Global challenges (climate change, and sustainable food production, technological advances such as the rise of generative artificial intelligence) continue to redefine the STEM landscape, resulting in entirely new jobs and career pathways within STEM fields (OECD, 2025). For example, the Australian federal Department of Education (2025) argues that “the gap between the knowledge generated in the education system and the skills demanded by employers and individuals is widening” and that STEM is a priority as it is predicted that future jobs will increasingly require STEM competences. This has important implications for STEM education and career advice, as the skills profile of the future workforce is determined largely by the study choices of students in secondary education (Australian Academy of Science, 2025). However, across the globe, students’ performance and interest in STEM subjects or careers continue to decline or stagnate. Especially, certain groups (e.g., girls, rural students or students from low SES areas) remain underrepresented in STEM fields such as mathematics, physics, engineering and IT. 

The world of STEM, and global movements surrounding STEM research and practice, is changing at an increasing rate in terms of its focus and its setting within global developments that are changing the face of public and political interactions with STEM.  

In this context, it is timely to investigate how the current generation of secondary students formulate perceptions about their future, how they see themselves in relation to STEM (e.g., motivation, identity, confidence; Calabrese-Barton et al., 2013) and how their ideas are shaped by their educational experiences as well as by factors external to school (e.g., parents, peers, (social) media). Given the rapid pace of change, the need for up-to-date information on STEM perceptions and aspirations is critical for effective policy making. This paper reports about a study in the state of Victoria, Australia which aims to reveal what young people perceive as important to their futures, with a particular focus on the role of STEM, and which gendered aspects they perceive, and reveal, in terms of opportunities and obstacles. The outcomes have implications for formal and informal STEM education and for career advice, which will be addressed.

The project combines desk research with an empirical study. Desk research focused on reports and public data sets collected through (annual) surveys among thousands of young Australians administered by Youth Insight, Mission Australia, LSAY and the Youth Barometer. Youth Insight has a focus on trends in young people’s relations with STEM (i.e., survey data on how students’ interest, confidence and aspirations towards STEM have changed between 2019 – 2023, STEM aspirations) while other monitors investigate more general concerns of young people related to challenges (i.e., cost of living, study and career, artificial intelligence, climate change).   In the second half of 2025, an empirical study was conducted. Eight schools in the state of Victoria were selected on the basis of providing real-world STEM and STEAM experiences to students in year 8-10. Schools were located in rural, regional or urban areas. After ethics approval was obtained, data were collected from 12 student focus groups (totalling 50 girls and 25 boys; year levels 8-10), and semi-structured interviews with 13 STEM teachers and 3 career advisors.  Focus groups for students were preceded by either a workshop (e.g., on future food production) or a recent outreach experience that could inspire students to think about their future in relation to STEM or STEAM, such as robotics events or astrophysics camps. Focus groups included both boys and girls, sometimes separately and sometimes mixed. The focus group interview protocols were semi structured and designed to be responsive to the particular contexts of the school and the students’ STEM experiences. The focus was on students’ experience of STEM through the provided workshop or STEM outreach activities they had attended and their perceptions of STEM, STEM futures and their relations to STEM. The questioning protocols were particularly alert to the way students’ perceptions and commitments – their identity work – reflected rural-urban contextual differences, gendered positioning, the role of STEM projects in framing identity, and different perceptions of STEM futures and career options.

Desk research indicates that boys and girls (aged 14-17 years) score very similar for science on interest, confidence and importance. However, boys score higher than girls for technology, engineering and mathematics. Interest, confidence and importance tend to decline with age. Students from low SES areas score a bit lower than those from higher SES areas on these indicators, particularly boys. In terms of STEM career aspirations, girls (14-17 year) are almost half as likely as boys to aspire to a career in STEM (22% versus 43%; Youth Insight, 2023). A substantial proportion of young people (about 20-30%) are reconsidering their career aspirations due to the COVID-19 pandemic, or the rise of Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI). The analysis of empirical data is in progress. Preliminary analyses reveal that schools play a crucial role in shaping students' aspirations and understanding of STEM futures. Students' perspectives were largely shaped by their school experiences and opportunities available to them to engage with STEM. It was found that students can be attracted to STEM through practical applications and real-world problems rather than pure content knowledge, suggesting that STEM contexts offer opportunities for diverse student engagement beyond traditional STEM careers. Related to pursuing STEM careers, students talked about opportunities to contribute to society, however, they expressed gendered concerns about ethical and equity issues related to STEM jobs. Students voiced gendered expectations about the impact of technological advances on society and work. Girls, in particular, were critical about GenAI being unreliable and indicated how unethical use of GenAI could compromise study and work. Differences were noticed in perceptions and expectations of urban students compared to those from rural areas. For instance, rural schools had strong sports cultures which was particularly important for boys, meaning that STEM identity formation was competing with other dominant identities.

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