UC Male Students Dominate Engineering and Business; In All Other Categories Women Outnumber Following US College Trend

After UC's information dump on gender, the New Zealand Reporter examines whether the South Island's pre-eminent university is following US trends that saw women dominate the halls of academia.

Source: University of Canterbury website

UC’s overall student numbers do not reveal a major gender division and nothing that tracks in the same direction college participation by US men. Between 2020 and 2023, UC female students tracked ahead of male numbers at about 51 percent of the pool.

Once engineering student numbers are removed from UC’s student numbers, female student dominance of the university’s population is clear, hovering at about 61%. In 2022, it briefly moved to 62% (2dp) before reverting to 61.41% (2dp).

Indeed, male participation rates amongst 18- and 19-year-olds, likely to be school leavers, has exceeded female rates year in and out during that four-year period.

Source: UC

But a wider picture of the data suggests the emergence of a vastly different trend. Across the board amongst 20- to 34-year-old students, women dominate in every age category.

Outside the faculty of Engineering, which has traditionally been dominated by men, and the UC Business School, women outnumber men in every single other faculty at UC.

That trend appears in the faculties of the Arts, Education, Health, Law, Science, and Services. The gap is particularly noticeable in Education, the gateway to school teaching, and Law.

Men Women

2020 289 1224

2021 311 1310

2022 242 1138

2023 260 1092

Education/Source: UC

Female law student numbers outnumber male students by roughly two to one.