In today’s job market, there is a gap between supply and demand for STEM profiles. There request by companies for competent profiles in the areas scientific/technologicalIndeed, far exceeds the offer. This is because technology, nowadays, develops at exponential speeds and the education system cannot keep up with this speed.
This problem is also due to persistent gender gap – that is, the difference between men and women – which in this field is still very evident. A low number of women in STEM subjects means that there is a low number of people specialized in these subjects. Let’s see in this article what the data tells us and what the reasons behind these problems are.
In STEM areas, demand exceeds supply
According to the World Economic Forum’s Jobs of the Future report, the 65% of today’s children will do jobs that don’t yet exist. In short, the digital transition is changing the way we work, and the demand for competent profiles in scientific areas is increasingly high.
According to the latest study by the Digital Skills Observatory of the National Association of ICT Companies, i.e. Information Technology, thesupply of jobs in the IT and technological fields it’s about the double that of available professionals in this sector. This means that the demand for digital skills is growing at a much higher rate than the supply, i.e. compared to the ability of the Italian training system to churn out new qualified profiles.
And here something very important must be said: the demand for STEM profiles is not so high just because the study trains us from a practical point of view. We must understand that studying scientific subjects gives us something very precise: the reasoning ability and understanding complex topics even if they are outside our skills. Studying science opens the mind to challenges, stimulates the creative thinkingbecause its great objective is to find solutions.
This is why the market demands a large number of scientific and technological profilesbut there are not enough students who choose this path. And here we come to the statistics: how many students choose STEM subjects?
Why don’t students choose scientific studies if the job demand is so high?
According to data from Ministry of University and Research in the academic year 2024/2025, the enrolled in STEM subjects they were the 28% of the totala figure in line with recent years in which the data remained around 30%. And in itself, this is not a low percentage of students enrolled in scientific-technological subjects, it is in line with the European average. This is a low number of members if we compare it with the demand on the labor market.
The curve of those enrolled in STEM subjects, in fact, should grow over time with the growth of job positions which are increasingly greater in the scientific-technological field.
But why is it that if there is so much work in the scientific field, the number of students in this field is not increasing? The answer comes from the Almalaurea 2025 survey, which shows that students tend to choose the degree course more for personal and cultural motivationsand less for reasons related to the job offer.
In short, to bridge this gap between supply and demand, what must be done is to promote, raise awareness and stimulate interest in scientific subjects which – culturally – are considered more difficult and less accessible, especially for girls.
The gender gap in STEM: statistics and origin of the problem
An important premise must be made here: science has no gender. Anyone can study it. Yet the data still tells us about a gap, a difference between men and women that has roots in the past.
In 2025 the women they represented the majority of members total university students with a percentage of 56.7%. What is worrying is that of these students, only 19.8% he decided to pursue a career STEM. In fact, if we take the total number of “scientific” students, we see that approximately 63% are male and 37% female.
That means almost 2 out of 3 students are men and only a third women. It must be said, however, that the gap is narrowing, albeit very slowly.
But why do women tend to choose degrees in technical-scientific fields less? It is not easy to identify a single motivation, it is a combination of socio-cultural factors which for centuries have influenced and influence our way of thinking and seeing the world around us.
The difference in childhood experience
A first important point can be found, for example, inchildhood: education and games that are subjected to boys and girls are still different, and this profoundly influences an individual’s mindset, from an early age. In fact, male children tend to play more team sports, have fun with more logical games, such as playing cards, constructions, or even war and strategy games, while girls are often subjected to more social games, such as dolls or characters that interact with each other, play with fake kitchens or fake chests, or create accessories such as bracelets or necklaces. Clearly, things are changing today, but they have been like this for a long time and still partially are. The fact that children play more logical games could be a factor that pushes future university students towards more scientific subjects.
The problem of reference models
It must then be considered reference model problem: for many years, there have been few examples of successful women in science. Although things are changing today, the history of women in science has been long and tortuous.
Today, fortunately, things have changed and women have more space in the sciences, but we must keep in mind that for many years the presence of women was an exception. And there lack of models to follow strongly marks the will of young women who, not seeing themselves recognized in these subjects, will not then undertake the path of science. The stereotype that science or technological subjects are something masculine can be very discouraging, even today when things are actually changing. Especially if they Career prospects are limited.
The invisible barrier of Glass Ceiling
In many fields the so-called is still present Glass Ceilingthat invisible barrier which still today prevents women from accessing top positions for obstacles that are often difficult to identify and for this reason they are metaphorically called “glass obstacles”. Look at this graph: it shows how within the academic environment, as the academic rank increases, women decrease in percentage, going from 40% of female graduates to only 24% of full professors.
The fact that the female presence in the sciences is low is not only a gender and cultural problem, but it is also a economic issue of strong impact for our country.
Being able to direct women, but also men, towards the sciences would lead to a greater workforce and talent discovery in an increasingly expanding field. As we have already said, the demand for professionals in this sector is very high, and being able to fill it is a great factor in economic growth for Italy.
