Industry Role Models

Back to All Actions

What is the Action?

Use industry professionals as role models for existing students. 

Quick Facts to Support this action

Industry role models have been known to influence female interest in technology, science and engineering (Toolkit Creating Connections with Role Models 2014, Study Do Female Role Models Reduce the Gender Gap in Science?). Exposing female students to this group of role models can promote recruitment of prospective female students (if they are in a school education setting) or retention of existing higher education computing students.

A recent UK study exploring role models and how they can inspire women to study computer science discovered that female students wish for more exposure to female industry role models.

Ways to Implement this Action

Invite industry professionals into the educational setting, or organise field trips to industry settings. Both activities involve processes such as finding role models, recruiting & instructing/training them, organising events with role models. The guidance on these processes can be used for any invited role models, whether online or offline. The guidance on How to Find Role Models, How to Train Role Models, and How to Prepare students for role models visits is available here as well as in the Resources section.

Case Study – ESTeEM at TU Dublin

TU Dublin launched its ESTeEM initiative (The Equality in Science and Technology by Engaged Educational Mentoring) to allow female students to be mentored by female industry professionals.

The university teamed up with companies to find women mentors already working in relevant industries. These mentors received special training and handbooks to guide them.

Next, female students from tech, engineering, and apprenticeship programs were brought in. Induction meetings were organised where students learned about the program and could choose their mentors. This choice helped students feel more involved.

The core of ESTeEM was regular lunch events. At these events, mentors, mentees, and TU Dublin staff sat together, sparking conversations and networking. A speaker from a company would share insights, and then discussions at each table helped students learn and connect, building a strong network of support. There were typically three mentors at each table, with two students for each of them, and a TU Dublin staff member as a moderator.

Feedback received from both mentors and mentees has been consistently positive, indicating that the practical implementation of the program fostered a supportive environment. The initiative’s success is highlighted by its recognition as best practice in 2019, when TU Dublin received the Bronze Award for Gender Equity from Athena Swan. In the 2020/21 academic year, the female intake for the Computer Science International degree reached a record 42%. This marks a 35% increase from 2015 figures, with the overall female intake across all computer science programs nearing 30%. ESTeEM’s role in providing role models and support has likely contributed to these results.

 

 

Evaluation Approach

Survey students after exposing them to role models.

Examples of post-survey questions inspired by the study involving industry role models Do Female Role Models Reduce the Gender Gap in Science? Evidence from French High Schools:

(1) Did you enjoy this intervention? Yes/No

(2) Would you say that this visit changed… [Possible answers: Strongly agree/Somewhat agree/Disagree/Strongly disagree]
• your perception of computer science-related jobs?
• your interest in computer science-related jobs?
• your perception of women’s place in computer science-related jobs?

(3) Would you say that this visit… [Possible answers: Strongly agree/Somewhat agree/Disagree/Strongly disagree]
• gave you new ideas for your future?
• influenced your aspirations and choices of study(or further study/career)?
• confirmed a choice you had already made?
• made you want to pursue/continue computer science-related studies/postgraduate studies?

 

 

 

Useful Links

Barr, M., Binnie, L., Jacobs, E., Pavlou, K. and West, K., 2024, September. Understanding the role models that inspire women to study Computing Science. In Proceedings of the 2024 Conference on United Kingdom & Ireland Computing Education Research (pp. 1–7).

Breda, T., Grenet, J., Monnet, M., and Van Effenterre, C., 2020. Do female role models reduce the gender gap in science? Evidence from French high schools. IZA Discussion Paper, pages 1–54.

Devereux, M., Heffernan, E., McKeever, S., Dunne, J., Shoemaker, L., and O’Leary, C., 2022. Reflections on Selected Gender Equality in STEM Initiatives in an Irish University. In: García-Peñalvo, F.J., García-Holgado, A., Dominguez, A., Pascual, J. (eds), Women in STEM in Higher Education. Lecture Notes in Educational Technology. Springer, Singapore.

KEEP ACCORDIAN COLLAPSED

Do not delete. This is important to keep the accordian items closed on initial load. Keep this at the top of the accordian stack.

The accordian will auto-open the first item on load. This item has custom css to keep it hidden. This means the user cannot see that it is open thus manually overriding the auto-open.

Events with Role Models TechMate Guide

Role Models Training

Finding Role Models