Women in STEM in the Eastern Partnership: EU-Driven Initiatives and Challenges of External Europeanisation

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

See the attached report

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

We would like to thank the reviewer for the constructive feedback and valuable suggestions. We appreciate the careful reading of the manuscript and the detailed remarks, which have helped us to improve the clarity and coherence of the paper. Below we provide point-by-point responses to the comments, along with a summary of the revisions made to the manuscript.

 

Comments 1. „A short section is devoted to the study of women in STEM in the whole Europe, not specifically in the EaP countries––for which the data seem to be missing”.

Response 1. Thank you for the observation. While Section 3.2 indeed draws on broader European and global data, its aim is to contextualize the specific challenges faced by EaP countries within wider systemic patterns observed across Europe and beyond.

In response to your comment, we have revised the section to ensure a clearer alignment with the focus of the article, by explicitly connecting these general trends to the EaP context.

 

Comments 2. “The referee, nevertheless, thinks that the whole study is interesting and, if better phrased and justified––page 12, for example, with findings issued from pages 4 to 11 seems to list more general conclusions, not necessarily coming from pages 4 to 11––, could be published in Societies”.

Response 2. We also agree with this comment. We have slightly updated the 3.1 section in order to strengthen its internal coherence and argumentative logic.

 

Additionally, we have revised all the items mentioned in the specific remarks and we have uploaded a new version of the manuscript, using Track changes.

 

We hope the changes implemented and the clarifications offered meet the reviewer’s expectations. We are grateful for the insightful comments and for the opportunity to revise our manuscript accordingly. Please see the revised version of the paper with tracked changes attached.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The article is of outstanding level. It is very well structured and written. I consider it is ready for publication.

Author Response

We thank the reviewer for the positive evaluation and kind words. We are grateful for the encouraging feedback and are pleased that the article was found to be well structured and ready for publication.

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Thank you for giving me this opportunity to review the manuscript entitled " Women in STEM in the Eastern Partnership: EU-Driven Initiatives and Challenges of External Europeanisation”. I have some comments.

Strengths:

-Use of a comprehensive case study methodology supported by current EU programs and policy frameworks (e.g., Horizon Europe, Erasmus+, GAP III).

-Nuanced consideration of sociocultural and political contexts in the EaP region.

-Rich and up-to-date data, including gender gaps, labour participation, and diaspora involvement.

-Clear articulation of limitations and pathways for future research.

Suggestions for Minor Improvement:

- While the results are explained across sections (particularly 3.1), the presentation could benefit from improved structure and clarity. For instance, clearer data tables, summaries, or visual cues (subheadings, bullet points or clearer transitions) would make the empirical content more “digestible”.

- The paper critiques GAP III’s limited focus on women in STEM but could provide more suggestions for how this might be improved or rectified in policy terms.

- Overall writing is of high quality, but minor grammatical issues are present. A professional proofreading pass would enhance readability. e.g. suggestions:

Line 47–48: “An area that is particularly susceptible when it comes to issues related to gender but still overlooks them is development.”- “is development” could be revised to “...is the field of development.”

Line 152–153: “...often via academic exchanges or project-based collaborations.” to “through academic exchanges or collaborative projects” for fluency.

Line 200: “...education intuitions and the civil society.” should be “educational institutions”

Line 274: “Women participation in STEM...” should be “Women’s participation...”

Line 438: “...not never translating in tangible action.” should be “never translating into tangible action” or “not translating into...”

Line 553: “.... from their country of origin...” better phrased as “of their country of origin”

- Figures are relevant and informative; however, their integration in the text could be improved. Ensure all figures are referenced and explained in detail in the body of the article (Figure 5 and Figure 6).

- Inclusion of more primary interview data or local academic voices from EaP countries could strengthen the qualitative aspect.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

While the manuscript is overall well written and the arguments are intelligible, there are several instances of minor grammatical issues (e.g., article usage, phrasing, singular/plural mismatches) and occasional awkward or dense sentence constructions. A light professional proofreading pass would enhance clarity and polish. I gave some examples in the previous comments.

Congratulations, well done!

Author Response

We would like to thank the reviewer for the constructive feedback and valuable suggestions. We appreciate the careful reading of the manuscript and the detailed remarks, which have helped us to improve the clarity and coherence of the paper. Below we provide point-by-point responses to the comments, along with a summary of the revisions made to the manuscript.

 

Comments 1. “While the results are explained across sections (particularly 3.1), the presentation could benefit from improved structure and clarity. For instance, clearer data tables, summaries, or visual cues (subheadings, bullet points or clearer transitions) would make the empirical content more “digestible”.”

Response 1. We thank the reviewer for this constructive suggestion. In response, we have revised the internal structure of Section 3.1 to improve clarity and flow by introducing thematic subheadings and enhancing transitions between paragraphs. We also reviewed Section 3.2 to ensure that the progression of ideas is more clearly signposted and aligned with the focus of the paper. Additionally, we improved the integration of figures and data references into the main text, in order to make the empirical content more accessible and reader-friendly.

 

Comments 2. “The paper critiques GAP III’s limited focus on women in STEM but could provide more suggestions for how this might be improved or rectified in policy terms.”

Response 2. Thank you for this useful suggestion. We agree that the critique of GAP III could be made more policy-relevant. Accordingly, we have revised Section 4.2 to include concrete recommendations on how future GAP iterations or related EU instruments could better integrate gender equality in STEM.

 

Comments 3. “Figures are relevant and informative; however, their integration in the text could be improved. Ensure all figures are referenced and explained in detail in the body of the article (Figure 5 and Figure 6).”

Response 3. Thank you for pointing this out. We have revised the manuscript to ensure that all figures, including Figures 5 and 6, are properly referenced and more clearly explained in the main text. The surrounding paragraphs were adjusted to integrate the visual data into the argumentation more effectively.

 

Comments 4. “Inclusion of more primary interview data or local academic voices from EaP countries could strengthen the qualitative aspect.”

Response 4. We appreciate this thoughtful suggestion. However, the present article was designed as a policy-oriented analysis based on secondary sources, institutional reports, and publicly available data. Our aim was to assess the normative influence of EU frameworks across the EaP through document analysis and programmatic evidence, rather than through primary fieldwork. Incorporating interviews or local academic voices would indeed enrich the qualitative dimension but would require a different research design and methodology. We believe this could form the basis of a complementary future study.

 

Additionally, we have revised all the grammatical issues mentioned and we have uploaded a new version of the manuscript, using Track changes.

 

We hope the changes implemented and the clarifications offered meet the reviewer’s expectations. We are grateful for the insightful comments and for the opportunity to revise our manuscript accordingly. Please see the revised version of the paper with tracked changes attached.

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The revised version of the paper is fine for publication as it is. Thanks for the improvements in the wording.