Defining Equity Indicators for Benchmarking Women's Participation in Science and Engineering Faculties across Canada

This paper demonstrates the use of national and regional data sets to address the multidimensional question of equity for women in Canadian science and engineering faculties. Unbalanced representation of women in science and engineering fields has been described as a “pipeline problem” reflecting both insufficient flow of women into science and engineering positions and leakage or attrition of women from the field. This research explores the problem by comparing male and female science and engineering faculty with respect to the following equity indicators: representation among full-time faculty at Canadian universities, financial compensation, recruitment into full-time faculty positions, career progress in terms of tenure and promotion, and attrition from full-time faculty positions.