Career: Future without a doubt

Caroline Schalk is 19 years old and has just graduated from high school with the highest possible grades in physics and math. Her parents both work in engineering, and Caroline Schalk had known for a long time that she also wanted to become an engineer. That is, until she began to become intimidated by the degree course, developing what she called an “irrational fear”. She suddenly had the feeling that others were ahead of her, and she no longer had the confidence to pursue the subject. So she moved further and further away from her original plans, researched business administration courses and ultimately pictured herself in a lecture hall for “International Business”.

Where did this sudden fear come from? Why did Caroline, who had good grades in science subjects, clear hopes for a technical career and her parents as role models, lose her nerve? Caroline says she thought that others – especially boys – were much further ahead than she was. They might have started programming, developing and building things themselves years ago, while she herself had no idea about any of that. Even with her mother as a role model, she had the feeling that technical degree courses were still “a man’s world” and that many around her unconsciously assumed that “men are simply more suited to it than women”.

Caroline Schalk’s thoughts are not only reflected in the student numbers at German universities and colleges, but they are also in line with research that has already asked numerous questions about why young women decide against STEM subjects, even though they have excellent grades in the relevant school subjects. Electrical engineering, together with computer science and mechanical engineering, are the least popular courses of study for women, who consistently make up well below 20 percent of the numbers.

Self-confidence is not innate, but is shaped by the environment

A VDE study on the image of electrical engineering also identified reasons that deter young women from studying electrical engineering. Some of the girls interviewed said that electrical engineering is a male domain, and also that they were afraid of not measuring up in this subject. They imagine that this profession would not be good for them personally, and that they could mess something up. Study leader Dr. Maya Götz writes: “People’s own beliefs that ‘the female mind is weaker’ and ‘men have more self-confidence and potential for aggression’ develop into aversion factors that deter them from this field of study.”

Psychologist and psychological psychotherapist Alina Zinn knows all about self-doubt. Her practice is often visited by women whose insecurities hold them back in their professional lives; she has developed a self-confidence booster program to support women in this. It is important to understand, says Zinn, that self-confidence – like self-doubt – is not innate, so it has nothing to do with gender. “Depending on how we grow up, how we are socialized and the people around us, we develop certain patterns in our thinking, feeling and behavior.” A great deal depends on the reinforcement and confirmation we receive from our personal environment. This strongly influences whether someone feels capable and empowered to achieve something – or thinks that others are better. According to Zinn, especially overprotected children whose parents do not expect too much from them, could later come to assume that they always need help. And that applies to boys just as much as girls.

And yet the level of confidence children develop in different school subjects diverges very early on; according to the OECD’s Gender Equality Report, in the first year of primary school, girls already have less confidence in their math abilities than boys, even if their performance is the same. And in the 2022 PISA study, 19.7 percent of girls reported feeling anxious in math lessons, compared to 9.8 percent of boys.

Such assumptions can then have a self-reinforcing effect: “If I assume I can’t do math, then maybe I won’t study for the exam, and I won’t be interested – it’s like a self-fulfilling prophecy,” says Alina Zinn. Your own assumption is confirmed and the thought pattern becomes entrenched, turning into a vicious circle.

In Caroline Schalk’s case, it was her father, the engineer, who kept asking why she had abandoned her career aspirations. “He told me not to throw away my talent,” says Caroline Schalk. She is now leaning towards a technical degree again; perhaps she will steer a middle course, she says, and is currently looking into how and where she could study business engineering.

Find out what’s important to you and question negative thought patterns

Marleen Stollberg graduated from high school with Caroline Schalk. She has complete confidence in her abilities in a demanding subject. She wants to study mathematics. “I just find math incredibly fascinating,” she says. This has no doubt contributed to her excellent grades. She is the only one of her friends who has decided to study a scientific subject. When she tells people who don’t know her that well about it, they sometimes say things like: you do know that math at university will be different from school math lessons? That you will only study with boys? Won’t that be too much for you? Marleen is facing a fair amount of resistance to her unusual choice of degree course, but she holds her own well. To those close to her, she has long since “made it clear what I want”. So studying math is already part of the image she has of herself, and the vision of who she could one day become. She knows clearly what she is interested in, has done her research and deliberately sought out female role models. Marleen admires mathematician Emmy Noether, who earned the respect of the scientific community in the early 20th century with fundamental contributions to algebra and theoretical physics, and follows Cambridge graduate Ellie Sleightholm, who explores math, physics, space travel and programming on her You Tube channel.

This clarity is important, says Nathalie Emas. She is a coach and primarily advises and supports women who want to change and develop professionally. It’s important to ask yourself: what is important to me personally, what drives me, where do I set myself apart from others? Emas also calls this “empathic self-management”, meaning telling yourself where you want to go and what suits you, while not being too hard on yourself. This also includes questioning negative thought patterns: why do I think this job doesn’t suit me? Why do I think I can’t do that? In order to make good decisions, you need “a certain openness towards yourself, and a flexibility of thought”, says Emas.

Networks could be really helpful here. Talking to others who are in the same situation and have the same doubts and similar ideas strengthens your self-esteem. Emas also emphasizes how important those around us are for self-confidence. “We all have uncertainties and doubts – but that’s precisely when we should allow ourselves to question things, to think again about what we can do and what we want.” This questioning can be encouraged through mentoring programs, for instance. Or you can seek collective support yourself, for example by joining relevant networks.

Don’t wait for role models to appear – be one yourself!

It seems that women are often unable to picture themselves in technical professions and therefore choose not to study electrical engineering. Sarah Hillmann has a different story: the 22-year-old is in her fourth semester of an electrical engineering course at Merseburg University of Applied Sciences. Strangely enough, she was never particularly good at math or physics. However, she had always been fascinated by chemistry, and was interested in gadgets. “I liked tinkering with things.” So she found out which degree courses matched her interests and ended up in electrical engineering. She took a close look at the timetable in advance and immediately thought that some modules looked interesting, and others less so. Even today, she still likes some things (the practical aspects) better than others (the theory). “But you get that in every subject,” she says.

Electrical engineering is clearly still male-dominated at her university too. “I’m the only woman on my course.” But that doesn’t bother her: “After all, studying is only one aspect of my life.” Also: “What good would it do me to wait for a bunch of women to suddenly turn up here for me to take my cue from?” She’d rather be the role model herself!

Anna-Elisa Jakob is a journalist from Hamburg.