Ashesi believes it takes commitment to ensure enrollment diversity which contributes to different perspectives to help shape Africa’s future products, policies, and infrastructure. If Africa is to experience inclusive economic growth, we must recruit more women, minorities, and the poor to our universities.

Consequently, Ashesi tracks its students from application to graduation paying attention to gender, socio-economic status, and country of origin.

Typically, at Ashesi, more male candidates apply than female. However, Ashesi strives to admit as many females as male students. For the past 5 years a minimum of 150 – 160 female students have been admitted to the 175 to 180 males. In 2022 for the first time more females were admitted, 193 to 181, female to male respectively.

Ashesi is in Ghana, and it is not surprising that more male and female applicants come from Ghana than from other African countries.

Different STEM programs, specifically, engineering, computer science and information systems, and business administration attract females differently. More male students apply for engineering and computer science than females, and it is the reverse for business administration. In 2022 there was a negligible difference in male and female counts in engineering and business administration:

The number of female students matriculated in 2022 were more than the male counterparts for the first time in the past 5 years.

The table below shows tracking of male to female graduation rates over a 4-year period: