Illustration: Rob de Winter
Two years ago, Wageningen was still lagging rather badly. When expressed in FTEs, a mere 7.6 percent of the Professors holding a Chair were women. The latest Monitor Women Professors, which was recently published, shows that this percentage had increased to 11.9% by the end of 2015. With this rise, Wageningen had passed Delft and Eindhoven Universities of Technology as well as Erasmus University Rotterdam.
However, the most recent picture is a tad more positive still. In the past year, Wageningen has seen the arrival of various women Professors holding a Chair. The counter currently shows 15.7 percent. This means that the percentage of women Professors holding a Chair has doubled in two years. This year, five of the eight appointed chair holders were women.
Personal
By 2025, Wageningen wants at least 25% of the professors to be women. Besides the Professors holding a Chair, Professors holding a personal Chair are also counted toward this number. Conversely to Professors by special appointment, Professors holding a personal Chair are also in permanent employment. At the moment, 23 percent of the Professors holding a personal Chair are women. This brings the total percentage of women professors (Professors holding a Chair or Professors holding a personal Chair) to 17.8%.
Percentages of women at Dutch universities
Despite the increase in the number of women chair holders, this total percentage has only increased by a few percent. This is due to the appointment policy of Professors holding a personal Chair: only two out of the ten newly appointed Professors holding a personal Chair were women this year.
PhD candidates
The men-women ratio among the Assistant Professors and senior lecturers is another indication of the fact there is no reason for rejoicing yet. In Wageningen, only one in four Assistant Professors and one in three senior lecturers is a woman. In both cases, Wageningen does not reach higher than 11th place nationwide. This is in stark contrast with the share of women PhD candidates: 54.4 percent of them are women. In this respect, Wageningen places first among all Dutch universities.