Cross-post: Why Peer Mentors Are Crucial for Women in STEM

By Rebecca Coglianese for Inside Higher Ed

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We recently celebrated Women’s History Month, and the month prior was International Women and Girls in Science Day, a time to reflect on what all women have accomplished in STEM fields. This day, and every day, I remember the important women who charted pathways and helped me become the scientist I am today.

I am proud to be part of a world where we strive for equal representation. I often think of Jocelyn Bell Burnell, who discovered the first neutron star—although her male adviser received the Nobel Prize for doing so.

I look forward to my future as a physicist focused on the niche world of braneworld research—the fascinating study of neutron stars and how gravity interacts with the universe. I am also studying an alternative gravity model and aim to broaden my course selection in graduate school to study new fields of planetary and galaxy life cycles, stellar dynamics, and solar plasma physics research. I want to show other young women that they, too, can play an important role in the research of the physical laws of our universe and all the other fields of science that keep our world spinning.

Read more at

https://www.insidehighered.com/opinion/views/2023/04/28/why-peer-mentors-are-crucial-women-stem

Eds note:

In 2013, John Johnson wrote about the Importance of Mentoring for Fostering Diversity and in 2022, Wu et al. published a study that showed Female peer mentors early in college have lasting positive impacts on female engineering students that persist beyond graduation.