Wyoming Women

I was recently invited to speak at an event in celebration of Women's History Month, along with a number of other women in the area both from the University of Wyoming and the surrounding community. It was a wonderful event, where I got to meet a lot of amazing local women and hear about their varied experiences. In the five minutes I was allotted, I talked a bit about myself and reflected on some of the challenges I face being a woman in science. This is a synopsis of what I said, stated perhaps a bit more eloquently now that I've had a chance to review it in my mind.

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I'm an assistant professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Wyoming. I've been here at UW since 2011. And although I've spent most of my life on the East Coast, I've come to love the Mountain West and I now consider myself to be a Wyoming Woman.

Promoting Diversity - UK's Athena SWAN Program

Imagine a world were research funding was dependent on diversity! If a science department had no tenured women, for example, then (at least in this particular fantasy) it would not qualify for $$ from NASA, NSF, DOD, NIH, etc. If a laboratory employed no people of color, then it would have a lot of work to do before it could even think about applying for grants. Proposals would be returned without review to principle investigators from organizations where the gender and ethnic breakdown of the scientific staff did not reflect that of the population at large. Crazy, huh? It’s a pipedream, you say, a fantasy, a delusion, a hallucination. This is just the kind of thing a person like me would dream about at night or fantasize about in all my spare time.

 

But wait! Believe it or not, there is an organization in Britain that is working to level the playing field for women in the STEMM disciplines (includes medicine in addition to the US STEM list). The organization is called Athena SWAN . The amazing thing about this organization is that unless a university or department has at least a Silver ranking with Athena SWAN, funding organizations such as the British National Health Service will not consider the institutions eligible for research grants!

Report: Gender in AAS Talks

Cross-posted from University of Washington Astronomy PhD Candidate Jim Davenport's blog:

Today I'm proud to announce that my AAS 223 Hack Day project is finally finished! Our "paper" (really an informal report) on the study of gender in AAS talks has hit astro-ph: http://arxiv.org/abs/1403.3091

This all started about 6 months ago when I was attending a different astronomy conference. I observed that the gender ratio for speakers seemed well balanced, as did the audience. Both were perhaps 60%/40% (Men/Women). However, the questions mostly seemed to be asked by men!

So I decided to organize a volunteer effort to study this. We collected data using a simple web-form (that Morgan Fouesneau graciously helped me make), and asked conference attendees to record the gender of every speaker and every question asker for talks they attended.We got over 300 submissions! I was going to be happy with 100, and figured I'd have to beg a few friends to participate. This was enough data to make some interesting plots... and also just enough data to know that we need more data!Here are a few highlights from the study:

1. MEN ASK DISPROPORTIONALLY MORE QUESTIONS THAN WOMEN IN TALKS.

FS FQ = Female Speaker, Female Questions,

FS MQ = Female Speaker Male Questions, etc

We were very glad to see that the gender ratio of all the speakers matched that of the conference participants. This also closely matches the gender ratio of astronomers under the age of ~40 as reported in the AAS Demographics survey recently.

AASWOMEN Newsletter April 25, 2014

AAS Committee on the Status of Women
Issue of April 25, 2014
eds. Michele M. Montgomery, Daryl Haggard, Nick Murphy, & Nicolle Zellner

This week's issues:

1. Large Survey Reveals Limitations for Women Scientists

2. The Confidence Gap and Possible Effects on Persistence and Pay

3. The Richer You Are, the Older You'll Get

4. Career Profiles: Astronomer to Education and Public Outreach Officer

5. Shortchanging Girls Shortchanging America

6. Another Unhappy Equal Pay Day

7. Podcast on Getting Girls and Women Involved in STEM

8. KICP Education & Outreach Summer School for Graduate Students

9. How to Submit to the AASWomen Newsletter

10. How to Subscribe or Unsubscribe to the AASWomen Newsletter

11. Access to Past Issues of the AASWomen Newsletter

Career Profiles: Astronomer to Education and Public Outreach Officer

The AAS Committee on the Status of Women in Astronomy and the AAS Employment Committee have compiled dozens of interviews highlighting the diversity of career trajectories available to astronomers. The interviews share advice and lessons learned from individuals on those paths.

Below is our interview with an astronomer turned Education and Public Outreach Officer. If you have questions, suggestions, advice to share, etc. about this career path, please leave a comment below.

For access to all our Career Profile Project interviews, please visit http://aas.org/jobs/career-profiles. We plan to post a new career profile to this blog every first and third Thursday of the month.

Large Survey Reveals Limitations for Women Scientists

I just read a 2012 Physics Today article about statistics on women scientists that was understandable and compelling.   It was great to see their numbers and be able to interpret them myself.

The PT article is called "Women in Physics:  A Tale of Limits" by Rachel Ivie and Casey Langer Tesfaye (Feb. 2012).  In 2009 and 2010, the Working Group on Women in Physics of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics did a large international survey to determine the status of women physicists worldwide.  They surveyed 15,000 women and men physicists from 130 countries, asking questions to reveal where women may be limited in their careers.

Results are given related to career-advancing activities that respondents experience.  Examples are invited speaker at conferences, leader of a group, editor of a journal and serving on conference organizing committees.  They gave the numbers and I couldn't resist doing my own analysis.  Here is my summary plot of the ratio of women to men experiencing different activities as a function of the importance of the activity.

The Confidence Gap and Possible Effects on Persistence and Pay

An article in The Atlantic by Kathy Kay and Claire Shipman is well worth reading and pondering.  On average, women are less confident than men, with harmful consequences for equitable advancement based on ability.  "Confidence, " says psychologist Richard Pette, "is the stuff that turns thoughts into action."  A person with low confidence tends to try less hard, to give up more easily, to negotiate less successfully, and to face fewer challenges that lead to growth.  Could it be that men's overconfidence is putting women at a disadvantage?

 Numerous surveys show the same thing: women as a whole are less confident than men.  In my own university's survey of its students, the gender difference on self-assessed confidence is one of the largest and most robust signals  in the data.  The effect has been noted in studies of math performance and as a reason why fewer women than men run for political office.  To be sure, there are underconfident men and overconfident women.  But the balance is tipped, and female self-confidence goes against social norms, as the mixed response to Sheryl Sandberg's messages makes clear.

AASWOMEN

AAS Committee on the Status of Women
Issue of April 18, 2014
eds. Michele M. Montgomery, Daryl Haggard, Nick Murphy, amp; Nicolle Zellner

This week's issues:

1. Strength in Numbers

2. Career Profiles: Astronomer to Staff Scientist

3. A Call to Nominate! And, Self-Nominate Too!

4. Women Earn Less Social Security

5. Study Finds Science Teachers Favor Males in Class

6. Presidential Proclamation - National Equal Pay Day 2014

7. Executive Orders to Help Close the Gender Pay Disparities

8. Gender Pay Gap in Academe May Not be What Matters

9. Careers in Astronomy in Germany and the UK

10. Changing the Face of Astronomy Research

11. Job Opportunities

12. How to Submit to the AASWomen Newsletter

13. How to Subscribe or Unsubscribe to the AASWomen Newsletter

14. Access to Past Issues of the AASWomen Newsletter

Career Profiles: Astronomer to Staff Scientist at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory

The AAS Committee on the Status of Women in Astronomy and the AAS Employment Committee have compiled dozens of interviews highlighting the diversity of career trajectories available to astronomers. The interviews share advice and lessons learned from individuals on those paths.

Below is our interview with an astronomer turned staff scientist at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO). If you have questions, suggestions, advice to share, etc. about this career path, please leave a comment below.

For access to all our Career Profile Project interviews, please visit http://aas.org/jobs/career-profiles. We plan to post a new career profile to this blog every first and third Thursday of the month.

A Call to Nominate! And, Self-Nominate Too!

Fellow AAS Members!

The time has come for you to nominate!  Nominate, I say, be it thy colleague, or thyself!

The AAS Prizes are important. They are our community's most visible means to foster and acknowledge excellence in research, education, and service.

Yet some of the research prizes remain overwhelming exclusive of women.

Strength in Numbers

Today’s guest blogger is Katja Poppenhaeger. Katja is a Sagan postdoctoral fellow at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA). Her research interests are exoplanets and their host stars, with a focus on stellar magnetic activity and its effects on exoplanetary atmospheres. She also is the organizer of the CfA's Women In Science Chats, a series of informal discussions where female CfA postdocs and graduate students can meet with visiting scientists.

A few weeks ago my colleague, Mohaddesseh Azimlu, mentioned how great it would be to have a group photo of all the female astronomers and astronomy students at the CfA. She was about to leave for a new career opportunity in Canada, so we hurried to invite everyone for a photo shot on a cold February day. We got an overwhelmingly positive response from the astronomers: We had 55 people join the picture, and 17 more who could not attend in person sent in photos of themselves to be added to the picture. Here's the result:

(picture credit: Clive Grainger, Katja Poppenhaeger)

AASWOMEN Newsletter for April 11, 2014

AAS Committee on the Status of Women

Issue of April 11, 2014

eds: Michele M. Montgomery, Daryl Haggard, Nick Murphy, & Nicolle Zellner

This week's issues:

1. Guest Post: Time to talk about Privilege

2. Cultural Change: Broadening the Metrics for Promotion

3. France A. Córdova Sworn In as NSF Director

4. Career Profiles: Astronomer to Tenure Track Faculty at a Community College

5. Uwingu Invites Applications for Graduate-Student Travel Grants

6. Look past cult of perfection to promote women in sciences

7. Yes, Daily Mail – black and Asian women can be qualified to talk

8. Job Opportunities

9. How to Submit to the AASWomen Newsletter

10. How to Subscribe or Unsubscribe to the AASWomen Newsletter

11. Access to Past Issues of the AASWomen Newsletter

Guest Post: Time to talk about Privilege

We have another guest post today from Caitlin Casey, a McCue Postdoctoral Fellow at UC Irvine who studies galaxy formation and evolution, including discovering and characterizing diverse types of starburst galaxies and how they relate to more "normal" spiral galaxies in the early Universe.  Caitlin recently cowrote, along with Kartik Sheth, a NatureJobs article entitled The Ethical Gray Zone, based on an extensive community poll on ethics and diversity.  She is also involved in STEM outreach and mentoring within her department and throughout astronomy.

After reading this pretty excellent article on Slate about how to 'look the part' of computer genius (long story short, being an Asian male is pretty helpful), I thought a lot about how the notion of privilege affects STEM research.  Privilege itself is a term that carries a lot of stigma and even vile hatred for some, as if there's an implied prejudice or blame that comes with it. Many folks aren't comfortable with the idea that they have special rights or advantages (or even immunities) based on their physical appearance or life choices, and that these advantages pervade all aspects of life: even, *gasp* their research and work environment.

Do you know what benefits this card carries?

Whenever I point friends or vague internet acquaintances to Peggy McIntosh's white privilege essay or similar compilations for other group privileges (e.g.  for male privilege, female privilege, class privilege, physical ability privilege, religious privilege, heterosexual privilege, etc.)  someone usually pipes up and shouts "prejudice!" or sometimes "stereotype!"  They then argue that discussing privileges provides re-enforcement and makes stereotypes even more harmful.

Career Profiles: Astronomer to Tenure Track Faculty at a Community College

The AAS Committee on the Status of Women in Astronomy and the AAS Employment Committee have compiled dozens of interviews highlighting the diversity of career trajectories available to astronomers. The interviews share advice and lessons learned from individuals on those paths.

Below is our interview with Andria Schwortz, an astronomer turned tenure track faculty at a Community College. If you have questions, suggestions, advice to share, etc. about this career path, please leave a comment below.

For access to all our Career Profile Project interviews, please visit http://aas.org/jobs/career-profiles. We plan to post a new career profile to this blog every first and third Thursday of the month.

Cultural Change; Broadening the Metrics for Promotion

The UK's House of Commons Science and Technology Committee recently released a set of recommendations for promoting "Women in Scientific Careers". The report includes numerous useful references to studies describing the range of obstacles to recruitment and retention, as well as useful references to studies providing remedies and solutions for these obstacles. 

However, many found the report 'weak', particularly in terms of failing to address the structural changes needed in academia to tackle inequality. For example, women faculty at the University of Cambridge published a letter in the Times Higher Education calling specifically for changes in how academics are assessed so that women do not face disadvantages for taking on tasks in teaching, administration and public engagement, rather than research. The letter says that a broader set of metrics should be used to evaluate performance and determine promotion.

AASWOMEN Newsletter for April 4, 2014

AAS Committee on the Status of Women
Issue of April 4, 2014
eds: Michele M. Montgomery, Daryl Haggard, Nick Murphy, & Nicolle Zellner

This week's issues:

1. Negotiating While Being a Woman

2. Build a Smarter Group from Scratch: Converse Equitably, Add Women, Stir

3. Career Profiles: Astronomer to Astrophysicist at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center

4. Astronomy and gender politics: In space and academia, Meg Urry pushes the envelope

5. LadyParagons Interview with Jessica Kirkpatrick, Director of Data Science at InstaEDU

6. Job Opportunities

7. How to Submit to the AASWomen Newsletter

8. How to Subscribe or Unsubscribe to the AASWomen Newsletter

9. Access to Past Issues of the AASWomen Newsletter

Career Profiles: Astronomer to Astrophysicist at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center

The AAS Committee on the Status of Women in Astronomy and the AAS Employment Committee have compiled dozens of interviews highlighting the diversity of career trajectories available to astronomers. The interviews share advice and lessons learned from individuals on those paths.

Below is our interview with Neil Gehrels, an astronomer turned Chief of NASA Goddard's Astroparticle Physics Laboratory. He loves his job, is very satisfied with his work-life balance, and finds his work environment to be very family friendly. If you have questions, suggestions, advice to share, etc. about this career path, please leave a comment below.

For access to all our Career Profile Project interviews, please visit http://aas.org/jobs/career-profiles. We plan to post a new career profile to this blog every first and third Thursday of the month.

Build a Smarter Group from Scratch: Converse Equitably, Add Women, Stir.

The below is a guest post from Dr. Sarah Ballard. Dr. Ballard completed her PhD in Astronomy & Astrophysics at Harvard University in 2012 and is now a NASA Sagan fellow at the University of Washington.  Follow her on twitter at: @hubbahubble

To work in astronomy is now to work in teams. A recent PNAS study reported that the average team size associated with a single publication grew from 1.5 in 1961-1965, to 6.7 in 2006-2010 (Milojević 2014). However, much of the dialog about the nature of intelligence is still focused upon single individuals. Though the conception of a person’s intelligence as a fixed quantity is fraught at best (see this summary by J. Johnson), it’s often the only way we conceive of intelligence at all. What is the nature of the intelligence of a group? What quantities are predictive of it, if any? It is now groups of individuals who publish new ideas in our field. To ask about group intelligence is now to ask: “How are units of knowledge produced?”