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Jakarta Post

Women encouraged to work in STEM industries

There were 60 students when Yunita Dyah, 34, was enrolled in the Petroleum Engineering Faculty at the prestigious Bandung Institute of Technology in 2002

Gemma Holliani Cahya (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Tue, August 14, 2018

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Women encouraged to work in STEM industries

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here were 60 students when Yunita Dyah, 34, was enrolled in the Petroleum Engineering Faculty at the prestigious Bandung Institute of Technology in 2002.

Of that, only six were women.

The situation did not change much when she decided to pursue a career in the same field. She had been working as a reservoir engineer at different oil and gas companies for the past 11 years and was promoted in March to senior reservoir engineer at United Kingdom-based Premier Oil.

Just like her days on campus, gender balance is not something that she encounters at work. But she does not see it as an issue.

“Working at an oil and gas company has been my calling since I was a kid,” she said recently.

Yunita is among the few women pursuing a career in the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) industries. The field has always been associated with men and is intimidating for women, but not for her.

“When your environment is supporting you, including your boss and your family, you can do any job, including in the STEM industries,” she said.

However, not many women in Indonesia are on the same page as Yunita.

Data from the Central Statistics Agency (BPS) in 2017, showed that only 30 percent of women were working in the STEM industries in the country.

“This is interesting because many women are interested in studying STEM during their college years but the number decreases significantly at work as many decide to work outside their majors,” said Arie Mega Prastiwi, a research coordinator at online research and news outlet Katadata, at a discussion on women in the STEM industries last week.

Data compiled by Katadata showed that 80.7 percent of biology students were female, while in chemistry they dominated with 66.8 percent.

However, the number was not reflected in the field, Arie added. Only three of 10 women in Indonesia pursued professional careers in the STEM industry, the finding later revealed.

“Around 61 percent of women take gender stereotypes into consideration when they are looking for jobs and 45 percent of them believe that working in the STEM industries is not suitable for women,” she said.

The patriarchal culture also shaped many women into believing the unspoken rules of what women were capable or not capable of doing, said Melanie Masriel, the director of communications, public affairs and sustainability at PT L’Oreal Indonesia.

“Women are stereotyping themselves into what they can and cannot do. They are limiting themselves. This is what we must change,” she added.

The company has cooperated with UNESCO to improve the situation and reduce the gender gap in the STEM fields across the globe.

Encouraging women in the STEM industries, Melanie said, would have a larger impact as it would be an advantage for the overall social economy. Moreover, STEM companies hiring women will also gain feminine values that benefited the company.

Vanny Narita, a researcher and chief executive officer of strategic communications firm PT AmonRA, said flexibility issues were still hindering women from working in the STEM industries because the workplace environment was not women friendly.

Starting small, such as providing facilities for working women such as daycare centers, lactation rooms, longer maternity leave and flexible working hours would be significant step to encourage women to work in STEM fields, she added.

“This is not an individual woman issue per se, this is a societal problem. So we need an integrated effort from the government, companies and for the environment to change it,” Vanny said.

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