By Camilla Hodge
Martha Sorensen loves school and always knew she would earn a graduate degree, but she had to decide between computer science, law or business.
“So many people enter the workforce with a bachelor”s degree,” said the now second-year MBA student from Las Vegas. “I wanted the added strength of a master”s degree.”
More and more women like Sorensen are finding reasons to seek higher education. A recent study published by the Council of Graduate School found that the number of women enrolled in graduate programs increased by 3 percent in the last year.
The overall increase in the number of graduate students, both short and long term, has been driven by the growing number of women and African Americans enrolling in graduate programs, according to the Council of Graduate School in a press release.
Universities in Utah are reporting similar increases in the number of women graduate students.
At BYU, the number of women graduate students has held steady for the last two years when the number increased from 38 percent to 40 percent of total students enrolled in graduate programs in 2004. The University of Utah Office of Budget and Institutional Analysis reported a 2 percent increase in the number of women graduate students from the 2004-2005 to the 2005-2006 years.
At BYU, this increase is welcome.
“While we don”t have specific recruitment programs for women here at BYU, we support and encourage women enrolling in graduate programs,” said Bonnie Brinton, dean of graduate studies at BYU. “We are active in recruiting a more diverse student body so students can have a more enriching experience.”
Brinton”s own time as a graduate student was “challenging, engaging, fascinating and compelling,” she said.
“There are so many advantages to earning a graduate degree,” she said. “In terms of career paths, doors will open, in terms of life experience, it offers intellectual and spiritual enrichment; it teaches critical thinking.”
Sorensen”s MBA education has already opened professional and personal doors.
“The MBA program has broadened my education,” she said. “Computer science is so focused. The MBA classes are valuable wherever you work, in your personal life and in managing a home.”
In the two short years she has been enrolled in the MBA program at BYU, Sorensen has also already seen a visible difference between the jobs she would have gotten with a bachelor”s degree and the jobs now available to her.
“A friend of mine who also graduated with a bachelor”s in computer science is still programming,” she said. “He”s moved up quite a bit, but when I graduate, I will end up with a wide variety of positions, starting much higher than I thought I could be.”
Diane Hartman, membership vice president of the Utah Valley branch of the American Association of University Women said it is important women recognize those professional advantages in an ever-changing workplace.
“Women make up almost half of the workforce now,” Hartman said. “The better-trained women are, the better they can contribute to the workforce. It also changes how well they can take care of their families.”
In fact, a study conducted by the association in 1999 found that women “tie schooling to a better chance of economic success” more than men do.
Gordon B. Hinckley, President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, also noted several statistics in a Sept. 30 address that more women enroll in college immediately after high school and by 2010, women will constitute 60 percent of the of all students enrolled in college. Women have also earned more master”s degrees than men since 1986.
“It is plainly evident from these statistics that young women are exceeding young men in pursuing educational programs,” he said. Hinckley and the church encourage both young men and women to get as much education as they can.
As a professor at Utah Valley State College, Hartman has seen first-hand the increase in women pursuing degrees in higher education.
“Women know they”ve got to have an education,” she said. “But sometimes we still have to overcome the idea that we can”t do this or it”s not traditional. It is our own helplessness that holds us back.”
Nationally, women now account for more than half the total of all graduate students. At BYU, women comprise 40 percent of all graduate students. The total number of women graduate students for the 2005 to 2006 academic year was 972 not including women enrolled in the law and accounting programs – the most in the last five years. Women graduate students at the University of Utah made up 46 percent of all students enrolled. A total of 2,901 women were enrolled in graduate programs, an increase from the previous year.
What Hartman and the association would like to see next is an increase in the number of women seeking advanced degrees in the hard sciences.
“Technology fields are going to lead the way, and women will be half the work force,” she said. “It”s a dynamic formula there, but you have to prepare women so they feel comfortable and have the necessary skills to do what they need to do. It”s a matter of developing confidence.”
Feeling comfortable and confident was the turning point for Sorensen in deciding which course of graduate study to pursue.
“If I had gone to work right after earning my bachelor”s, I don”t know if I would have come back,” she says. “It [the MBA program] felt right.”
