Written evidence submitted by Dr Angus Holford, Research Fellow, University of Essex and Dr Margaret Leighton, Lecturer in Economics, University of St Andrews (DIV0001)

We have analysed the Higher Education Statistics Agency’s (HESA) ‘Destination of Leavers from Higher Education’ (DLHE) survey, to study the prevalence of unpaid work as a career step towards STEM professions; how this varies by how the unpaid work experience was obtained; and differences by gender and socio-economic background.

Our study followed 25,755 science graduates from the end of their degree to 3-and-a-half years after graduation. Our analysis weighted them to the profile of the population of science graduates from UK universities between 2003 and 2009. Our full paper has been peer-reviewed and published in the open access scientific journal PLoS ONE (see reference below).

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This submission addresses three topics in the call for evidence:

“The nature or extent to which women … and those from disadvantaged socioeconomic backgrounds are underrepresented in STEM in academia and industry”

We show that 3.5 years after graduation, only 32.8% of science graduates were working in STEM, according to the list of occupations defined by the Royal Society as “definitely” part of the “scientific workforce”

In our regression models we control for degree class, sex, socioeconomic status (SES), and cohort of graduation. These models show that, other things equal:

Men are 13.6 percentage points more likely to be in a STEM job 3.5 years after graduation than women,
High SES graduates (as defined by their parents’ occupation) are no more likely to be in a STEM job after 3.5 years following graduation than low SES graduates.

“the reasons why these groups [women and those from disadvantaged socio-economic backgrounds] are underrepresented in STEM in academia and industry”

The research shows that, for graduates who did unpaid work 6 months after graduation, how they found their position was associated with different career outcomes.

Those who found their unpaid position through personal connections were considerably more likely (9.1 percentage points) to be working in STEM 3 years later, than those who found unpaid work through other means.

This contributes to underrepresentation of women in STEM in academia and industry because we also find that, other things equal, men are 3.5 percentage points more likely to have found their unpaid position through personal connection than women.

We find no significant difference in use of personal connections by parental SES, other things equal.

The use of personal connections to find an initial paid position does not increase the likelihood that the graduate will be working in STEM 3 years later. This suggests that those with access to personal connections and the ability to work for free have an advantage in accessing and persisting in STEM professions.

“What can and should be done… to address the issues identified.”

We find no gap in persistence in STEM professions for science graduates by parental SES after controlling for degree class. This highlights the importance of targeted resourcing to close the gap in compulsory, further and higher education performance and attainment by SES is required to improve access to STEM professions for underrepresented groups.

Our results on the importance of personal connections for unpaid work to represent a path into STEM professions shows the need for alternative policies which make the acquisition of valuable early-career scientific work experience affordable and accessible to science graduates regardless of their financial ability. This could include an expansion of STEM profession placements during university holidays, with additional maintenance loan or grant support to enable this where necessary.

January 2021

Reference:

Fournier AMV, Holford AJ, Bond AL, Leighton MA (2019) Unpaid work and access to science professions. PLoS ONE 14(6): e0217032. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0217032