Thank you, Christel.
First, Madam Chair, I want to thank you for your invitation to provide you—you and the committee members—with some data on non-traditional studies for women.
We have just seen the current picture of employment for women of all ages in Canada. In general, that picture speaks to the career choices made in the near and distant past.
What I would like to do here is focus on the new generations of women about to enter the labour market and the fields they have chosen. We want to focus in particular on occupations traditionally held by men.
Today, this overview of women's education gives us an idea of the forces that will influence the women entering the labour market in the near future. The changing role of women in society has had an impact in recent years on their education, and this change is clearly illustrated by recent census data, shown in the graph on page 8.
For older generations, it is quite clear that, overall, men formerly had a higher level of education than women. This is a relatively well known fact. This situation has changed significantly in recent generations. Not only have women caught up to men's education levels, but also, according to data from the last census, in 2006, the number of women under 35 attending university was greater than the number of men.
For some time now, women, like men, are choosing in greater numbers to attend college or university. But where then are these women choosing to pursue their postsecondary education? In the graph on page 9, we see that younger generations of women are much more likely to go to university than women from previous generations. As I indicated previously, this is relatively well known. It is especially true for college and university studies.
In fact, according to data from the last census, we also find that 33% of women aged from 25 to 34 had a university degree, compared to 25% of men of the same age. Although equally applicable to men and women, fewer women are going into trades-related occupations. The same is not quite true for the trades. In fact, at the time of the 2006 census, fewer women aged 25 to 34 had a trade certification than in previous generations. This is also seen with younger men, but fewer of them attend college and university.
On page 10, you see the areas of university study for women. The data is for two years, 1992 and 2007. Overall, 56% of university graduates in 1992 and 61% in 2007 were women. The graph reveals four main points.
First, in both 1992 and 2007, the majority of university graduates in health- and education-related fields were women. This is also probably quite a well-known fact.
Second, the percentage of female graduates went from less than 50%—a minority—in 1992, to over 50%—a majority—in 2007, in two areas of study: physical and life sciences, as well as agriculture, natural resources and conservation.
Third, the percentage of female university graduates increased in all disciplines; they now represent over 50% of all graduates in all areas of study, with three exceptions: architecture and engineering; mathematics and information sciences; and personal, protective and transportation services.
It is also interesting to note that the percentage of female graduates has dropped in only one area of study during this 15-year period, and that is in mathematics and information sciences.
Let us turn now to page 11. If we consider Canadians with a trade certification, we see a significant split between men and women. The most popular areas of study for men are also those with the fewest number of women. Overall, 37% of all Canadians with a trade certification in 2006 were women.
This table shows the five most significant areas of study for men, and the female participation rate for each. They are: mechanical and repair technologies, construction trades, precision production, engineering technologies/technicians, and transportation and materials moving. Nearly 80% of all trades-certified men specialized in one of these five fields of study. As you can see, the percentage of women working in these same fields varies between 2% and 3% only, to 10% in engineering technologies and 7% in transportation.
On page 12, of course, we see that some women are trade-certified. Where are they? The table shows the most popular fields of study for women who hold a trade certificate. The five categories shown here together account for 86% of all women. Only 9% work in the other specializations.
In summary, the percentage of trade-certified women in all trades has increased over the past decade. However, less than 4% of them work in the trades, such as construction, electricity, etc.