<p>Ranking these schools is hard because most people have experience with only one as an undergrad (at most two if they transferred) - and coming in as a grad student is different. Also different STEM majors seem to do a better or worse job of attracting and retaining women so I’m not sure how useful it is to lump all the STEM areas together. (Bio-medical engineering, for example, is totally different from electrical engineering in this respect.) I’ve also seen no statistics that compare the attrition rate for women in STEM (non-premed) at various schools - or even documenting the attrition publicly. I know it’s an issue - Stanford is doing some research on this topic right now, and I’m sure other schools are too. There are lots of hypotheses, but no clear answers.</p>
<p>Advice? I’d look for schools that have a critical mass of women in the specific STEM major you are interested in, and assume it’s a proxy for some level of effectiveness on the part of the school in attracting and keeping women who are interested in that major.</p>