Norwegian higher education institutions are positive to earmarking of posts for women.

Gender equality has been a priority in Spain the last years. But in the research sector little has changed. At the conference Women’s Worlds in Madrid Spanish scientists were inspired by Norway.

Minister of Education and Research Tora Aasland has said that she wants to implement national measures to promote gender equality in science. But do we know enough about the cause of the gender imbalance? The relationship between research and measures in academia has spurred debate in Norway this spring.

In Norway one in three university and university college rectors are women – an increase of 75 per cent in two years. All the same, we are having a hard time catching up with our Swedish neighbours, who, thanks to network building, are close to achieving full balance between the sexes.

In a new memo requested by the Ministry of Education and Research, the Committee for Mainstreaming - Women in Science recommends active use of gender quotas and earmarking of permanent and temporary positions for female scientists.

The Committee for Mainstreaming – Women in Science has looked at the need for a collaborative effort to build networks for female scientists in Norway. The pilot project found that there was an interest in strengthening and co-ordinating the networks.

The world will be a better place if more girls become engineers, says Camilla Schreiner. She does research on the connection between gender and choosing a career within the Natural Sciences.

The Ministry of Education and Research is requesting the KiF Committee to prepare models ensuring women employment in academic positions in male dominated fields. This autumn, the Ministry will announce the measures the various institutions can make use of.

The Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) and the University of Tromsø (UiT) share this year’s Award for Gender Equality, worth two million Norwegian kroner. "I do hope this will inspire more people to work for gender equality," Tora Aasland, minister of Research and Higher Education said during the award-giving ceremony.

The gender equality aspect was missing in the first national evaluation of the Quality Reform. This is evident in the government report on the reform.

Numbers suggest that women are lagging behind in Norwegian innovation. A narrow and outdated definition of innovation explains why, says Elisabet Ljunggren at Nordland Research Institute.

Female professors feel that they spend more time teaching after the introduction of the Quality Reform, the Norwegian follow-up to the Bologna Declaration. Women, to a larger degree than men, also say that the reform has changed their methods of teaching.

The University of Oslo is the first scholarly institution that has looked at its budgets from a gender equality perspective. The survey suggests that male researchers at the University get more money than their female colleagues.

The Ministry of Education and Research has established a new gender equality award worth two million Norwegian kroner. The award will go to the institution that has done the most to promote women in science.