Careers

Women get to Work:

Let’s go back a 100 years to 1915. As a woman it would be 1 more year until you could become a policewoman with full powers and 5 more years until the snappily titled Sex Discrimination Removal Act allowed you to become a lawyer, a vet or civil servant (the first female solicitor was appointed in 1922). You would have to wait 7 years (until 1922) to be allowed to inherit property equally with your husband and a whole 13 years before you gained equal voting rights with men. If you were 15 in 1915, you would be 65 before you saw your first female minister of state (Barbara Castle) and 70 before The Equal Pay Act of 1970. At 85 years old you would be able to celebrate the amendment to The Equal Pay Act which finally introduced equal pay for work of equal value. In theory.

Women at War

With all this mind you might wonder what part women played in the labour market back in 1915? In the early 20th century women could be found working in a variety of settings including textiles and clothing factories, coal and tin mines as well as commerce and agriculture. Four years earlier, the census of 1911 showed that 28% of all employed women were in domestic service. (Think below stairs in “Downton Abbey”). Meanwhile, the majority of upper and middle class women did not work for a living although some might be found pursuing “respectable” professions such as teaching or nursing. There were, in fact, over 200 female doctors by this time but that’s another story. (See www. womanandhersphere.com for a fascinating article about the war). The outbreak of war in 1914 clearly had an impact on women and work. Many women were recruited into jobs left vacant by the men who had gone off to fight. This meant that 600,000 women went to work in what had been male dominated roles in industry. In addition, new jobs were created which fed directly into the war effort. Our local area had an important role to play as many of the region’s companies switched their production to weapons and shells. If you look closely at the photograph you can see women munitions workers (being supervised by men, of course) at the works of the Yorkshire and Lancashire Railway Company at Horwich. It is no surprise then that the employment rate for women increased during the war from about 24% of the population in 1914 to 47% (according to some figures) in 1918. And what’s more, 40% of women workers were married. 100 years later in 2015 more women are in work than ever before. 14 million now have jobs. In 2013, the female employment rate reached 67.2%, the highest since the Office for National Statistics’ records began. In the interests of symmetry, it is worth pointing out that women today make up 47% of the UK workforce (see www. opportunitynow.bitc.org.uk/WomenWorkFactsheet). Now where have we heard that figure before?

Bolton Girls buck the trend

Since we’ve leapt forwards to the 21st century let’s stay here and focus on some of the progress we have made in male dominated roles. There is absolutely no question of there being any kind of inequality when it comes to students at Bolton School. Much of the Careers programme in the Sixth Form is shared with the boys and access to opportunities is free of bias. Without banging the drum in support of single-sex education too loudly however, it is clear that at Bolton girls are bucking a national trend by showing their passionate interest in studying Science at A Level and beyond. Too many articles in the national press over the past few years have headlines like that in The Independent (December 2014): How can we encourage more girls to study Science? Statistics published by Ofsted show that more than 40% of girls who sit AS Physics nationally do not continue onto A2, compared with 29% of boys. At Bolton School Girls’ Division it is often half that figure. It is most likely, for example, that 70% of this year’s cohort, often only half, will take Physics to A2 and each year a number of girls pursue the subject at degree level. It was no surprise then that last Autumn Term the specialist careers day on Engineering attracted a great deal of attention from girls in Years 10 and upwards. The keynote speaker, Kate Bellingham, TV presenter of many science programmes, was followed by a whole range of different talks, some of which were delivered by old girls working in varied fields of Engineering. One of them, Shakti Patel (left in 2011), is studying Aeronautical Engineering at Loughborough University and is presently on an industrial placement at MBDA. Amy Williams (nee Worsell, left 1997) spoke about her experience of being a civil engineer and her role as a contracts manager with the Highways Agency. Both are inspirational role models for any young woman. You can read more about Amy and Shakti on page (51) of this magazine.

Amy Williams with pupils in Years 10 and 11.

Women get to Work: from 1915 to 2015

Closing the “Gender Gap”

Before we become too complacent, however, it is interesting to note that a report on a study of students at 7 universities, published by Oxford University’s Careers Service this March, laments the “gender gap” for graduates (www.ox.ac.uk/news). Not only do fewer female graduates secure graduate-level jobs than their male counterparts 6 months after leaving university – the short fall is 9% - but there is a pay disparity, too. On average the young women who took part in the study accepted £4000 less for their first job! This year the Careers Department have ensured that girls are more aware of the variety of jobs available to them and what they can do to compete with the best. In March, all Year 12s listened to a fascinating talk from Charlie Ball, old boy and Deputy Director of Research at Graduate Prospects. He explored the reasons why it still makes economic sense to go to university and what the changing job market really looks like once you graduate. Some weeks later, the illuminating talk from Martin Birchall, Managing Director of High Fliers Research and the editor of The Times’ Top 100 Graduate Companies, was extremely well attended by parents and pupils from Year 9 upwards. Perhaps these events will help to equip students to go out and close that “gender gap” in the years to come. It is clear that girls who are leaving Bolton School in 2015 have so many more opportunities available to them than their “sisters” 100 years ago. If young women are going to get to work in the 21st century on a truly equal footing however, they need to develop the grit and determination to ask more of themselves and the confidence and self-belief to make it happen, whatever their ambition. Beth Lowe Head of Careers and Higher Education

Shakti Patel with pupils in Years 10 and 11.

Engineering at Cambridge

Tejal (Class of 2014) writes to tell us about her first year studying Engineering (traditionally a male-dominated subject) at Cambridge. “Choosing to study Engineering, for me, was really about applying maths and physics to solving problems in the real world. Doing work experience with BAE Systems and Rolls Royce allowed me to see how creatively scientific principles can be applied, and really inspired me to get involved with projects like the Engineering Education Scheme and Headstart. I was thrilled to receive undergraduate scholarships from the Reece Foundation (Arkwright Trust), the IMechE and the IET, and have had some great networking opportunities as a result. The first year Engineering course at Cambridge has been intense but extremely enjoyable, and the supervision style of teaching really encourages you to approach problem-solving differently. Over the summer, I’m looking forward to starting an undergraduate research placement in Mechanical Vibrations. In the photo, which is from one of her Michaelmas supervisions, Tejal is winding the Trinity Clock.