STEM plays an important part in the Australian Public Service (APS) across many STEM and non-STEM roles.
The Australian Public Service Employment Database (APSED) compiles data on workforce composition, including people working in STEM roles, as well as diversity characteristics.
Publicly funded research agencies (PFRAs) are Commonwealth agencies which typically employ a high proportion of STEM-qualified people.
You can use the following interactive data to compare numbers and employment levels of women and men working in the APS in STEM, health and non-STEM roles.
Source: Australian Public Service Commission 2026 (unpublished)
The Power BI dashboards in the monitor present data in different formats, including charts, graphs and tables. You can customise these dashboards based on what you're interested in.
APSED is maintained by Australian Public Service Commission (APSC) using data provided from human resources systems of APS agencies. It stores employment data of all current and former APS employees.
Job roles in the visualisations correspond to the APS Job Family Framework. STEM roles are not shown separately but combined as STEM and health. This is because data is shown at the job family level of the framework, which includes ‘science and health’ as one job family. Agencies voluntarily provide job family data and data from earlier years may see a higher volume of data anomalies. In June 2025, there is no job family recorded for 12.2% of employees. In recent years, the APSC has undertaken a strengthened approach to data quality, validation, and collection completeness surrounding job family data.
The APS job function ‘development program’ is commonly shown in APSED outputs in 2023 and prior years. For the purposes of the STEM Equity Monitor, we have combined ‘development program’
across all years with ‘administration’. All other APS roles, classification levels and diversity information are as provided by agencies to the APSED.
Culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) status refers to first language. People in the CALD group had a first language that was not exclusively English.
We haven’t shown staff numbers below 10. We have suppressed this data either because the staff number was below 10 (primary suppression), or to ensure staff numbers below 10 cannot be revealed by subtracting from totals (secondary suppression). Suppressed data appears as 0% in the table, and zero in the chart. As a result of suppressing this data, the sum of staff numbers in the chart may be lower than the totals above the chart.
Counts by gender show employees identifying as man or woman. We have included people who use another term to describe their gender in all proportions.
We haven’t shown data separately where First Nations status, disability status or CALD status is not known. We have included people whose diversity characteristics are not known in proportions except for CALD status, where they are excluded.
Previous editions of the STEM Equity Monitor used the APS Employee Census, rather than the APSED. From the 2025 edition of the STEM Equity Monitor, we have used the APSED instead, because it includes data by diversity groups. Comparisons cannot be made between sources, as one is self-reported by census respondents, and the other comes from the human resources systems of APS agencies.
See more information about the APSED on the APSC website.
This data does not cover all publicly funded research agencies. Workforce data was supplied by the following agencies:
Participating agencies defined which occupations in their agency were STEM and health, or non-STEM. They based this either on the department’s methodology or through a self-determined analysis. Some roles may be classified differently across agencies.
All STEM roles are shown together, so different levels of representation of women in individual STEM roles can’t be shown in the analysis.
Agencies also aligned classification levels in their organisation to equivalent levels in the APS if they do not use standard APS classifications. In some cases, classification levels were approximately aligned to reporting broadbands of APS classifications, based on publicly available APS classification band descriptors.
Agencies reported numbers of employees who preferred not to disclose gender. We have not presented these employees in the analysis.
Some staff in senior positions may be described as being in management or leadership occupations, so may not be captured in STEM roles and fields in the visualisations above.
Read more about our methodology and this data.
In 2025, 39% of APS employees working in STEM and health roles were women. This proportion has remained stable since 2022. In comparison, women made up 64% of employees in non-STEM roles.
Of all employees, 13% were in a STEM and health role. This equated to about 24,900 people out of the total 198,500 in all role types. These roles included:
The majority of women working in STEM and health roles were employed at the APS 5 or 6 level. Of all women in STEM and health roles, 54% were working at the APS 5 or 6 level.
Gender equity in STEM and health roles is also highest at the APS 5 or 6 level. Of all people working in STEM and health roles at the APS 5 or 6 level, 43% were women. This compares to:
The calculation of equity by diversity groups data mostly includes APS employees whose diversity characteristics are not known. We have not shown these groups separately, but have included them in the calculation of proportions. For comparison by CALD status, the calculation of proportions excludes employees whose CALD status is not known.
In 2025, 3% of employees in all APS roles were First Nations people. Around 600 First Nations people had a STEM and health role, accounting for 2% of all employees working in STEM and health. First Nations people made up 3% of employees working in non-STEM roles. First Nations people account for 3.2% of the Australian population, according to the 2021 Census.
The largest numbers of First Nations STEM and health employees were working at the APS 1 or 2, trainee and graduate level and the APS 5 or 6 level. The APS 1 or 2, trainee and graduate level had the highest proportion of First Nations employees. At this level, 22% of all people in STEM and health roles were First Nations people. Around 80 First Nations STEM and health employees were working at the EL/SES level, accounting for 1% of all employees at this level in STEM and health roles.
People with disability made up 6% of employees in all roles in 2025. This proportion was the same for people with disability working in non-STEM roles. In comparison, people with disability made up 5% of those working in STEM and health roles.
Around 700 people with disability in STEM and health roles were working at the APS 5 or 6 level in 2025. This represents 55% of people with disability working in STEM and health roles. Across the levels, the proportion of APS employees with disability was between 4% and 7%.
CALD people made up 27% of employees in all roles and 35% of those working in STEM and health roles. The largest number of CALD employees in STEM and health roles were working at the APS 5 or 6 level (3,300), accounting for 36% of all employees at this level. The next largest is the EL/SES level (2,800), where CALD employees made up 33% of all employees.
CALD people made up 45% of all employees at the APS 1 or 2, trainee and graduate levels. This had the highest proportion of CALD employees. Across the levels, the proportion of CALD employees was between 33% and 45%.
Women in all diversity groups had higher representation in APS STEM and health roles in 2025:
The proportion of women among First Nations employees decreased from 44% in 2024 to 43% in 2025.
You can use this interactive data to compare numbers and employment levels of women and men working at PFRAs in STEM, non-STEM and health occupations since 2020.
Publicly funded research agency data 2025 (unpublished)
The Power BI dashboards in the monitor present data in different formats, including charts, graphs and tables. You can customise these dashboards based on what you're interested in.
APSED is maintained by Australian Public Service Commission (APSC) using data from human resources systems of APS agencies. It stores employment data of all current and former APS employees.
Job roles in the visualisations correspond to the APS Job Family Framework. STEM roles are not shown separately but combined as STEM and health. This is because data is shown at the job family level of the framework, which includes ‘science and health’ as one job family. Agencies voluntarily provide job family data and data from earlier years may see a higher volume of data anomalies. In recent years, the APSC has undertaken a strengthened approach to data quality, validation, and collection completeness surrounding Job Family data.
APS job function ‘development program’ is commonly shown in APSED outputs in 2023 and prior years. For the purposes of the STEM Equity Monitor, we have combined ‘development program’ across all years with ‘administration’. All other APS roles, classification levels and diversity information are as provided by agencies to the APSED.
Culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) status refers to first language. People in the CALD group had a first language that was not exclusively English.
We haven’t shown staff numbers below 10. We have suppressed this data either because the staff number was below 10 (primary suppression), or to ensure staff numbers below 10 cannot be revealed by subtracting from totals (secondary suppression). Suppressed data appears as 0% in the table, and zero in the chart. As a result of suppressing this data, the sum of staff numbers in the chart may be lower than the totals above the chart.
Counts by gender show employees identifying as man or woman. We have included people who use another term to describe their gender in all proportions.
We haven’t shown data separately where First Nations status, disability status or CALD status is not known. We have included people whose diversity characteristics are not known in proportions except for CALD status, where they are excluded.
Previous editions of the STEM Equity Monitor used the APS Employee Census, rather than the APSED. From the 2025 edition of the STEM Equity Monitor, we have used the APSED instead, because it includes data by diversity groups. Comparisons cannot be made between sources, as one is self-reported by census respondents, and the other comes from the human resources systems of APS agencies.
See more information about the APSED on the APSC website.
This data does not cover all publicly funded research agencies. Workforce data was supplied by the following agencies:
Participating agencies defined which occupations in their agency were STEM and health, or non-STEM. They based this either on the department’s methodology or through a self-determined analysis. Some roles may be classified differently across agencies.
All STEM roles are shown together, so different levels of representation of women in individual STEM roles can’t be shown in the analysis.
Agencies also aligned classification levels in their organisation to equivalent levels in the APS if they do not use standard APS classifications. In some cases, classification levels were approximately aligned to reporting broadbands of APS classifications, based on publicly available APS classification band descriptors.
Agencies reported numbers of employees who preferred not to disclose gender. We have not presented these employees in the analysis.
Some staff in senior positions may be described as being in management or leadership occupations, so may not be captured in STEM roles and fields in the visualisations above.
Read more about our methodology and this data.
In 2025, 71% of all people working in the sampled PFRAs were in STEM and health occupations, about 9,400 people out of the total 13,400 in all role types. This increased from 70% in 2024.
Women made up 31% of people in STEM and health occupations in 2025, the same proportion as 2024. In comparison, women made up 60% of non-STEM occupations in PFRAs.
The largest number of women in STEM and health were working at the EL1 level (1,000). The largest number of men in STEM were also at the EL1 level (2,500).
Although the EL1 level had the highest number of STEM and health employees, it had one of the lowest proportions of women in STEM and health roles in 2025. The gender split for STEM and health employees at the EL1 level was 30% women and 70% men.
The EL2 level had the largest difference between men and women in STEM and health roles, with only 24% of EL2 STEM and health roles held by women. This was a slight improvement on the proportion of women in EL2 STEM and health roles in 2024, where the gender split was 23% women and 77% men.
The highest proportion of women in STEM and health roles were working at the graduate, APS 1-2 level (50%). For non-STEM roles, the highest proportion of women were working at the APS 3-4 level (64%).
In 2025, women held 21 of 54 SES positions for STEM and health occupations. This makes up 39% of SES STEM and health roles, which is an increase from 36% in 2024.
Since 2024, all participating PFRAs included output categories for people who did not identify as a man or woman. We have included limited analysis on these non-binary and gender diverse people below.
There were 54 non-binary and gender diverse people across the sampled PFRAs. Around three quarters (77%) of these people were in STEM and health roles.
In 2025, the largest number of non-binary and gender diverse people in STEM and health roles were working at EL1 level. In 2024, it was the APS 5-6 level.
