Brecha de género en orientaciones de bachillerato. Caso de Uruguay

This paper constitutes a first attempt to investigate the factors that underlie the gender gap existing in the choice of upper secondary courses in Uruguay. The paper aims to contribute in the understanding of the factors that account for the underrepresentation of women in STEM fields and courses demonstrating that there is an existing leaky pipeline. Discrete choice models (probit) and multinomial logistic models have been estimated using a retrospective survey applied in 2014 to Uruguayan young students who took the PISA test in 2009; finding that academic achievements, socioeconomic characteristics, attitude toward education and self-reported motives, influence the rational choices of individuals in upper secondary education. In fact, after controlling for socioeconomic and academic variables, it is observed that being female decreases the probability of choosing scientific courses in 8.7 percentage points. Furthermore, having repeated a grade before the age of 15 decreases the likelihood that women will opt for scientific courses, while it is not significant in the choice of men. Moreover, high reading performance at PISA test at age 15 increases the likelihood that both men and women will choose scientific courses. Better understanding of the factors that underlie the gender gap in STEM fields is necessary to design public policies capable of promoting gender equality and economic growth.