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Designing a tool to engage girls in STEM careers

Women are seriously under-represented in careers relating to science, technology, engineering and maths (the STEM subjects) in the UK. The problem starts at school, where many girls who have done well in those subjects decide not to pursue them beyond the age of 16, believing that STEM careers are ‘for the boys’.

Explorations

Framing Opportunity

Generating Ideas

Build & Test

Timeline

October 2018 – January 2019

About

We joined with WISE, which has been working to raise the profile of women and girls in STEM since 1984, in its latest campaign to tackle these culturally engrained stereotypes. Our task was to build a tool that would help girls between the ages of 11 and 19 relate more easily to STEM-based careers, and to encourage them to stick with maths, physics, technology, computing or engineering all the way through school.

Screenshot of the first screen of My Skills My Life. It says "What is your personality type? Complete our quiz to discover your personality type, and see how your skills match up to Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM) careers."

We built an interactive game that helps students find out more about themselves and what they are good at. Students are asked a series of questions about the kind of person they are, and their answers are fed into an algorithm that matches them with three personality types. They are then shown pictures and profiles of women in STEM careers who share their personality, and a list of roles where their traits might be valuable. The idea is to reinforce the message that whatever kind of person they are, there’s a place for them in STEM.

Screenshot of My Skills My Life showing the results of the quiz. It says "Fantastic! You have matched with 3 personality types".

The new tool, My Skills My Life, was launched on 23 January at a ceremony attended by WISE’s patron, Princess Anne, and covered by BBC Radio Berkshire, BBC South Today and the Reading Chronicle. WISE hopes the publicity will help it bring the game to 200,000 girls over the coming months.

Read more of our story

A future for girls in maths and science

People

Maisie Bowes, Ian Hutchinson, Sharon Allen, Katherine Jennings, Dr Rebecca Bendayan

Disciplines

Behavioural insights, Kids and youth, Programming, Service design

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