To Enhance Enrollment of Female Cadets at Maritime Institutions and to Increase Women Seafarers in The Shipping Industry

Shipping has historically been a male dominated industry and that tradition runs for a long time. However, recently the need to advance women’s role in maritime activities has become a topic of unprecedented interest. Changes are quite noticeable in the many maritime areas. There are more and more female role models for young women to follow in the maritime industry, such as Captain Tshepo Motloutsi of South Africa qualifying to earn the position in 2016, Kate McCue, the first American female to captain a mega-cruise ship last year, and successful women entrepreneurs, like MF Shipping group CEO Karin Orsel, who is also the president of WISTA International. The enrollment of female cadets in maritime institutions all over the world has been going up year after year.

This paper presents an analysis of what maritime institutions can do to advance the opportunities for women to survive and thrive in the maritime field, and empower female cadets with skill sets to embrace the new era of technologically facilitated maritime industry. Taking Massachusetts Maritime Academy as a case-study entity, applying school wide questionnaires and data collected over the course of about 40 years, the paper examines the exact measures a maritime institute could use to increase the enrollment of female cadets, to give female cadets the exact skills and trainings which would help them face the challenges and climb the shipping sector ladder, to prepare them culturally and socially to blend in well with their male peers in the work-place and to enhance the efforts of female cadets to gain adequate support from both family and society for them to enter the maritime industry and be successful in jobs and career development.

The preliminary findings suggest that job market success upon graduation and subsequent career development of the senior female cadets will have more impact on the enrollment and growth rate of female enrollment at MMA than the remote role models in the maritime industry. Support and encouragement from their family and friends account hugely in their selection of the maritime sector. With the on-going study of the topic, and further analysis of the survey results, more interesting findings will surely be generated.