Encouraging Female Engineers When Jess Stone tells people she is training to become an engineer, they often remark that she does not look like the kind of person who would "fix a boiler." According to the 23-year-old, who works for aerospace company Airbus, there's "a bit of a misunderstanding around the term engineer. Oily overalls? These ideas are so outdated." While 47 percent of the UK workforce is female, the figure for those working in core engineering occupations is just 12 percent. In engineering businesses, it is only 9 percent, according to Engineering UK. "Times have changed. There has been progress but it's still a male bastion," says Margaret Craddock, who has spent 33 years in the sector. She recalls one eager salesman visiting her site office 30 years ago and asking her, when she was the co-owner of a machinery business, "Is there anybody important here?" More recently, she has also heard men ask women in the sector, "Are you a real engineer?" In her current role as BatchLine Division lead with Dyer Engineering, a fabrication and machining business in County Durham, Craddock does come across women, but mostly in engineering purchasing departments. "But when you get to welding and machining, it's a harsh environment. It's noisy, it's dangerous," she says. With a retiring workforce and technology creating new opportunities, engineering in Britain is suffering from severe skills shortages, and new blood is urgently needed. According to Engineering UK's 2018 report, the sector has an annual demand for 124,000 engineers and technicians with core engineering skills but faces a shortfall of up to 59,000 every year. Engineering offers exciting prospects and fascinating work. "I really enjoy the technical challenges," says Emilie Weaving, a mechanical development engineer working for construction equipment manufacturer JCB. Salaries are also good. According to Engineering UK, graduates with an engineering and technology degree had an average starting salary of around 30,000, above the all-subject average of 24,500. Despite eager recruits like Ms. Weaving and Ms. Stone, the lack of diversity in UK engineering, which is also reflected in the low intake of people from black, Asian, and minority ethnic backgrounds, is a concern for the sector. When it comes to international comparisons, the United Kingdom scores poorly. According to Hayaatun Sillem, Chief Executive of the Royal Academy of Engineering, it "has the lowest proportion of female professional engineers of any European country." But that is not to say that this is only a British issue; proportions are low across the continent. Recruitment isn't the only issue; there's also a retention problem. A 2017 report from the Institution of Mechanical Engineers said that within a few years of gaining an engineering degree, just under half of the United Kingdom's female engineering graduates were leaving the profession, while two-thirds of male engineers remained. Clearly, this is a huge waste of women's potential. Critically evaluate the factors that have caused low participation of female engineering. To include references