In certain fields of science, one and a half times more competent female senior university lecturers are available than needed to succeed leaving professors. However, boards of directors see no support to replace retiring men with women. Just a bit more than 17 percent of professors in the Netherlands are female, which places the country in Europe’s bottom four. Statistics from the Monitor Female Professors study show that students and graduates have a fifty-fifty gender balance, but higher on the academic ladder, the proportions change quickly.