International Women’s Day 2026 | Higher Education and Real Equality: An Ongoing Challenge

On March 8, we commemorate International Women’s Day, a date that invites us to advocate for real equality and reflect on how we can help advance it. This year, I invite you to rethink the role of universities in this collective struggle. 

In recent years, significant progress has been made in women’s access to higher education. Today, women represent 56% (IDESCAT, 2023) of university students in Catalonia. However, the data still reveal an uncomfortable reality: having a university degree does not guarantee salary or professional equality. 

In Catalonia, the gender pay gap persists, currently standing at 16.75%, according to the “2026 Report: The Gender Pay Gap across the Different Territories of Catalonia” by UGT of Catalonia. According to the same source, it rises to 21.70% among highly qualified professionals. 

Women earn less than men with the same education and experience, and this gap widens when factors such as origin, social class, or caregiving responsibilities come into play. This reality cannot be ignored or normalized, but neither should it lead to the wrong conclusion: education remains essential. 

Giving up on higher education is not a solution to inequality. On the contrary, it is precisely in a context of structural inequalities that education becomes a key tool for empowerment, critical thinking, and opportunity. What must be questioned is not the value of education, but the responsibility of educational institutions and the labor market to ensure that this value translates into equal rights and opportunities. 

CETT is a university center committed to this transformation — a university that takes an active role in promoting inclusion. For this reason, we are committed to requiring equality standards in internships and partnership agreements, monitoring the professional careers of our female graduates, integrating a gender perspective across our programs, and making visible the inequalities that persist, even when they are uncomfortable. Failing to do so would mean contributing, by omission, to their perpetuation. 

Investing in women’s education is a collective commitment to social and economic progress. But this commitment will only be complete if it is accompanied by bold policies, salary transparency, and shared responsibility among educational institutions, companies, and public administrations. Equality cannot be reduced to an access statistic: it must be reflected in salaries, leadership positions, and personal and professional growth. 

Education is a powerful tool for transformation, and the 21st-century university must use it to empower critical, aware, responsible, and inclusive individuals who will continue building the social equality we need. Only then will higher education fulfill its promise of equality and social justice for all women. 

Dr. Maria Abellanet i Meya, president of CETT

• Film Forum for Students 

  A film forum featuring a movie aligned with the theme, followed by a space for critical discussion on gender and inequalities through cinema. This open and participatory session is part of the course Tourism and Gender, taught by Professor Nur Abellan Calvet.

• Gastronomic Offer 

  From March 2 to 6, the Aula Restaurant will pay tribute to leading female chefs of Catalan cuisine, replacing the usual starters in the snack, soup, and APT menus with vegetable chips in reference to Ada Parellada; vegetable broth with buckwheat spaghetti in reference to Fina Puigdevall; and an inside-out cannelloni in reference to Carme Ruscalleda, whose signature "colored eggs" will also be offered. 

  At the Espai Fòrum, a dish inspired by Fina Puigdevall will be added to the menu: "colored eggs".