- King’s College, London (33%) has the highest female representation in its Computer Science faculty
- Just 8% of the academics in the School of Computer Science at Birmingham University are women
- Oxbridge: Computer Science faculty at Cambridge (19%) has almost twice as many female academics as Oxford (10%), the top university in the UK
- Full list of universities and the % of female Computer Science academics available on request
London, 23rd February 2021 — Just 15% of academic staff in the Computer Science faculties of the UK’s leading universities are women, research by developer recruitment platform CodinGame reveals.
CodinGame research highlights the lack of female academic role models to inspire young women interested in studying Computer Sciences at one of the top 25 universities in the UK (according to Times Higher Education)1.
Of the 25, just one – King’s College, London (33%) – has more than 30% female representation in its Computer Science faculty. While, at two universities, Birmingham (8%) and Southampton (9%), women make up less than 10% of the academic staff.
The percentage of female academics in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Oxford, the UK’s top university, was one of the worst, with just 10% female representation.
Cambridge University, with 19% women and 81% men, has almost twice as many female academics in its Computer Science faculty as Oxford, but still less than one in five faculty members are women.
Studies have shown the importance of female role models in inspiring girls to pursue STEM fields, including Computer Sciences2, and going onto have a career in tech.
The tech industry as a whole continues to suffer from a lack of gender diversity, with women making up less than 20% of the tech workforce for IT jobs. The lack of girls choosing to study STEM subjects, particularly Computer Sciences, at university is a factor.
But CodinGame research shows that universities could and should be doing more to lead by example, by getting their own departments in order and addressing the percentage of female academics in their Computer Science faculties.
Table: UK universities with the highest % of female academics in their Computer Science faculties:
| University | % of female academics |
| King’s College, London | 33% |
| Cardiff | 24% |
| Newcastle | 20% |
| Cambridge | 19% |
| University College London | 17% |
Table: UK universities with the lowest % of female academics in their Computer Science faculties:
| University | % of female academics |
| Birmingham | 8% |
| Southampton | 9% |
| Oxford | 10% |
| Liverpool | 10% |
| Sussex | 11% |
Aude Barral, co-founder of developer recruitment platform CodinGame, comments:
“Women still account for less than 20% of the tech workforce, and the issue of gender diversity within the tech sector has been a talking point for years.
“Encouraging more women to study STEM subjects, and particularly Computer Sciences, at university, and inspire them to forge a career in tech, would be a step in the right direction to address the gender imbalance.
“But women continue to be underrepresented in STEM university courses, and Computer Sciences has the worst ratio of women to men of any of the STEM fields3.
“There could be a number of reasons why women aren’t choosing to study Computer Sciences to a higher level. But the importance of female role models to inspire young women shouldn’t be underestimated, nor should the lack of female academics teaching Computer Sciences in our leading universities.
“Our very best academic institutions should be leading by example. The huge gender disparity when it comes to faculty staff needs to be addressed, if we hope to encourage more young women to choose tech as their future career.”
—Ends—
Notes to editors
1 CodinGame took the top 25 UK universities as ranked by the Times Higher Education
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/student/best-universities/best-universities-uk
2 Girls in STEM: The importance of role models
https://news.microsoft.com/europe/features/girls-in-stem-the-importance-of-role-models/
3 Stemwomen.co.uk
https://www.stemwomen.co.uk/blog/2021/01/women-in-stem-percentages-of-women-in-stem-statistics
About CodinGame
CodinGame is a challenge-based training platform where programmers can improve their coding skills through gamified puzzles and challenges. The company’s approach has been designed to lead advanced developers to the next level while being noticed by top companies looking to hire tech talent. Headhunters and recruiters find the developers they need among our community of more than 2million passionate programmers. Recruiters can set candidates online skills tests to replace technical interviews with more insightful evidence of ability, and find coders they wouldn’t be able to identify through traditional hiring channels.
