Globally, women’s participation in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math related disciplines remains low, especially in Engineering. However, most of the programs at Ashesi are STEM and the Engineering Department as well as the Computer Science (CS), and Management Information Systems (MIS) departments at Ashesi have been successful in attracting and enrolling relatively high numbers of female students. Ashesi uses several direct and indirect approaches to encourage female students into its STEM programs.
Website
The Ashesi website is consistent in showcasing both male and female members of its community. Its statistics page disaggregates data to highlight the higher-than-average proportion of women that make up the Ashesi community
Female Representation
On average fifty percent of Ashesi’s faculty, administrators and staff are female. Often Ashesi is represented by women in spaces where most universities are represented by men.
Chief Academic Officers of African Universities are often men, but Ashesi is different.
A Robust Supportive Application Process
One strategy to get good talent is building a strong admissions pipeline that supports applicants throughout the application process. Female students are more likely to be unfamiliar with the process and thus need guidance completing the application. An integral part of our process has been a feedback system where we obtain students’ feedback on our application process to help us improve. We try as much as possible to make sure the process is friendly to every applicant to increase their chances of completing and submitting the application forms.
Ashesi Outreach Program
We are also very intentional about school visits to urban, peri urban and rural areas speaking at programs to encourage brilliant girls to apply for STEM-related courses. We focus on students at girls high schools and ask women associations to serve as advocates. A few of the several girls’ high schools we recruit students from include Alliance Girl’s High School and Precious Blood Girls’ High School (Kenya); Arundel (Zimbabwe); and Aburi Girls Senior High, St. Mary’s Senior High, St. Roses Senior High and Wesley Girls High School (Ghana).
School and Family Visits
We also receive parents and schools at our beautiful campus to have a firsthand experience of our culture. Girls from the African Science Academy are frequent visitors each year to our campus as part of their college tour initiative.
School Programs
The Ashesi Innovation Experience (AIX), a two-week program which provides high school students insights on transition to college has also been a major talent recruiting conduit into Ashesi. The Engineering and Robotics modules of AIX often intrigue to female participants many of whom return to study in Ashesi’s STEM programs.
Testimonials of Female STEM Students and Graduates
Testimonials of continuing STEM female students and graduates inspire other girls to consider careers and programs in STEM. This is an example of a testimonial.
Partners
Our partners such as CAMFED, MCF among others consistently provide us opportunities to reach and enroll female students in STEM. For example, Linda, with support from CAMFED and the Mastercard Foundation, attended Ashesi University in Ghana and is currently employed by CAMFED.
We are encouraged to recruit both men and female students as we see value in not only diversity but balance.