Impeding and facilitating factors for selecting studies in the clean energy sector

If you’re a policymaker, VET provider, school, company, employer or social partner, this message is for you:

You don’t need to adapt to the system; rather, you can help change it.

In the context of the clean energy sector, this is not just a call to action; it is a challenge to rethink and transform existing structures that have long excluded girls and young women from pursuing studies and careers in this field. Despite the accelerating demand for clean energy and STEM-related skills, gender disparity remains a significant barrier, particularly in vocational education and training (VET) pathways. Societal norms, educational systems and workplace cultures continue to reinforce the idea that technical roles are not for girls, leading to their underrepresentation in renewable energy and related sectors. However, the time for change is now.

The Blueprint – Impending and Facilitating Factors for Girls Selecting Studies in Clean Energy Sector, developed by the team of the STAR Girls project, is a report that outlines the key barriers and enablers influencing young women’s decisions to pursue studies and careers in the clean and renewable energy sector. Based on both desk and field research, the Blueprint presents a holistic and interdisciplinary framework that identifies structural, cultural and institutional factors at play. The document consolidates evidence from national reports in Spain, Greece, Portugal, Italy, and the Netherlands, and provides education providers, policymakers, companies, employers and social partners with actionable insights to address gender inequality and pave the way for a more resilient clean energy future.

Barriers impeding girls from entering the Clean Energy Sector and Recommendations

One of the central conclusions is the importance of systemic change over individual adaptation. Rather than focusing on changing girls to fit into existing systems, the Blueprint calls for transforming those systems to ensure they are more inclusive and supportive of girls’ participation. A gender-transformative, intersectional approach is essential, as it recognises that girls’ access to education and career opportunities is shaped not only by gender, but also by how it intersects with socio-economic status, migration background and disability. In this sense, the report places particular responsibility on European institutions and national or regional policymakers, recommending that gender equality be integrated into EU green skills strategies, energy transition frameworks and VET governance systems. This includes embedding gender equality objectives and indicators into funding programmes, strengthening gender mainstreaming in National Energy and Climate Plans, improving harmonised data collection, and ensuring that VET strategies and accreditation systems include clear equality targets, responsibilities and resources.

Additionally, key societal and cultural barriers identified in the report include the strong gender segregation in VET, with girls being a minority in fields such as energy, electronics, mechanics and ICT. These fields are often perceived as “male domains”, where girls struggle to see themselves and their future roles in the sector. These stereotypes are reinforced at early stages, often by families, peers and media narratives. To address this, the Blueprint recommends:

• For policymakers to integrate sustained career guidance before key educational tracking decisions, to promote explicit counter-stereotyping in career guidance, to engage families to support girls’ aspirations in technical fields and to provide practical exposure to technical and clean-energy-related work.
• For schools and VET providers to redesign communication and recruitment practices to remove stereotyped imagery and language, and to ensure outreach materials, open days and promotional campaigns are free from gender bias.
• For employers to ensure placements are genuinely inclusive by preparing supervisors and teams, to provide safe facilities and inclusive protective gear, to enforce zero-tolerance policies for harassment and sexist behaviour, and to ensure that girls and women are not excluded from core technical work or confined to peripheral roles.

The facilitating factors to overcome barriers for girls in the sector

However, the Blueprint also highlights several facilitating factors that can help change this narrative. From an educational perspective, gender-transformative pedagogy is crucial. Teacher training on gender bias, hands-on learning opportunities and inclusive classroom practices are presented as essential conditions for change. This is an area where VET providers, schools and guidance services are the main actors. Thus, the report recommends:

• Continuous teacher training on gender bias, inclusive workshop practices and equitable task allocation.
• Embedding these approaches in teaching standards and school development plans.
• Ensuring safe and inclusive learning environments through anti-harassment policies, accessible reporting mechanisms and visible institutional commitment.

The Blueprint also emphasises the need to create mentoring ecosystems and use career guidance that challenges stereotypes while engaging families to support girls in their technical aspirations. At the institutional level, the report stresses the need for policies and practices that promote gender equality, including:

• Implementing Gender Equality Plans and gender-sensitive curriculum redesigns.
• Embedding a culture of equality at home and in schools, where the influence on children is strong.

Role models and mentoring are critical enabling factors, but the report makes clear that isolated examples of exceptional women are not enough. Every woman, in every role, can be a role model and what matters most is the development of wider support ecosystems, referred as “constellations”, to provide girls with a broader spectrum of support and inspiration. For this reason, the report recommends:

• Schools should establish structured mentoring programmes with women professionals and near-peer mentors.
• Employers and social partners should actively participate in these networks by proposing role models, mentoring opportunities and inclusive placements.
• Policy level support should focus on long-term funding for mentoring networks, outreach and teacher training, instead of fragmented short-term projects.

This is exactly why the STAR Girls project is now assembling its Dream Team of women mentors, building a network where 100 incredible women will mentor 100 young women, paving the way for the next generation of clean energy leaders.

Another facilitating factor include shifting how the sector is framed – if it continues to be framed as a masculine technical domain, it will remain less attractive to many girls. This makes companies and employers especially important actors in shifting the narrative. The report recommends reviewing recruitment and communication materials for gendered language and bias and using more inclusive imagery. Schools and guidance services also have a role here, by ensuring that girls receive concrete information about jobs, progression pathways, wages and working conditions, and by framing technical careers as socially meaningful as well as technically demanding.

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By working together, by advocating for girls to have balanced opportunities, we can build a sustainable and equitable energy sector that reflects the talents and ambitions of all young people, regardless of gender. This way, we might not need to celebrate women in technical fields as the exception, but rather to embrace it as the norm.

You can download the Blueprint here.