Examining Females Participation in Engineering as a Discipline: A Case Study of Uganda and Nigeria

Abstract

Engineering is traditionally perceived as a discipline peculiar to the male folks and women are under-represented in all engineering fields. Could it be that women are less confident about their abilities? Or are men more qualified than women for engineering based on physical strength? Could it be based on societal values placed on the male child above the female child in most African societies? This research work seeks to address the above questions. It focuses on the factors hindering women from adopting engineering as a discipline in Uganda and Nigeria. Data were gathered from university convocation proceedings and questionnaires have been generated to harvest information from the larger populace which includes female students studying engineering, female engineering lecturers, and female engineers. The research work also recommends measures to foster/encourage the interest of female folks in engineering. To explain the trend of females’ degree of participation in engineering in Africa, data collected from respondents from both Nigeria and Uganda Universities and the graduation lists of universities in Nigeria were analyzed using SPSS and Python. The results show that socio-cultural beliefs and the lack of female engineer role models are key factors influencing the participation of females in engineering. Generally, the percentage of females who graduated and practiced engineering is low compared to their male counterparts. It was observed that female participation is more pronounced for computer and biomedical engineering, while for mechanical engineering is negligible. Thus, this present research indicates the most prevailing factors affecting the participation of females in engineering in Africa and provides recommendations for a possible measure that may strengthen the increase in the participation of females in engineering in Africa.