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Today, women are actively participating in science, while the number of women among the world's top scientists is growing. Women still face a lot of obstacles in science which can be summed up using metaphors such as the glass ceiling, the sticky floor and the glass cliff. The role of women in research excellence is still an issue, as well as their low numbers in top positions. That is why policy changes are needed to tap women's talents and resources to the full. For much of history, women were officially excluded from the scientific realm. This volume shows that, despite the invisibility of women in the historical narrative of mainstream science, it does not mean that science was always exclusively a man's world.

Experts say that lack of respect for teaching, public perception are two main causes of the shortage of STEM graduates in the U.S. In the president's FY12 budget, $206 million would go to STEM training programs. According to a panel of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education experts and industry leaders, the United States is still falling short of producing the number of STEM graduates needed to fill 21st-century jobs – and panelists said the problem can be traced to to a lack of support for teachers.

Sanghvi's five-year career at Facebook underscores the meritocratic nature of the startup world, where a bright, young engineer like Sanghvi, who was raised in the industrial town of Pune, India, and didn't regularly use a computer until her freshman year of college, could play a key role in shaping one of the world's most influential web companies.

Henrike Paetz, Communication Director SAP Research about Gender and Technology, answers to the three questions on the occasion of her Master Thesis "Femal Factor in Software Design".

Women in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) make 86 cents on the male dollar. That’s way better than the gap in the law which was 77 cents on the male dollar just one year ago. STEM needs far more women in it ranks. Only one out of every seven engineers is female and only 24 percent of those who work in all STEM fields are women.

Take a look at the senior management of Apple. Every senior executive is male. At IBM, it's 10 of 12. And at Texas Instruments, it's 3 of 12. Then consider how many technology companies have a female CEO. There's Yahoo, of course. Xerox. Hon Hai Precision Industries, Apple's biggest contract manufacturer. Then it gets more difficult. Indeed, there are a number of top women executives slightly below the CEO level. But why so few at the top? Given that women are more than half the population and that young women now outnumber men in graduate schools, there ought to be more. Surely, as far as consumption of technology products goes, from iPhones to Kindles, women are a huge market.

Paper about the study, which examined whether the design of virtual learning environments influences undergraduates’ enrollment intentions and anticipated success in introductory computer science courses. The results showed that changing the design of a virtual classroom – from one that conveys current computer science stereotypes to one that does not – significantly increased women’s interest and anticipated success in computer science. Gender disparities in interest and anticipated success in the stereotypically designed classroom were mediated by women’s lower sense of belonging in that environment

Numerous studies document the frustrations - personal and professional - of women who pursue science careers in higher education. Many of these women complain about unfair treatment, as well as frustrations that come with being in the minority (sometimes the extreme minority) in their departments. The National Science Foundation is supporting a research project to focus more attention on STEM faculty at community colleges, where men and women are about 50-50 in faculty positions over all, and where women make up 47.7 percent of STEM faculty (compared to about one third at four-year institutions). Researchers who are part of a team at Ohio University studying the issue gave an overview of initial findings here at the annual meeting of the American Sociological Association.

Dozens of school-age kids gathered at the Tech Museum in downtown San Jose for a day of hacking. Armed with laptop computers, the youngsters hunkered down around tables, and in bean-bag chairs on the floor, to learn from a team of veteran hackers, most of them young engineers at Silicon Valley startups.