Well, as a mathematician myself (one might even say a celebrity mathematician – I was the “mathmo” on Beauty and the Geek in the UK), I’m always glad to see anyone get into maths. However, one thing that’s always interested me is if you look at the split of the sexes at both Undergrad and Postgrad level.

I’m a 3rd year at the moment, and if I look around an average lecture, I tend to see a split of about 75/25 boys to girls. Next, look at PG level – you get very few girls – I know quite a number of Postgrads, only 1 of whom is a girl, so I would suspect a 90/10 split. At Professor/Doctor level, this split seems to be even more acute, looking at the staff for the Department – I can only think of 1 female lecturer or faculty member off the top of my head, and I know most of the department since I’m president of the Maths Society.

Now, obviously it’d be great to see more girls take maths at Uni level (my girlfriend is a great example of this), but I think it’s another challenge all together to get girls to take the study to Doctorate/Professorship level.

Jamie Sawyer

Well, as a mathematician myself (one might even say a celebrity mathematician – I was the “mathmo” on Beauty and the Geek in the UK), I’m always glad to see anyone get into maths. However, one thing that’s always interested me is if you look at the split of the sexes at both Undergrad and Postgrad level.

I’m a 3rd year at the moment, and if I look around an average lecture, I tend to see a split of about 75/25 boys to girls. Next, look at PG level – you get very few girls – I know quite a number of Postgrads, only 1 of whom is a girl, so I would suspect a 90/10 split. At Professor/Doctor level, this split seems to be even more acute, looking at the staff for the Department – I can only think of 1 female lecturer or faculty member off the top of my head, and I know most of the department since I’m president of the Maths Society.

Now, obviously it’d be great to see more girls take maths at Uni level (my girlfriend is a great example of this), but I think it’s another challenge all together to get girls to take the study to Doctorate/Professorship level.

Jamie Sawyer