On Being a Role Model
I recently hosted a get-together of the women in my department. Because it is a small department, this meant myself plus a bunch of students. The gathering made me realize that while there is still a lot of work to be done to achieve gender parity at higher levels, students these days are reaping the successes of previous generations to get rid of outright discrimination. All the students felt that they were treated no differently than their male counterparts and none had any complaints to report.
But if you consider where the active fronts in the battle to achieve gender partity are, like maternity/paternity leave, fighting unconscious bias in hiring, and achieving equity in prizes and awards, students are generally too young to have faced these issues.
I am trying to strike a balance between giving advice to prepare these women students for the challenges they might face head versus coming across as too cynical about those challenges. Then again, the work that the CSWA does is to try to eliminate those challenges all together -- not that I think our work will be done any time soon.
For now, I'll simply work to be a role model and be available to turn to for advice. Then again, if things are good enough that they never feel the need to ask me for advice, then the CSWA is doing its job.
- Cswa Climate Site Visit Program For Astronomy Departments - A Department Chair's Perspective
In 2009, the MIT Physics Department hosted a Climate Site Visit for Women and Minorities from the APS Committee on the Status of Women in Physics and Committee on Minorities. As a relatively new department head with interest in improving the status...
- Mind The Gender Gap
A recent Nature article discusses problems with the hiring and retention of women in science and engineering. The National Science Foundation finds that while female scientists have made steady gains in recent decades they face persistent career challenges....
- Family Leave - International Comparison
A friend (thanks Diego Fazi!) recently posted on facebook the image to the left, showing various national policies for the number of weeks provided for maternity leave. Click here for the raw data. Yes, men and women in other countries face other...
- Obstacles To The Progress Of Women In Science And Engineering
In her Keynote Address to the MIT150 Symposium Leaders in Science and Engineering: The Women of MIT, Professor Nancy Hopkins presented a wonderful summary of the reasons why there are so few women faculty in science and engineering, especially at the...
- Notes From A Workshop
I attended a workshop in France last month, and I made some interesting observations from a gender balance point of view. Out of 40 participants, 7 were women. (18%) Out of 17 invited speakers, 1 was a woman. (6%) Out of 7 contributed talks, 1 was a...