Last week I received this letter from a lovely reader...a letter I have been carefully, carefully pondering:
Dear Dr. Isis,
I am an assistant professor at a big research university. Despite general appearances of democracy, my department is in reality run by a small group of oligarchs, all of them famous old men. This isn't terribly surprising, given the fact that there are few women at that career stage in my field. I don't think they are doing a bad job running the place, nor do I seriously object to any of their major decisions regarding how we do our science. There have been several new hires in the last couple years, and several of the appointments have been women, so it is clear that the oligarchs do not actively discriminate. However, the fact remains that the oligarchs are all men, and they lack a real perspective on what it is like to be a woman in this place.
I have recently been asked to sit on a committee tasked with reviewing the departmental policies that affect women. I know, this seems a rather broad mandate, as it would imply that the committee review all departmental policies, since all policies here affect everyone, regardless of gender. When I asked a few questions, it was clear that the committee is supposed to review the 'women' policies, those that relate to parental leave, and childcare. A few more questions revealed that the oligarchs had little intent to actually change anything, rather the committee is supposed to craft documents to be made available on the departmental intranet with titles such as '10 things I wish I had known' and 'work-life balance'. This will then all be written up and submitted to a national equal-opportunity agency so that the department can be congratulated on its pro-women policies. More solid measures, like career progression, parental leave, and salary, will not be open for discussion.
My tenure review will take place in three years, and I feel under pressure to accept committee assignments in order to demonstrate that I am a good departmental citizen. However, I really don't want to spend precious time discussion and crafting intranet documents, when the committee has no hope of effecting real improvements. More importantly, I do not want my very presence on this committee to suggest that I think the department has done all that it should to promote its women. Any ideas on how to get out from between this rock and hard place?
Many thanks,
Biologist in a Bind
I am going to offer an opinion here, but I also am going to give you all a bit of fair warning: When it comes to departmental and societal politics, Dr. Isis is really not a political genius. In fact, I really tend to deal with things more like today's Dilbert:
Figure 1: This comic in all of its full-sized glory can be found here.
I'm really not very good at exercises in futility. In fact, I have been known for responding poorly. Still, what I take away from our reader's letter are two issues:
- BiaB has been giving a committee assignment that she believes is futile.
- BiaB needs additional department service for her tenure dossier.
Figure 2: An artist's rendition of this reader's situation.But, that's an issue of local politics that you might do better to get local advice on. Your local advocates would know how the grumpy old men would respond to a counter committee proposal, and I am sure I have a commenter or two who will be happy to leave you a little advice below.
The issue beyond the committee assignment is, what is the real value of this committee? My general assessment is:
Figure 3: It's probably about a useful as a screen door on a submarine.I find lists like "10 things you should know about being a woman scientist" to be about as useful as lists like "10 ways to please your man." The focus is generally on all of the things you should be doing and about half are going to leave you with a sore backside. People can create documents until they are blue in the face, but the real benchmark is how are women represented in your department? How do women in your department fare compared to their male counterparts? Do they receive tenure at the same rate? Are they paid the same? Are they bringing in the same level of research funding and mentoring students with the same success? What about the success of students in your department? Are men and women represented equally among the ranks? Are female students as likely to find work at graduation? Are female PhD-level students as likely to enter academia and achieve tenure?
I mean, it's great to offer reading materials, etc. that a woman can access, but if you're an an MRU, there may be a group for women in science and engineering that already has these resources in place. You recreating them would be like me writing a grant to discover the crystal structure of DNA. What I think are really missing are real mentoring resources (ie, people) for young women in science - mentors that women would turn to answer questions like this - and policies like the ones that you pointed out that support women during the period in their lives where their careers are especially vulnerable. But, you've got to have a local community that supports these things. After all, that's why communities like this are so popular, right? If these systems were in place at MRUs, I wouldn't still have 12 questions in my inbox.
So, if your department really wants to demonstrate their forward thinking, they should be able to show the real, tangible resources they are offering to help women succeed. Not a list of documents on a department's intranet.
But you already knew that, BiaB. In the mean time, do the best you can and keep the focus on getting tenure. Then when you've got the Shied of Invulnerability to protect you from the oligarchs, you can change the world.
Education
Life Science
Comments
Are there other (more senior?) women on the committee? If so, beg off and let them handle this. You can offer to meet with them to give your perspective as a junior faculty member.
Are there no other women on this committee? Then beg off, because you'll be in the very bad position of having to complain about policies that harm you but not other members of the committee.
Posted by: Rosie Redfield | November 22, 2009 2:19 PM
The best advice I got was to negotiate a "no committees for 3 years" clause when I got my first position. Then, after about 18 months, my fellowship mentor told me to find an important committee I cared about and get myself on it. That way when they tried to put me on the "dead rats ass" committee, I could gracefully say no. IACUC and other such committees are a work load, but they are significant and can let you out of innumerable trivial assignments.
Of course, none of this helps the present situation.I suspect the writer is going to get stuck doing this, but there may be ways to use this assignment to "work in the white spaces" to improve things.
Posted by: Pascale | November 22, 2009 4:40 PM
agree with Pascale@ 2.
"work in the white spaces" ... particularly if she can get to be Chairman of the committee - that way, at least any documents produced for the intranet will be USEFUL ones; at least they can be adequately researched and have links to other work that others have done. That could be a small victory in itself.
Posted by: d. | November 22, 2009 4:44 PM
"...all policies here affect everyone, regardless of gender."
Maybe the first thing you can do for her is explain to her the difference between "gender" and "sex".
"Check out my new boat - ain't she a beauty?" - gender.
"The new boss is that woman in the blue top over there" - sex.
Posted by: Vince Whirlwind | November 22, 2009 5:40 PM
Minor nitpick, but I think that's a picture of a dragon doing naughty things to a naked woman on its colossal tadger.
Posted by: Katharine | November 22, 2009 6:17 PM
Disclaimer: My advice may kill your career.
I'd be extra cheeky and just write in the documents recommendations for women to lobby/whatever for change in all the bad policies - make an exhaustive list - if you can't make any actual change. Assuming you can't get out of this.
Posted by: Katherine | November 22, 2009 7:17 PM
Vince, don't be a douche. "Gender" is a perfectly reasonable way to describe identifying as female here. Things in the workplace are not as neat as XX and XY. Policies that affect "women" also affect the transgendered, etc. If there is something else you'd like to explain to this letter writer, I'd suggest you get your own blog.
Katharine, I don't think you're nitpicking. I think that is exactly what that is a picture of.
Posted by: Isis the Scientist | November 22, 2009 7:51 PM
How does an untenured person avoid being a committee patsy? The short version is that you can't.
I'm an assistant professor, and through a process that I still don't quite comprehend I became chair of a university committee. They assured me that it would look good on my performance evaluations, and it was also clear that my background played a role: They wanted somebody from an academic discipline outside the usual club that handles the matter before this committee, to show that this isn't just the usual club, just as the good old boys want BiaB to show that the final document isn't just the view of the good old boys.
Unlike BiaB, I'm actually chair of the committee, but that doesn't mean I have significant clout. It just means that I have even more headaches. Power still resides elsewhere. (They even have a handler assigned to me.) The odds of any significant change coming out of this committee are nill, and once I've served a sufficient amount of time to show that I did my part I will resign my chairmanship and thank everyone involved.
I know that change can and sometimes does happen, but the paths to change are complicated and murky and don't generally pass through committee rooms. Especially if you're an assistant professor sitting in a room with people who were teaching there before you were born.
So, my advice to BiaB is that if you get even one teensy weensy piece of good stuff into that document, declare victory. Otherwise, keep your head down and work towards tenure. Having tenure doesn't necessarily mean that once you're safe you'll be able to change the world (doesn't ever generation say "Once I'm older, let me tell you, I'll fix everything!"?) but at least it makes it a bit safer to fight the fight. And, perhaps more importantly, over time you'll learn more about the process and see things that are completely invisible to you right now.
Posted by: Alex | November 22, 2009 9:25 PM
Oh, and definitely definitely DEFINITELY keep your head down on committees. I have a friend who, well, he got too involved, saw too much, said too much, and it worked out very badly for him. Committees are dangerous places.
Posted by: Alex | November 22, 2009 9:32 PM
Thank you, dear Goddess @7.
I was wondering how to respond to Vince, but you have done it for me. Not clear cut at all.
I could think of the alternative interpretation of his first example as 'sex', being equivalent to the well-known line "would you like to come up to see my etchings?", and thought his second example was a valid description of the gender of the person, and in fact was gender neutral (she may have been standing with a group of people of both or either gender, and been the only one who was female and had a blue top). No different from saying "my boss is the guy over there, the one wearing the blue shirt".
Posted by: d. | November 22, 2009 9:59 PM
I'm not an academic, so maybe my idea is not appropriate...
Is there any way, if you can't avoid the committee, that you could recruit "experts" or "consultants" to serve on it?
I'm thinking people from other departments who would risk a lot less than you by rocking the status quo.
You know... you're flattered by the opportunity...you know you're young and lack experience...there is really no one senior in the department who has walked the walk.
But over in sociology, history, women's studies or whatever there are people who have worked on similar projects in the past. Why re-invent the wheel?
Someone who is staring down retirement instead of tenure might be able to make some progress you can't.
Posted by: R E G | November 22, 2009 11:20 PM
You could pick just one of the policies that aren't specifically a "women's" policy and explain to the guys how this particular policy affects men and women differently. And suggest a way to change it to make the policy more fair to both genders. These sound like well intentioned guys but maybe they just haven't looked at things from a woman's point of view. Just focus on the one and it will bring home the idea that all policies affect women. Pick one that would have the biggest impact on women, like tenure rules, starting salaries, raises. A big one for women can be negotiating startup packages. Or pick one that you think they would be willing to make changes to.
Posted by: Sara | November 23, 2009 6:38 AM
I think Letter Writer might be giving up too soon on her ability to make a difference. Groupthink is hard to avoid, and I've found that a thoughtful comment in a committee setting can sometimes free up others to express their misgivings. Even a little pushback can get things rolling in ways she might not expect. Plus, maybe this will help her move onto (head up?) a committee that investigates the real issues, once you've gotten tenure.
Posted by: Dacks | November 23, 2009 12:29 PM
much like the advice given to dudes en route to Vietnam,
keep your head low.
Got to love tokenism of sticking the woman on the "gender" committee. I got the fun of drafting faculty maternity policies AFTER I had already finished being pregnant.
I am also a year away from tenure and this year managed to negotiate a no committees agreement in exchange for other "service."
That said, if you are well and truly stuck, squeeze in whatever part of the document drafting that gets foisted on you around other things. Under the "guise" of being "green" I carry a subcompact laptop to every freakin' meeting I am required to attend. I surreptitiously do work. I have become quite adept at revising documents during kiddie care time as well.
Posted by: feMOMhist | November 23, 2009 6:00 PM
...
@ whirlie...
The phrase that comes to my mind is: 'Sex is who we are, gender is what we do.'
Calling your boat a 'she' is anthropomorphism at best.
...tom...
' who has his own blog but likes to comment on those of others. ...:minism:... '
Posted by: ...tom... | November 23, 2009 9:48 PM
The IOM was "kind" enough to define Sex and gender for us a few years back (obviously, none of them have to discuss either topic with folks with mental ages of 13 or they would have said sex only referred to the act of intercourse).
"Sex [is] the classification of living things, generally as male or female according to their reproductive organs and functions assigned by the chromosomal complement. Gender [is] a person't self-representation as male of female, or how that person is responded to by social institutions on the basis of the individual's gender presentation. Gender is shaped by environment and experience."
My studies examine the role of biological sex in response to disease, so I can put this word in the title of my talks and legitimately draw more people into the audience (they often leave early). As I am performing rodent studies, gender is probably the same thing; however, I don't believe the concept of gender can exist in nonhumans (are there other species who are transgendered?).
You would think the words of the IOM would be sufficient, but I still have to argue this point with reviewers convinced I have used the wrong term in my manuscripts. Sigh.
Posted by: Pascale | November 24, 2009 10:48 AM
@Pascale - very nicely said!
I too do work on sexual dimorphism, and found the following scientific distinction helpful. Sex is genetic, gender is a human social construct. Animals do not have gender (even if you are doing OVX experiments).
By and large, try to keep the discussions in workplace about gender, for all the reasons stated above, as well as the fact that "sex" has become a loaded word in western lingo.
Advice from a senior prof: keep your head down. No one ever gets tenure for service, but you sure as hell will get denied for insufficient science, and maybe even teaching.
Posted by: rzg | November 26, 2009 12:05 PM