2007-08 Campus Action Project Teams

The 2007-2008 Campus Action Project (CAP) theme was Behind the Pay Gap, based on the research report that was released in spring 2007 and examined the gender pay gap for college graduates. The objective of the CAP program in 2007-08 was to provide a platform to raise awareness of the inequity in pay between women and men in the workplace.

Young girls build a circuit board at Bucknell University's Girls Play Fair event

While several measures of educational achievement show that on average women are faring as well as their male counterparts today, often times these gains do not translate into comparable economic success beyond college. In 2004, college-educated women 25 and older earned 75 percent of what their male peers earned. This pay gap appears within the first year after college – even when women are working full-time in the same fields as men – and widens in the first ten years in the workforce. AAUW Educational Foundation research points to several factors that appear to be pivotal including, the field of study, occupational choice, and family-work balance issues such as time out of the labor force.¹

Selected CAP teams implemented a project that addressed one or more of the recommendations from the report Behind the Pay Gap. These recommendations include: promoting careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics to girls and women, encouraging women to negotiate for better quality jobs and pay, supporting mothers in the workplace, and ending gender discrimination. Please download a copy of the report for a full list of recommendations.

¹Goldberg, J. D., & Hill, C. (2007). Behind the Pay Gap.

Questions? Call 202/728-7719 or send an e-mail to cap@aauw.org.