AASWOMEN Newsletter for August 8, 2014
Issue of August 8, 2014
eds: Daryl Haggard, Nicolle Zellner, Meredith Hughes, & Elysse Voyer
This week's issues:
1. On Leadership
2. A Report from the (First of Many?) AAS Dinner to Discuss Dual Career Couples
3. Response to "The First Female Astronomer"
4. Sign Up to Stay Informed about APS CUWiP
5. In Science, It Matters That Women Come Last
6. Why Lego's First Female Scientist Kit is Selling Out
7. How to Submit to the AASWOMEN newsletter
8. How to Subscribe or Unsubscribe to the AASWOMEN newsletter
9. Access to Past Issues
1. On Leadership
From: Joan Schmelz via womeninastronomy.blogspot.com
When I try to imagine a LEADER in the field of astronomy, it is not usually the likeness of a woman that comes to mind. I said in a blog comment recently that the front in the battle for gender equality has shifted to the senior ranks. I also know that we all need role models to help us navigate in unknown territory. As a senior woman in astronomy, it is my peers who are the emerging leaders. So where do we look for role models? Where do we go to get good advice from the women who have forged the path that we are trekking?
One place to look is the word of business. Although few and sometimes far between, women have been presidents and CEOs of major companies. Here are some quotes from these successful businesswomen that resonated with me:
"Don?t Be Your 'First, Worst' Critic" - Virginia Rometty, CEO, IBM
"I learned to always take on things I?d never done before. Growth and comfort do not coexist." - Virginia Rometty, CEO, IBM
Read more at
http://womeninastronomy.blogspot.com/2014/08/on-leadership.html
Back to top.2. A Report from the (First of Many?) AAS Dinner to Discuss Dual Career Couples
From: David Charbonneau via womeninastronomy.blogspot.com
Today's guest post is by P. R. McCullough, M. Meixner (Space Telescope Science Institute), J. L. Christiansen (NASA Exoplanet Science Institute at Caltech), and L. A. Willson (Iowa State University). Earlier this year, Dr. McCullough wrote a blog proposing AAS Dinners to Discuss Dual-Career Couples. Well, the first such dinner was held this summer, and here is what happened!
The first dual-career couple dinner took place at a Thai restaurant on Monday Jun 2, 2014 during the Boston AAS. We five persons were two astronomer+astronomer pairs and a female half of a couple (astronomer+academic scientist). We happened to span the range from newly-hired Asst. Profs, to mid-career, to near retirement. The conversation ranged over a number of issues relevant to 2-career couples. What follows incorporates most of the key points raised.
Read more at
http://womeninastronomy.blogspot.com/2014/08/a-report-from-first-of-many-aas-dinner.html
Back to top.3. Response to "The First Female Astronomer"
From: Sethanne Howard [sethanneh_at_msn.com]
In response to the Huffington Post comment by Mario Livio. En He'du'anna was the first scientist in written history and she was an astronomer who lived in Ur, c 2334 BCE. Mario was 2,000 years off.
The original Huffington Post article can be accessed here:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mario-livio/the-first-female-astronomer_b_5568077.html
Back to top.4. Sign Up to Stay Informed about APS CUWiP
From: WIPHYS Posting for August 4, 2014
A new email list was created to share news, announcements, and deadlines related to the APS Conferences for Undergraduate Women in Physics (CUWiP). To join the list, email [email protected] with the subject "Subscription to CUWiP email list". Alternately, join the APS Conferences for Undergraduate Women in Physics (CUWiP) LinkedIn group to stay in the know. Join here:
https://www.linkedin.com/groups/Conference-Undergraduate-Women-in-Physics-4439529
Back to top.5. In Science, It Matters That Women Come Last
From: Meredith Hughes [amhughes_at_wesleyan.edu]
by Emma Pierson
People tell me that, as a female scientist, I need to stand up for myself if I want to succeed: Lean in, close the confidence gap, fight for tenure. Being a woman in science means knowing that the odds are both against you being there in the first place and against you staying there. Some of this is due to bias; women are less likely to be hired by science faculty, to be chosen for mathematical tasks and to have their papers deemed high quality. But there are also other barriers to success. Female scientists spend more time rearing children and work at institutions with fewer resources.
One measure of how female scientists are faring is how many papers they write. Papers are the coin of academic science, like court victories to lawyers or hits to baseball players. A widely read paper could earn a scientist tenure or a grant. Papers map money, power and professional connections, and that means we can use them to map where female scientists are succeeding and where inequality prevails.
To this end, I downloaded and statistically analyzed 938,301 scientific papers from the arXiv, a website where physicists, mathematicians and other scientists often post their papers. I inferred the authors? gender from their first names, using a names list of 40,000 international names classified by native speakers.1 Women?s representation on the arXiv has increased significantly over the 23 years my data set covers.
To read more, visit
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/in-science-it-matters-that-women-come-last
Back to top.6. Why Lego's First Female Scientist Kit is Selling Out
From: Meredith Hughes [amhughes_at_wesleyan.edu]
by Aimee Picchi
When it comes to stating the obvious, sometimes it takes a child to make the case.
Take 7-year-old Charlotte Benjamin, who earlier this year wrote a letter to Lego to point out a major fault with its minifigures: "There are more Lego boy people and barely any Lego girls." On top of that, the female minifigures did things like go to the beach and shop, while the boys "went on adventures, worked, saved people, and had jobs."
Several months after Charlotte wrote her plea, the toymaker has come out with its first minifigure set featuring scientists who are also women, designed by geoscientist Ellen Kooijman. The three tiny plastic figures are a paleontologist, an astronomer and a chemist, and they come with props that include scientific instruments, such as a telescope and a microscope. It turns out that Charlotte was onto something: Shortly after going on sale, the $19.99 minifigure set is already sold out at the Lego store.
Read more at
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/why-legos-first-female-scientist-kit-is-selling-out
Back to top.7. How to Submit to the AASWOMEN newsletter
To submit an item to the AASWOMEN newsletter, including replies to topics, send email to aaswomen_at_aas.org
All material will be posted unless you tell us otherwise, including your email address.
When submitting a job posting for inclusion in the newsletter, please include a one-line description and a link to the full job posting.
Please remember to replace "_at_" in the e-mail address above.
Back to top.8. How to Subscribe or Unsubscribe to the AASWOMEN newsletter
Join AAS Women List by email:
Send email to aaswlist+subscribe_at_aas.org from the address you want to have subscribed. You can leave the subject and message blank if you like.
Be sure to follow the instructions in the confirmation email. (Just reply back to the email list)
To unsubscribe by email:
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To join or leave AASWomen via web, or change your membership settings:
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Back to top.9. Access to Past Issues
http://www.aas.org/cswa/AASWOMEN.html
Each annual summary includes an index of topics covered.
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