Student engagement is essential in determining a student's interest in a particular subject in class. When students have a strong desire to learn, they are more likely to understand the information and perform well in class. Student engagement theory refers to Frederick, Blumenfeld, and Paris that consists of three main components, namely behavioural engagement, emotional engagement, and cognitive engagement. Engagement consists of publicly observable behaviours, as expressed in a person's involvement in an activity.(Yu et al., 2019) Student engagement was a factor that improved student participation in school and, as a result, influenced students' achievement, academic knowledge, and social behaviour. In this study, gender difference can be a critical factor on student engagement that attention in current time. The purpose of this study was to identify student engagement across gender in the first semester of writing class and to fill out research student engagement across gender. This study was qualitative study utilizing questionnaire and interview design. The participant of study ware 36 students from educational department UIN Walisongo Semarang in first semester 2020/2021. The participants consisted of 15 males and 21 females. The data collection was done through questionnaire and interview. The obtained date were analyzed descriptively. The result shows that, males and females have no significant gap in student engagement.