Sciences and Technology at the Universidad Mayor de San Simón: The faculty that loved (more) boys

Abstract

This study focuses on the Faculty of Science and Technology at the Universidad Mayor de San Simón (Cochabamba, Bolivia), as it constitutes one of its largest faculties (the second in terms of student population and the first in terms of faculty population) and one of the most male-dominated. Understanding the gender perspective as a relational lens that, when applied in the field of education, examines practices, representations, imaginaries, and discourses that reinforce the supremacy of one gender, the first part identifies degree programs according to their level of masculinization, while the second part explores the testimonies of social actors to examine the representations constructed around the factors conditioning gender inequalities among students and faculty in both male- and female-dominated programs. The study combines both quantitative and qualitative approaches in order to establish statistical scenarios, as well as to analyze gender-related factors that influence young people in their choice of career, access to teaching assistantships, professional success, and other aspects within traditionally male-dominated fields of knowledge, with the aim of supporting, in the future, the development of university policies that are more inclusive of half of society and that contribute to the construction of more just and equitable societies.