What Can I Do? Become a Guest Blogger

Today’s suggestion: Guest blog for the Women in Astronomy Blogspot.

The Women in Astronomy Blog has continued to increase its readership and the range and frequency of posts since its inception in May 2008. We now publish a new blog post at least three times a week, over site has an average of 2,000 visitors per week with high impact posts reaching over 10,000 views. Our regular rotation of bloggers includes current CSWA members, Ed Bertschinger, Dave Charbonneau, Neil Gehrels, John Johnson, Jessica Kirkpatrick, Joan Schmelz, and Laura Trouille, as well as CSWA alum, Hannah Jang-Condell. We have also had dozens of external contributors. 

Because this large group spans career stages from graduate student to full professor and includes astronomers who have moved to careers outside academia, the blog effectively addresses concerns and provides relevant resources and advice across career stages. Topics discussed this past year included mentoring advice, role models, evolution in workplace culture/climate, work-life balance, family leave policies, job/career advice, unconscious bias, impostor syndrome, stereotype threat, bullying, sexual harassment policies, and more. The blog is linked to share entries on Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and LinkedIn.

Even casual readers of the blog could not help but notice the excellent posts we get from guest bloggers. Many of these people simply volunteered after we published a request for guest bloggers in the AASWOMEN Newsletter. If you have a topic you would like to write about, send it to me at the address below. We ask for a draft ~10 days ahead of the deadline so we can read it over and make suggestions. We would also need a short bio (3 or 4 sentences) that will introduce our readers to you.

-Joan Schmelz [jschmelz_at_memphis.edu]

What Can I Do? Share Advice & Resources

Today’s suggestion comes from CSWA alum, Caroline Simpson. Caroline is an associate professor at Florida International University. She works on star formation and evolution in dwarf galaxies. She also edited CSWA's weekly e-newsletter, AASWomen, from 2006-2013.

Spread the word in casual conversation, in class, wherever it seems appropriate, about resources online for women in science. Have links on your own webpage to them. Good examples would be the CSWA Advice page and the CSWA Resources page . Post your favorites in the comments section so the rest of us can share them.

Make sure your department webpage and/or Facebook page occasionally donates some time and space to women-related issues, items, resources, and news announcements. This doesn’t need to be limited to items directly related to your department; include national and international items that indicate that your department is conscious of the challenges facing underrepresented minorities. If you have policies or benefits that are of particular interest to women or dual-career couples, highlight that.

What Can I Do? AASWOMEN

Today’s suggestion: Get a friend/colleague/supervisor to subscribe to the AASWOMEN newsletter.

The CSWA publishes a weekly email newsletter called AASWOMEN which has over 1000 active subscribers. The editors are Michele Montgomery, Daryl Haggard, Nick Murphy, & Nicolle Zellner. A typical issue contains requests for information or advice, links to news items about women in science, announcements of honors and awards given to women in science, information about programs and meetings, and links to internship and job postings. Some of the topics covered over the past year include: advice on responding to bullying, sexual harassment, and unprofessional behavior; information and statistics on why women aren't promoted to full professor as often as men are; parental leave for graduate students; unconscious bias; and a series of ongoing contributions about 'how things have changed - for the better!' which highlighted practices we are thankful to see have vanished (women are no longer automatically expected to serve the tea and cookies at colloquia, for example).

What Can I Do? Form a Women in Astronomy/Physics/Science Group

Today’s suggestion comes from Sonali Shukla. Sonali researches the formation of young stars, in particular, X-ray and infrared signatures of disks around these types of stars. She uses data from the Chandra X-ray Observatory and the Spitzer Space Telescope. After completing two years as a postdoc at the Pennsylvania State University studying properties of brown dwarfs and young stars, she is now in an education and outreach position in the physics department at the University of Maryland. 

Ever wonder what you could gain from joining or starting a local Women in Astronomy/Physics/ Science group? When I was an undergraduate, I was the only female student in the physics program until my junior year. With such small numbers, there was no such women’s group in my department. However, I got along well with all my fellow students, and was blissfully unaware of any unconscious bias against women.

In graduate school, I had several female friends, and one of my colleagues and I decided to start a Women in Physics group – something that didn’t exist at my university. Our first meeting was a tea, and was well-attended by faculty and students. I mostly expected the meetings to mainly be of a social nature, but our next tea meeting brought up some surprises: while chatting, many students discovered some common slightly negative interactions with certain faculty and staff. Most of them consisted of only mildly insensitive comments, but it wasn’t until we were together as a group that we were able to put the pieces together. Working as a team with faculty support and our department chair, we were able to positively address some of these issues and the group went from strength-to-strength afterwards. During my time in graduate school, the group became a fixture in the department. We held group lunches and social events, established a mentoring program, shared resources, and even managed to instigate and create a college-wide policy on parental leave policies for graduate students.

What Can I Do? Make Women Feel Like They Belong

Today’s suggestion comes from CSWA alum, Caroline Simpson. Caroline is an associate professor at Florida International University. She works on star formation and evolution in dwarf galaxies. She is also a long-time editor of AASWOMEN, CSWA’s weekly e-newsletter.

One of the ways to help members of underrepresented groups succeed professionally is to indicate clearly that they are already part of the ‘club.’ Subtle things can help with this and are easy to do. Here is an idea regarding women in astronomy, but it can be extended to any underrepresented group:

Make sure that there are visible images that women are and have been important contributors to the field, and that your department or workplace recognizes that. Put up posters (commercial or homemade) representing women in science. I just asked our department chair to purchase this one for our hallway. Seeing things like this helps telegraph to students that the department is, in fact, 'female friendly' ;) or at least that it is 'female conscious.'

What Can I Do? Give a Talk on a Women-in-Science Topic

Many graduate students and postdocs would like to do something to promote women in astronomy and help create a female-friendly workplace, but their time for such activities is limited. This is the second in a series of monthly posts with suggestions for those who want to help but don’t have the time to commit to being a full-fledged CSWA member. Today’s suggestion: give a lunch talk in your department/research group summarizing information on a Women-in-Science topic that interests you. You don’t have to start from scratch. Here are two suggestions for getting started:

(1) Check out the CSWA resources page for information on the two-body problem, work-life balance, sexual harassment, mentoring, unconscious bias, diversity, and taking a career break.

(2) Download Why So Few? from AAUW (it’s free). The report presents evidence that social and environmental factors contribute to the underrepresentation of women and girls in STEM. Focus on any chapter – they are all good! Two of my favorites: Stereotypes and Spatial Skills. They even have a ready-made powerpoint presentation.

What Can I Do? CSWA Town Hall

I often get questions from graduate students and postdocs related to how they can help CSWA. They know they don’t have the time to commit to being a full-fledged committee member, but they believe in what we’re doing and want to do something to support women in astronomy & help create a female-friendly workplace. We have had some great suggestions from CSWA members, CSWA alums, and AASWOMEN readers. Today’s suggestions is especially timely because the CSWA Town Hall, “Unconscious Bias, Stereotype Threat, and Impostor Syndrome,” is taking place TODAY, Tuesday, June 4, at 12:45 - 1:45 pm in Wabash Ballroom 3 of the Indiana Convention Center.

Today’s suggestion: Invite your department chair/boss/research supervisor to attend the CSWA Town Hall.

Hope to see you there!