women in science
skookumchick | August 24, 2008I got an email from a reader a few days ago posing a doozy of a problem: she's heading to an interview this week at an institution, and part of her interview involves having "beer with the guys".
With her permission, I share with you an edited version of her email:
Hi ladies,I am a job candidate for a tenure track position in my field interviewing at a university in the south in 2 weeks. These are huntin' fishin' PhD folks (of course 95% white dude phenotype). There's 2 women of around 30 faculty in the department (grad students are 50% female). I have some colleagues (three relatively…
skookumchick | August 20, 2008In my inbox this afternoon:
We are requesting your help in identifying participants for a study that we are conducting at Rice University. Essentially, we are trying to identify ANY faculty who have voluntarily left one academic job for another job (either academic or nonacademic).
Who fits in this criteria?
Any faculty member who was in an academic position but left academics altogether.
Any faculty member who left a research institution for a teaching institution.
Any faculty member who left a teaching institution for a research university.
Any faculty member who left a teaching or…
sheril | August 19, 2008The NYTimes Claudia Dreifus recently interviewed Dr. Nina V. Fedoroff, science adviser to the secretary of state and administrator of the Agency for International Development:
Q. WHY DOES THE SECRETARY OF STATE NEED A SCIENCE ADVISER?
A. Because science and technology are the drivers of the 21st century's most successful economies.
There are more than six billion of us, and the problems of a crowded planet are everyone's: food, water, energy, climate change, environmental degradation. Other nations, even those that have lost respect for our culture and politics, still welcome collaboration on…
sciencewoman | August 7, 2008
Dear ScienceWoman,
I am starting a career as a teacher and would very much like to enroll in a masters specializing in teaching high school science. I am wondering if you could help direct me to some grants or incentives that are geared towards encouraging women to pursue graduate teaching degrees in these areas. Any help you could give me would be much appreciated. Thank you.
Sincerely,
Future Teacher
P.S. I'd also like to stay in Texas if possible.
Dear Future,
That's fabulous that you want to be a high school science teacher. We need lots more enthusiastic and knowledgable science…
sporte | August 4, 2008Pfizer has pledged to donate up to $10,000 to the cause of science education, through Donorschoose.org, but only if enough of you, dear readers go to Big Think: Think Science Now and vote for your favorite video.
If you're not familiar with Pfizer, they're a pretty well-known drug company. You probably read about one of their products every time you delete messages from your e-mail in-box.
You don't even have to watch the videos, just vote.
I strongly recommend watching the videos, though. They are all profiles of scientists who work at Pfizer or other research organizations. It's…
sciencewoman | July 17, 2008John Tierney had a piece in Tuesday's New York Times on "A new frontier for Title IX: Science." Anyone who's read anything by Tierney before knows to expect anti-woman idiocy, but the Times dignified his piece by putting it not in the opinion section, but in the science section. And that poor editorial decision makes the piece worth responding too.
If you haven't yet read the article, here's how Tierney starts out:
The members of Congress and women's groups who have pushed for science to be "Title Nined" say there is evidence that women face discrimination in certain sciences, but the quality…
sheril | July 14, 2008
Real ad for epMotion: An automated pipetting system.
Yes folks, biotech is targeting women in science. Readers can, uh, form their own opinions of Eppendorf's approach...
sheril | July 3, 2008According to ABC, a new study reports that women tend to drop out of research between their postdoc positions and running their own labs. I can't say I'm shocked. While personal anecdotes are not reliable evidence, by age 28 I've already seen this trend firsthand among my peers many, many times.
We ladies make up approximately 45% of postdocs, 29% of tenured faculty, and only 19% of those running independent labs. Yes I've written about this topic before, but what's different here is that researchers found no evidence of gender bias, but rather 'women's desire to be with their children…
sheril | June 26, 2008
'I wanted to blaze a trail as a woman in math--once I decided I probably couldn't be a baseball player.'
- Moon Duchin
A pioneer in mathematics, Moon hopes to do interdisciplinary teaching and research incorporating math and the humanities.
Moon has a keen mathematical intellect, which she brings to bear on problems of history, politics, and philosophy seldom touched by rigorous logic. Her essays and teaching breathe new life into the ancient idea that mathematics is the prerequisite for all serious thinking.
More at Scientific American...
skookumchick | June 17, 2008I'm at the College of St. Catherine in St. Paul, MN at a completely fascinating (so far!) conference on feminist science studies. Because of the free Internetz, I'll try liveblogging the sessions I'm in, but may get distracted as it is (as I have mentioned) completely fascinating.
Here's some of what I'm hearing:
Marlene Zuk, talking about the problems with using males as model organisms and how the use of model organisms seem to result in making those model organisms role models for humans, and the problems with the scala natura constructing the most complicated (and therefore good)…
skookumchick | June 12, 2008You may have read this announcement already - it's making the rounds on the "women in STEM" listservs (I got this version off of WEPAN, but I also saw it on the NSF-PGE listserv). It reads:
House Celebrates Women Scientists, Technologists, Engineers, and Mathematicians
On June 4, the House approved, by voice vote, a resolution (H. Res. 1180) recognizing the efforts of outstanding women scientists, technologists, engineers, and mathematicians in the United States and around the world.
Sponsored by Rep. Dave Reichert (R-WA), the resolution contains a number of findings, including:
women have…
sheril | May 30, 2008Yes, there are jobs that offer women 'man sized paychecks', but I'm not encouraged looking at mean salaries in the sciences. While we ladies recently experienced a sightly higher percentage increase than the fellas, it seems to me something still doesn't add up:
sheril | May 13, 2008I'm pleased to make my first cameo appearance in the Scientiae Carnival, the 'best blogging on women in science, technology, engineering and mathematics!'
This month's collection is hosted by FlickaMawa of A Cat Nap and the theme is career paths, perspective, and changing self-image. Go check it out...
skookumchick | May 12, 2008Okay, so I've been keeping this under my hat for the last six-eight months, scared of jinxing things, but it's becoming arduous to keep hiding, so I'm sharing.
Purdue submitted a proposal in December for an NSF-ADVANCE institutional transformation grant - the purpose of these grants are to improve the lot for and of women in science and engineering academia, particularly faculty positions. I'm listed as a co-PI on Purdue's grant.
NSF hasn't awarded anything yet, so we are in official limbo, waiting for word. However, the waiting game has now bumped into the annual ADVANCE PI meeting,…
sheril | April 16, 2008 ..says Natalie Portman.
My third post of the week examining science illiteracy and women is now up over at Correlations. This time, find out where fellas surpassed the ladies by 30 percentage points... (gulp!)
sheril | April 15, 2008Back to taking on the science literacy gender disparity...
Correct answers to scientific literacy questions, by sex: 2006
(by percent)
The continents have been moving their location for millions of years and will continue to move. (True)
Male 85
Female 75
All radioactivity is man-made. (False)
Male 77
Female 64
The universe began with a huge explosion. (True)
Male40
Female27*
* that right folks, almost 3/4 of female respondents answered incorrectly
sheril | April 15, 2008Over at Denialism blog, PalMD asks us to:
..imagine you are sitting in the doctors' lounge, and a senior physician says that sending women to medical school is a bit of a waste.
[cringe]
He goes on to explain:
In the early 1960's, about 5% of medical American medical students were women. Now about half are. Women are first authors on more medical papers than ever, yet fill only about 11% of department chairs, and fill about 15% of full professorship positions.
Hmmmm... sounds familiar...
Well, this is the real world, and in the real world, half of us are women, and women are the ones who…
sheril | April 8, 2008I'm troubled to read that according to a UN-commissioned report, women are discriminated against in almost every country. We make up 70% of the world's poor, owning 1% of titled land. While I often write about gender bias in academia, that disparity is merely the tip of the iceberg.
Surely more can be done to improve opportunities for women globally. So how and where do we begin?
skookumchick | April 5, 2008I'm sitting in panels and sessions at this great conference on Engineering, Social Justice and Peace which is the 7th annual conference of this kind. Here are only some of the snippets of what I've been seeing and hearing:
I heard yesterday of exciting and courageous curricular attempts to integrate social justice into engineering education. I heard of a course called "Engineering and Social Justice" offered through engineering and sociology at Queen's University, a first-year course where projects were focused on social justice, year-long experiences for students in Engineers Without…
sciencewoman | March 14, 2008A few weeks ago I challenged the readers of this blog to join me in reading Paula Caplan's "Lifting a Ton of Feathers: A Woman's Guide to Surviving in the Academic World." This weekend we're set to discuss the book - and we'll see where the conversation goes from there.
If you've read the book (and you have a blog), I'd encourage you to post your thoughts on your blog and then put a link in the comments here. I'll make this the first of three posts where I'll pull out what I think are highlights of the book and try to add my own two cents.
Below the fold, you'll find my thoughts on "The…