More women working as professors in almost all Dutch universities

Women still lag behind in science, and this is changing only slowly. The share of women working as professors increased by 1.1 percentage points last year, according to the annual monitor of the National Network of Women Professors.

This is slightly faster than in the past two years when the growth rate remained below 1 per cent. If the trend continues like this, it could take another 20 years before we have as many men as women working as professors.

In Utrecht, the percentage of women working as professors rose from 30.2 to 31.9 per cent. This puts UU in fourth place among Dutch universities.

No outliers
There are no outliers, but Tilburg is the university where the percentage increased the most: 2.1 per cent. At Erasmus University Rotterdam, it actually went down by 0.2 per cent.

Open University is the only one that has been above 40 per cent for years. Maastricht follows with 36 per cent. Most universities are around 30 per cent, with the exception of Erasmus University. TU Delft is the laggard.

© HOP. In fte. Graph excludes healthcare.

The LNVH network asked universities in 2020 about their targets for 2025. Four out of 14 have met this percentage: Erasmus University, Tilburg University, Open University and the University of Amsterdam.

The network predicts that eight universities will "fail to meet their target at this rate." Thus, the national figure of at least 31.2 per cent of professors being women is also expected to be missed.

Full-time
Women are just slightly more likely to work full-time than men. The figures above have been converted to full-time jobs (FTE). If you look at the number of people (regardless of the size of their appointment), the percentage of female professors is not 28.7 but 28.3 per cent.

The figures for teaching hospitals are not in the national staff figures. The LNVH therefore made its own enquiries. Among UMCs, the proportion is 31.6 per cent, with 39.3 per cent at the Free University and 27.8 per cent in Rotterdam.

Dark clouds
The network fears for the future, given the planned budget cuts to higher education and research. "Dark clouds are gathering over the sector," the press release reads. Issues such as gender equality and diversity will come under pressure, the LNVH predicts. "People in precarious positions, often women as this Monitor once again shows, are even more vulnerable as a result."

Caspar van de Berg, president of UNL, the association of Dutch universities, commented: "The Monitor shows that we still have a long way to go towards equal representation in science." He does, however, call it encouraging that, according to the Monitor, enough women are working in science to become professors when men retire.