Header

Canada Undergraduate Enrollment

Over the years, Canadian undergraduate enrollment of female students pursuing engineering degrees has steadily increased and has remained above 20% for the fifth year. As undergraduate enrollment increases, there has also been an increase in female-identifying students in engineering undergraduate programs. In 2020, Engineers Canada’s annual report, Canadian Engineers for Tomorrow, indicated that females represented 23.4% of all students enrolled in undergraduate engineering programs representing an increase of approximately 6% since 2010.

Undergraduate Engineering Enrollment by Gender 2010 to 2020
Source: Engineers Canada. (2021). Canadian engineers for tomorrow: Trends in engineering enrolment and degrees awarded 2016-2020.

The top three disciplines in 2020 with the highest proportion of enrolled female undergraduate students were biosystems engineering (53.1%), chemical engineering (42.2%), and geological engineering (37.4%). On the other hand, software engineering (17%), mining or mineral engineering (16.4%), and mechanical engineering (16.2%), represented the three lowest ranking disciplines with the fewest number of female undergraduate students enrolled in proportion to male students. However, the discipline attracting the highest number of female students in 2020 was civil engineering, with 3,430 students.

Canada UGEnroll Disc
Source: Engineers Canada. (2021). Canadian engineers for tomorrow: Trends in engineering enrolment and degrees awarded 2016-2020.

Additional Resources