THE STEM SISTERHOOD

WHY ARE WOMEN SO UNDERREPRESENTED IN STEM?

As a global health technology company that attracts world-class scientific researchers and developers, we've asked ourselves this question often. We do a lot in our communities to address the issue, and in 2012, we also started a high school STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) internship that has changed how we recruit.

In the United States, women only make up 24 percent of the STEM workforce, way below most other sectors. Sterile lab coats and safety glasses, so often associated with these occupations, don't accurately convey the creative thinking needed to solve our world's biggest problems.

We know that high school girls over index on creative thinking and are more likely to seek a career that has a positive impact on the world. The good news is, these skills are precisely what's needed in tomorrow's STEM pioneers. Our biggest problems cannot be solved without smart, imaginative thinking and the desire to make lasting change.

We also know that hands-on, creative experiences encourage girls to engage in STEM and related subject fields, which is why we continue to invest in our high school STEM internship program. The internship aims to demystify what it means to work in STEM by giving students the opportunity to contribute to our life-changing technologies alongside engineers and scientists who look like them. Because we choose students from diverse schools near the cities where we work, about two-thirds of these students from across the U.S. are women and about 60 percent are minorities. About half of them end up in our college internship program, and we've recently hired our first high school internship alumnae on as full-time employees.

But we’re not stopping there. We need more women in STEM, and more STEM mentors, and we know the perfect women for the job.

Meet our STEM Sisters. A select group of incredible women who are making a difference through STEM fields at Abbott, every single day.