Although women are climbing up some parts of the STEM ladder, they often reach an impasse near the top of their career tracks due to the lack of female role models, according to Daniela Witten (pictured), associate professor of statistics and biostatistics at the University of Washington. She’s hoping that will change as more women share their stories.

“It’s really wonderful to be part of a conference where all of the speakers are women, and so we can really see the broad ways in which women are contributing to data science, both in and out of industry,” Witten said about her participation at the recent Global Women in Data Science Conference (WiDS) in Stanford, California.

Witten spoke with Lisa Martin (@LuccaZara), host of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s mobile livestreaming studio, during the conference. They discussed the academic and career trends for women in engineering and statistics.

The WiDS conference has opened doors for women to interact on an interdisciplinary team setting, according to Witten, who noted that “to be successful in data science, you need to really not only have technical skills, but also the ability to work as a team player and to communicate your ideas.”

Balancing the STEM gap

Twenty percent of undergraduate engineering degrees are awarded to women, but only 13 percent of those women remain in the engineering workforce, according to research from MIT. Witten sees the problem starting in universities where academic departments are pulling the few STEM women to recruiting events and asking them to stretch their time and energy, while she sees few men being asked to compromise to such an extent.

“Even though the intent is good, to clearly showcase the fact that there’s diversity in STEM and in academia, the end outcome can actually be hurtful to the women involved who are being asked to do more than their fair share. So we need to find a way to balance this,” Witten said.

Mentorship was key to Witten’s own success, starting with her studies at Stanford under guidance from her advisors and faculty, which ultimately helped her career soar. Now teaching at the University of Washington, Witten is mentoring the master’s and doctorate students in data science. Last year, the university received 800 applicants for the master’s program in data science.

Watch the complete video interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of the Global Women in Data Science Conference. (* Disclosure: TheCUBE is a paid media partner for the Women in Data Science Conference. Neither Stanford University, the event sponsor, nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: SiliconANGLE