January 2020
Featured in this insight: Education, Manufacturing, engineering & industrial, Children & young people
Survey finds more young people open to career in engineering: The results of the latest annual survey by EngineeringUK have been published and reveal some encouraging findings for the engineering sector.
The Engineering Brand Monitor polled more than 2,500 young people (aged 7 to 19 years) and found 45% would consider a career in engineering. This is a significant increase from 2016 when 37% said the same.
The survey also questioned members of the public (1,800) as well as STEM secondary teachers (1,000) with 80% of the teachers polled and 68% of parents believing that following a career in engineering would be desirable for their students or children. Nine out of ten STEM teachers (90%) and 69% of parents held positive views of engineering, according to the survey.
The research also revealed the effectiveness of STEM outreach with those who had attended a STEM careers activity in the last year, three times more likely to explore an engineering focussed career.
Knowledge of engineering
Looking at the level of knowledge about engineering held by respondents, almost a quarter of 11 to 19 year-olds said they 'knew a lot' or 'quite a lot' about what a career in engineering would entail, however there were clear gender differences in perceptions about engineering.
The survey found that while 30% of boys (11 to 19 years) knew 'a lot' or 'quite a lot' about what people working in engineering did, just 18% of girls said the same.
Almost seven in ten boys (69%) said that if they wanted to, they would be capable of following a career in engineering, compared to 54% of girls.
Gender differences around the perceptions of engineering were also evident in the younger age group polled, with 59% of boys aged 7 to 11 viewing engineering positively, compared to 41% of girls. Seven out of ten boys (70%) in this age group said they would like to pursue a career in engineering, compared with just 49% of girls.
