Women leaders in Latin American higher education: The cases of Chile, Colombia, and Mexico

• In Event: Persistent educational exclusion in Latin America: At the periphery of a ‘digital society’

Proposal

This research examines gender hierarchies in women’s access to leadership positions and their concentration in lower echelons of professions within top higher education institutions across Latin America. We focus on the cases of Mexico, Colombia, and Chile. Despite global progress in gender parity in tertiary education enrollment (Willige, 2023), labor markets continue to disadvantage women—who are represented in stable positions in higher education but lack opportunities for advancement and career promotion. Applying Sandra Acker’s theoretical framework on “the gender script” we can study vertical and horizontal segregation (1999) within higher education institutions. Our work builds upon previous research about the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) (Cortina & Quezada, 2021), which confirms patterns of horizontal and vertical gender segregation in one of the largest universities in Latin America. Horizontal segregation results in the concentration of women in teaching positions —with less access to research resources—and vertical segregation results in salary differences and the invisibilization of women in the production of knowledge and theory building. Based on the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile and the Universidad Nacional de Colombia statistics and relevant research, we develop a gender-disaggregated dataset considering distribution across faculty and administrative roles in university disciplines and research grant allocation from 2017 to 2021. We conduct statistical analyses and compare the cases of Chile, Colombia, and Mexico to explore barriers women face in academia. Key areas of investigation include patterns of gender segregation in academic positions, research funding distribution by national councils, and barriers to women’s advancement in research and leadership roles. The study contributes to higher education equity literature as it unveils social dynamics hindering women from attaining leadership roles and exemplifies why the demands on gender parity are insufficient to curtail pervasive power asymmetries built within the system.

Authors

• Regina Cortina, Teachers College Columbia University

• Jonathan Beltran, Teachers College at Columbia University