gender inequality still prevail in higher education

CONTACT: Gero Federkeil, email: gero.federkeil@che.de, phone +49 (0) 5241 9761 30

This past September, U-Multirank launched the second edition of its analysis on gender balance in higher education. While gender inequality has been a major dimension of inequality in higher education, data from the latest U-Multirank edition confirm that still today there are strong gender imbalances among males and females in academic careers. While women in total count for more than half of bachelor’s (BA) and master’s (MA) students, their share is smaller among PhD students (48%), academic staff (45%) and professors (29%). The new edition analyses gender ratio among rectors/vice-presidents for the first time: Only one out of five leaders of higher education institutions are female. According to U-Multirank data this pattern is very much the same among EU and non-EU institutions.

Findings from the U-Multirank data show that women are particularly underrepresented in research intense universities. Only 24% of professors are women in institutions with high or very high percentages of expenditures on research – compared to 36% in institutions with a low share of research expenditures. In addition, our data show a strong effect regarding the subject focus of institutions: At institutions with a majority of graduates in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM fields), women are underrepresented both at the student level and among academic staff.

Still worlds apart: Gender balance by subjects

Furthermore, data from the U-Multirank subject rankings suggest that differences between study subjects still follow traditional patterns of ‘male and female study subjects’. While women are still a minority in most of the science and engineering subjects, both among students and academic staff, subjects like nursing, social work, education and psychology are still strongly dominated by women. In these subjects, the majority of both students and academic staff are female. In social work for example, U-Multirank found only 17 out of almost 200 departments where men make up for more than half of the students.  Furthermore, at four out of five departments the majority of academic staff is female. Comparing science and engineering data from the rankings 2019 and 2022, we see that gender patterns did not change overall within these three years.

Among the subjects with the most balanced gender ratio are business studies, economics, political science, agriculture, history and – as the only science subject, chemistry. Here the percentage of males and females among both students and academic staff are between 40% and 60%. In many other study subjects, there are only a few, or even no departments with a balanced gender ratio (see appendix 3).

Hilligje Van’t Land, Secretary General of the International Association of Universities (IAU) comments on the monitor: I highly recommend this second U-Multirank Gender Monitor.  To assess the current state of play and to inform future decision making to address the existing issues, U-Multirank’s analysis shows how women and men are generally distributed at universities, and whether the well-known ‘male and female subjects’ still exist at higher education institutions.”

U-Multirank’s latest results not only give insights on balance among males and females in higher education, but as a multi-dimensional global ranking it makes transparent the detailed performance of universities. In doing so, students can make better informed choices about what, or where to study based on what matters most to them - including the gender balance of a study programme. Universities can use U-Multirank data to assess their strengths and weaknesses and find ways to create or strengthen their strategic plans, including aspects of gender balance.

Although a modern notion of gender requires more than a binary classification of female and male, the current data available for such an analysis is limited. Therefore, this analysis concentrates on gender in a binary system, but will be improved upon in future years. As a first step in 2020, U-Multirank introduced the category ’non-binary/diverse’ into its student survey. Additionally, U-Multirank will continue to extend its definition of gender in ongoing and upcoming data collections, including surveys at the institutional and department levels, which are the basis for the U-Multirank gender monitor.

Ends

 

Background

U-Multirank is a non-commercial, multi-dimensional global transparency tool, presenting more than 30 indicators on university performance across five dimensions: teaching and learning, research, knowledge transfer, international orientation and regional engagement. The 2021 release covers 2,200 institutions from 96 countries. All results are freely accessibly on the website.

Data for the U-Multirank gender monitor are based on a sample of 2,000 institutions that provided data on gender. On our website we present the gender profiles for individual institutions. U-Multirank is collecting data on gender on different, both institutional and subject, on different stages: students, BA/MA graduates, PhDs students and graduates, academic staff and professors. As part of its effort to include issues of social inclusion and diversity, U-Multirank recently started to collect gender data beyond the binary classification male/female.  The U-Multirank gender monitor brochure provides links to the list of institutions with a balanced gender ratio by subjects.

U-Multirank originated at a conference of the European Commission during the French presidency in 2008. Since 2017 it is funded by the Bertelsmann Foundation, the European Union's Erasmus+ Programme and Santander Group. U-Multirank is developed and implemented by an independent consortium led by the Centre for Higher Education (CHE) in Germany. The Center for Higher Education Policy Studies (CHEPS) at the University of Twente and the Centre for Science and Technology Studies (CWTS) from Leiden University, both in the Netherlands, as well as Fundación Conocimiento y Desarrollo (FCYD) in Spain are partners in the project. The consortium is headed by professors Frans van Vught (CHEPS) and Frank Ziegele (CHE).

 

Appendix:

 

  1. Illustration: The persistence of the gender gap in higher education
  1. Illustration: Still worlds apart: Gender balance by fields
  2. Full report: U-Multirank Gender Monitor 2022

Stay informed about U-Multirank:

Financial Partners:

close Icon

Consent Preferences / Cookie Settings

This page allows you to opt out of optional cookies used by the U-Multirank website.

Once you have set your cookie preferences, we will follow the specific choices you made. Please remember that if you delete your cookies, or use a different browser or computer, you will need to set your cookie preferences again. 

Required Cookies

These cookies enable core site functionality. It is not possible to disable these cookies since our services do not work without them. They are emitted by the CMS and by the U-Multirank Data Collection-API and they hold information about your choices. They are used for functional purposes only and are not valid beyond this session.

Tracking Cookies

These cookies are used to track performance and to monitor functionality of the website. This information helps us to optimize our services. Embedded partners are Google Analytics, Google Tag Manager, DoubleClick and HotJar.