STEM, Gender and AP

                            STEM, Gender, and AP

Discrimination in its numerous subtle guises is offered to explain the differences in STEM gender disparities. But here’s another possible explanation for the female shortages in STEM and economics starting in high school: Boys have a greater interest than their female counterparts in STEM and economics and demonstrate a higher level of aptitude in STEM and economics. In all 14 STEM and economics AP subjects as shown in the top two graphs, high school boys out-perform high school girls based on average test scores in 2019. More high school boys than girls received scores of 5 (the highest score) in the 13 subjects, and in some cases (three of the physics subjects) the male-female ratio was more than 4-to-1. In other subjects (Microeconomics, Computer Science and Physics Mechanics), the male-female ratio was greater than 2-to-1.

These graphs are from Perry.