Use figure 1.4 to brainstorm other factors that influence the number of women in STEM fields.
Figure 1.4: Reflections on the factors that impact the number of women in STEM.
Differences in Mathematics Achievement Scores
The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), which assesses students in grades 4, 8, and 12, is the most commonly cited U.S. assessment in mathematics. NAEP has been administered approximately every four years since 1973; however, there have been changes in test administration since its inception that impact statistical comparisons. For example, since 1990, students have been assessed by grade rather than by age, and there was variation in the allowance of accommodations at some testing sites in 1996 and 2000.
From 2003 to 2017, there has been a slight gender difference based on the average fourth-grade mathematics assessment scores, with boys scoring significantly higher than girls during each assessment administration (National Center for Education Statistics [NCES], 2017). For example, in 2003, boys scored higher (with statistical significance) when scores were analyzed by average scale score, percentile, and proficiency level. There were significant differences that favored the performance of boys at the 25th, 50th, 75th, and 90th percentiles, and the gap between boys’ and girls’ scores increased as the scores increased (with a five-point difference at the 90th percentile). According to the NAEP proficiency data from 2003, boys also outperformed girls in the categories of advanced (5 percent compared to 3 percent), at or above proficient (35 percent compared to 30 percent), and at or above basic (78 percent compared to 76 percent; NCES, 2017). For example, the average scale score of fourth-grade boys was 236 compared to the average scale score of 233 for fourth-grade girls, a seemingly small but statistically significant difference. Additionally, according to the proficiency data from 2003, fourth-grade boys outperformed girls in four of the five content strands: number and operations, data analysis, algebra and functions, and measurement, with the discrepancy in measurement being the largest (NCES, 2017). This is consistent with gaps in the measurement strand from the 1996 administration of the NAEP, which Ellen Ansell and Helen M. Doerr (2000) analyze to reveal that fourth-grade boys were more accurately able to choose appropriate units or read and use a measuring instrument (such as a speedometer, thermometer, or ruler). When Ansell and Doerr (2000) further analyze the gender gaps within racial groups and across content strands, they find significant differences that still favored boys for white and Hispanic groups in number operations and measurement and Asian and Pacific islanders in measurement. This analysis also reveals, however, that African American girls outperformed African American boys in geometry and data analysis at the fourth-grade level.
While NCES (2017) documents that fourth-grade boys achieve higher scores in mathematics than girls, the achievement gap between boys and girls has not widened between 2003 and 2017, with the most recent 2017 data revealing an average scale score of 241 among boys and 239 among girls. This means that the mathematics achievement gap between grade 4 boys and grade 4 girls persists, but it has not grown in recent years.
There is more research that speaks to the matter of the mathematics gender achievement gap. For instance, Sean F. Reardon, Erin M. Fahle, Demetra Kalogrides, Anne Podolsky, and Rosalía C. Zárate (2018) report on a study (“Gender Achievement Gaps in U.S. School Districts”) of students in grades 3–8 across ten thousand U.S. school districts:
Both math and ELA gender achievement gaps vary among school districts and are positively correlated—some districts have more male-favoring gaps and some more female-favoring gaps. We find that math gaps tend to favor males more in socioeconomically advantaged school districts. (p. 2)
More specifically, among Reardon, Fahle, et al.’s (2018) findings, the distribution of mathematics gaps “implies that 95% of districts have math gaps that are between -0.07 and +0.13 standard deviations, favoring males in 72% of school districts and females in 28%” (p. 21). Additionally, this research finds that in wealthier districts and districts with more economic inequality among adult men and women, mathematics gaps favored boys on average. These analyses show that the mathematics gender achievement gap is not necessarily across the board or applicable for all students.
When considering the research presenting differences in mathematics achievement scores between boys and girls, we find that if there are differences, they are often small and are typically evident among higher-performing students (Lindberg, Hyde, Petersen, & Linn, 2010; Reardon, Fahle, et al., 2018).
Differences in Student Responses Regarding Self-Concept in Mathematics
In addition to achievement data, NAEP (NCES, 2017) reports data based on students’ questionnaire responses about their beliefs about mathematics and themselves as learners. For example, when asked to consider the statement “I am good at mathematics,” students could choose the answers “A lot like me,” “A little like me,” or “Not like me.” Among fourth-grade students, boys were significantly more likely than girls to identify the following statements as being a lot like themselves: “I like mathematics” (50 percent boy, 43 percent girl), “I am good at mathematics” (56 percent boy, 43 percent girl), and “I understand most of what goes on in mathematics class” (58 percent boy, 55 percent girl).
Additional data from the Education Quality and Accountability Office (Casey, 2017) support the idea that gaps in students’ self-concept may not be limited to the United States. For example, although girls and boys earned similar grades during the 2016 to 2017 academic year:
Only 49 percent of Grade 3 girls in Ontario agreed that they were good at math compared to 62 percent of boys. The difference widens in Grade 6, where 46 percent of girls said they were good at math compared to 61 percent of boys. (Casey, 2017)
Differences in Problem-Solving Approaches Among Boys and Girls
In 1980, Problem Solving in School Mathematics (Krulik & Reys, 1980) initiated a shift in mathematics education that proposed problem solving to be central to mathematics instruction and across mathematics curriculum. Along with this notion, the discussion of methods, strategies, and heuristics for problem solving abound in mathematics publications and conference presentations. In addition, starting from this point, research on problem solving became more visible in the discipline. For example, Elizabeth Fennema, Thomas P. Carpenter, Victoria R. Jacobs, Megan L. Franke, and Linda W. Levi (1998) find that boys were more likely than girls to use novel or invented problem-solving approaches when given mathematics tasks. Comparison observations find that girls were more inclined to use the specific procedures that the teacher taught in previous instruction for a given problem type. The researchers further explain that the use of invented algorithms appeared to be important for students to develop key concepts in mathematics, such as place value and number sense, and for students to be flexible in new situations, such as extensions of learned mathematics. Ana Villalobos (2009) offers additional research findings that explore “strategy socialization” with regard to risk-taking and rule-following, and suggests that girls are disproportionally represented in the development of “algorithmic strategies” and boys in “problem solving strategies” (p. 27). In this study, the author suggests that over-rewarding a single strategy, especially when the strategy yields accurate solutions, can lead to difficulties in switching strategies, which is necessary when “solving unfamiliar problems that require new approaches later in the curriculum” (Villalobos, 2009, p. 27).
Although this research took place prior to specific curriculum standards that advocate for multistrategy instruction