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WOMEN ‘MORE LIKELY TO
DURING COVID-19’
TAKE UP ONLINE LEARNING
One of The Big Issue’s partners in our Ride Out Recession Alliance is
online training provider FutureLearn, who have found that women
are taking a lead in science, engineering and maths courses.
The pandemic has given women the opportunity to become
more ambitious about their careers, with online learning allowing
them to target male-dominated industries, according to training
provider FutureLearn.
A YouGov survey carried out on behalf of the firm found 40 per
cent of British women say they are more likely to take an online course
over the next five years to boost their career, compared to 35 per cent
of men.
The pandemic has had an impact on attitudes to learning over a
computer, tablet or phone – 27 per cent of women told the researchers
they were more interested in taking an online course as a result of
Covid-19, while 23 per cent of men said the same.
FutureLearn reported 55 per cent of people enrolling on science,
engineering and maths courses last year were women. Female
students also drove a 350 per cent increase in enrolments in tech
and coding courses between 2019 and 2020, comprising the majority
of applicants.
“Online learning grew in popularity during the pandemic and is
set to continue doing so as technology advances,” said Matt Jenner,
director of learning at FutureLearn.
“We explore the latest technological innovations but they must be
provided within universal access to learning; ensuring their utilisation
is integrated with our understanding of the issues that impact our
world today, as evidenced by the proportion of people wanting to
learn about environmental issues, inclusivity and diversity.”
University of Exeter professor Anna Mountford-Zimdars explained
that the flexibility of online education suits women and warned they
must aim high to overcome the gender pay gap.
“Despite more equality in terms of sharing caring, childcare and
households chores, it is still more likely that women do many of these
tasks,” she said. “Women may thus particularly love the opportunity to
develop themselves in flexible ways.
“Unfortunately, in the UK, we continue to have a most regrettable
pay gap in employment. Women who have the same qualifications
as men earn less. This is often around 20 per cent. So, a less happy
interpretation of women’s zest for more education is that we simply
have to achieve higher than men to make the same money.”
With 1.7 million now out of work in the UK and redundancies rising
during the pandemic, The Big Issue’s Ride Out Recession Alliance has
teamed up with FutureLearn and jobs board Adzuna to provide free
training and job searches to people looking for work.Head to bigissue.com/jobs-training to find out how you can
access free online training and advice, and look through
thousands of job opportunities at jobs.bigissue.com