The Government has moved to address a long-standing and serious gender imbalance affecting Ireland and indeed most OECD countries - a shortage of women engaged in science and engineering research.
Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment Micheál Martin last week announced a €1 million programme aimed at bringing women science graduates back into the labs. Science Foundation Ireland will administer the three schemes, one of which provides scholarship support for female Leaving Cert students who decide to pursue science or engineering at third level.
The programme is not just about gender equality, according to the Minister. The Government has set us on a path towards a knowledge-based economy in which the currency is not traded goods but traded ideas and knowledge. In pursuit of this, it has greatly increased the amount of State support flowing into Ireland's research labs. Research and the efforts of scientists and engineers is what makes such an economy work, but its success depends on a steady supply of high-quality researchers. And here is the rub. Ireland will need to recruit an additional 12,500 researchers through 2010 if it is to meet EU targets for research spending. Where are these researchers to come from given that this is beyond the current capacity of our universities?
One source of supply is the large number of women science and engineering graduates who decided not to remain in science. Although women make up almost half of science graduates and post-graduates, they only account for 14 per cent of the top academic and research posts in European third-level institutions, according to the EU's new report, Women and Science: Excellence and Innovation-Gender Equality in Science. A "leaky pipeline" is the inelegant but apt term used to describe the loss of these graduates who represent a valuable resource on our doorstep, provided of course that they can be coaxed back into the workforce. The challenge, and the goal set by the new SFI Women in Science & Engineering Research Initiative, is to bring these women back into the labs by offering funding to help them make the return to research. The scholarship scheme for Leaving students is meant to help replenish the leaking pipeline according to Trinity College vice-provost, Prof Jane Grimson, the SFI board member who helped push the programme through.
Will the new scheme have any impact? Prof Grimson acknowledged that there have been many reports and recommendations, but precious little progress so far. Yet it must work if Ireland is to achieve the goal of an economy driven by the power and creativity of the mind.