Ahead of the International Day of Women and Girls in Science the event brought together women professionals in science and technology to reflect on visibility in the media and the challenges researchers face when communicating their work. The Meet-up marks the launch of the eighth edition of the #científiques initiative, which on 11 February will see nearly 600 women scientists give talks to around 40,000 students across Catalonia.
The Aula Magna at UAB Casa Convalescència was filled yesterday with women professionals in science and technology at the eighth #científiques Meet-up. The event focused on the visibility of women scientists in the media and addressed the challenges researchers face when communicating their work and offering expert opinions to the press.
The Meeting marks the launch of the #científiques initiative, jointly organised since 2019 by the Catalan Foundation for Research and Innovation (FCRI) and the Barcelona Institute of Science and Technology (BIST), with the collaboration of the Government of Catalonia, to mark the International Day of Women and Girls in Science on 11 February.
The #científiques initiative aims to highlight women’s contribution to science and technology and to inspire ten- to fourteen-year-old students across Catalonia through relatable, real-life female role models, helping to challenge gender stereotypes surrounding STEM disciplines.
At the opening of the event, Eduard Vallory i Subirà, Director General of BIST, highlighted the threefold aim of #científiques: “to break the invisibility of privilege, to do so through education, and to give visibility to what already exists: women who are doing top-level science and technology.”
Meanwhile, Miquel Gómez Clares, Director General of FCRI, stated: “#científiques is an initiative that fosters scientific vocations in schools through role models who break gender stereotypes and, at the same time, builds a sense of cohesion among women scientists from many different backgrounds.”
The role of the media
The main focus of the #Científiques Meet-up was the representation of science and technology professionals in the media. As an introduction, Pampa García Molina, Director of the Science Media Centre (SMC) Spain, presented the findings of the study Participation of women scientists as expert sources in the media: motivations and obstacles, carried out by SMC Spain in 2025 on the basis of a pioneering survey in Spain. The study shows that greater media exposure benefits male scientists by leading to more future appearances. It also finds that women scientists decline media invitations more often than their male counterparts, often for work–life balance reasons.
García Molina was then joined by researchers Sandra Acosta Verdugo, Head of a research group at the Barcelona Beta Brain Research Center (BBRC) of the Pasqual Maragall Foundation and Professor of Neuroanatomy at the University of Barcelona (UB), and Anna Sanchez Vidal, Associate Professor and researcher in the Marine Geosciences research group at UB. The discussion was moderated by Cristina Sáez Torres, Coordinator of the science section of the newspaper Ara.
The Meet-up also featured a talk by the scientist featured on the #científiques 2026 poster, Tamara Vázquez Schröder, a researcher at the BIST Community Institute of High Energy Physics (IFAE) and a member of CERN’s ATLAS scientific collaboration. Vázquez described her day-to-day work as a researcher and her studies into subatomic particle collisions, through which she aims to expand our understanding of the fundamental laws of nature.
The IFAE researcher Tamara Vázquez Schröder (left), and the Spanish Science Media Centre (SMC) director Pampa García Molina (right)
The closing session included contributions from the Rector of UAB, Javier Lafuente Sancho; the Minister for Equality and Feminism, Eva Menor Cantador. The event also counted with the institutional representatives Sonia Fernández Cuenca, Director General for Curriculum and Professional Development, Department of Education and Vocational Training, Government of Catalonia, and Teresa Sanchis Estruch, Director General for Research, Department of Research and Universities, Government of Catalonia.
An initiative reaching approximately 40,000 pupils across Catalonia
On Wednesday 11 February, to mark the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, 578 women scientists and technologists from public and private institutions will visit 530 schools across Catalonia to talk to around 40,000 students aged ten to fourteen about their career paths and research.
The aim of these visits is to show that anyone can pursue a career in science and technology, regardless of gender; to bring young people closer to STEM disciplines; and to help challenge the gender stereotypes that still surround them.
As part of the #científiques programme, participating researchers and technologists are also offered training sessions to help them prepare their school visits. One of these sessions took place yesterday, ahead of the Meet-up, offering practical tools and guidance on how to communicate their work to young audiences, while also creating space for networking and for building connections among participants.
In parallel, the initiative includes a fifteen-hour training course for teachers accredited by the Department of Education and Vocational Training, designed to help them incorporate a gender perspective in the classroom and to foster children’s STEM identity.
A persistent gender gap
Despite progress at the early stages of academic careers, gender inequality remains a reality at the highest levels of the scientific system. Women hold only 30% of top academic positions in the European Union, even in fields where they are strongly represented. In terms of institutional leadership, just 26% of heads of academic institutions are women, although parity is closer in governing bodies, where women account for 39% of members (She Figures 2024, European Commission).
In Spain, the gender gap is particularly evident in STEM degrees. In almost no university programme in this field do women reach 50% of enrolments, with especially low figures in Mathematics (36%), Physics (27%), Telecommunications Engineering (23%) and Computer Science (13%). The imbalance is even greater in vocational education and training, where 52% of male graduates qualify in STEM specialities, compared with just 7% of women. In most STEM vocational programmes, at both intermediate and advanced levels, the ratio of men to women is almost nine to one (Esade, 2024).
In Catalonia, an analysis carried out by CERCA using the UNEIX database (2023) shows that in CERCA centres the imbalance between men and women in scientific careers begins immediately after the doctorate. Women’s representation decreases progressively as careers advance, to the point where the number of women in scientific leadership positions is not proportional to the pool of highly qualified women and remains virtually stagnant.
As regards first-year enrolments in engineering and architecture degrees at Catalan universities in the 2023–2024 academic year, women accounted for 5.5% of the total, compared with 15% for men. Despite this disparity, a positive trend should be noted: the percentage of women enrolled in these degrees has increased by more than one percentage point since the 2019–2020 academic year (BIST, based on data from the Department of Research and Universities, 2024).
As highlighted by Elyès Jouini, Chairholder of the UNESCO Chair on Women and Science, this inequality is not only a matter of social justice but also a loss of talent that limits science’s capacity to address the major challenges of the twenty-first century. The absence of women in research and innovation influences the questions that are asked, the methodologies that are used and the solutions that are developed, generating biases that can have real consequences for health, technology and social progress.
