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Girls in STEAM

Girls are just as capable. They just need the chance to discover it.

Boys outnumber girls seven to one in the HSC subject that teaches real programming. The gap opens before Year 9, which means it opens at an age a parent can do something about.

Enquire about a class → See the numbers
A girl at a laptop with a game she built on the screen
Years 4 to 12Cabramatta Centre and live online$595 a termSmall classes

Where girls are missing

The gap, in numbers.

At school 12% 214 girls of 1,778 students of NSW students sitting HSC Software Engineering in 2025 were girls.1
At work 16% about 1 in 6 of people working in STEM-qualified jobs in Australia in 2025 were women.2
At university 37% just over 1 in 3 of university STEM enrolments in Australia are women.3

These are not small gaps. In the one HSC subject that teaches real programming, boys outnumber girls seven to one. That ratio follows girls into university and into work, where women hold about one in six STEM-qualified jobs.1,2

Interest by age

The gap opens early, not late

The Australian Government's Youth in STEM survey shows that girls' interest and confidence in STEM generally decline as they get older.4

The gap is already visible by the early teenage years, just as students begin making subject choices.

That is why early experience matters. If a girl has never built a game, written a program or experimented with technology, she may be deciding whether technology is for her before she has really had the chance to try it.

Girls interested in studying engineering
36%
Ages
12 to 13
29%
Ages
14 to 17
26%
Ages
18 to 21

Each column is out of 100. Australian Government Youth in STEM survey.4

Why it matters

Technology across careers and school

Medicine, law, finance, design, engineering and teaching are all being changed by software and AI. Understanding how technology works, not just how to use it, is becoming valuable across many careers.5

Technology is also part of school. In NSW it is compulsory through the early years and Years 7 to 8, with electives such as Computing Technology and HSC Software Engineering available later.6

A girl who has already built games and written programs starts with something valuable: experience.

A girl at a laptop imagining herself as a doctor, a dentist, a lawyer, a scientist and an engineer
Women who did it

They started young. Now they shape what comes next.

Four women, two of them Australian. Each one started somewhere ordinary.

Marita ChengAge 19

Marita Cheng

The robot builder

Raised by a single mother in a housing commission flat in Queensland. Founded Robogals at 19. Young Australian of the Year, now runs a robotics company.

Fei-Fei LiAge 16

Fei-Fei Li

The AI pioneer

Arrived in the United States at 16 and helped run the family dry-cleaning shop. She built ImageNet, the database that set modern AI going.

Michelle Simmons2018

Michelle Simmons

The quantum builder

Quantum physicist at UNSW Sydney. Her team built the world's first single-atom transistor. Australian of the Year.

Gwynne ShotwellAt school

Gwynne Shotwell

The rocket boss

One talk by a woman engineer at her high school made her choose engineering. Now President of SpaceX.

These are examples of women who started somewhere. None of them is associated with AI Creators Academy in any way.
Portraits: Marita Cheng by Crawford Australian Leadership Forum, CC BY 2.0, via Flickr; Fei-Fei Li by ITU Pictures, CC BY 2.0; Michelle Simmons by AustraliaUnlimited, CC BY 3.0; Gwynne Shotwell, NASA/Bill Ingalls, public domain. The last three via Wikimedia Commons.

What works

Give girls the chance to start early

  • Start early. Girls' interest in engineering is higher at ages 12 to 13 than in the older age groups surveyed. Early experience gives them a chance to discover whether they enjoy it before making later subject choices.4
  • Build real things. A game, website or working program gives a child something tangible to be proud of and explain.
Two girls building a game together at a laptop, one holding a paper sketch of the game level

What we do

AI Creators Academy is open to girls and boys from Year 4, at our Cabramatta Centre and live online across Australia.

Classes are small and taught by a qualified teacher and software engineer, supported by an experienced school teacher. With two educators in every class, students get more individual attention.

Every child builds something they can explain, not just something they copied.

“Our goal is to make complex skills fun, meaningful, and achievable for every child. We're building the next generation of creators.” Stuart Yung, founder

Give her the first try

Coding for Kids, Game Making, Understanding AI and Virtual Robots.

Years 4 to 12  ·  $595 a term

Tell us her year and we will tell you where she should start.

Enquire today →
Sources
  1. NSW Education Standards Authority, 2025 HSC course enrolments, Software Engineering: 1,562 male, 214 female, 2 non-binary, 1,778 total. nsw.gov.au
  2. Department of Industry, Science and Resources, STEM Equity Monitor 2025: women were 16% of workers in STEM-qualified occupations and 31% of workers in STEM industries. industry.gov.au
  3. Department of Industry, Science and Resources, The state of STEM gender equity in 2024: women are 37% of university STEM enrolments. industry.gov.au
  4. STEM Equity Monitor, Youth in STEM survey 2025–26 (YouthInsight): girls' interest in studying engineering 36% at ages 12–13, 29% at 14–17, 26% at 18–21; girls' confidence fell in all STEM subjects with age. industry.gov.au
  5. Jobs and Skills Australia, Our Gen AI Transition (2025): generative AI has a greater capacity to augment work than to automate it. jobsandskills.gov.au
  6. NSW Education Standards Authority, Computing Technology 7–10 Syllabus (2022) and Software Engineering 11–12, 2025 HSC examination. curriculum.nsw.edu.au, nsw.gov.au