Career Profile: Observatory Staff Astronomer

 The AAS Committee on the Status of Women in Astronomy is compiling 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 Gwen Rudie. She studies the chemical and physical properties of very distant galaxies and their surrounding gas in order to further our understanding of the processes that are central to the formation and development of galaxies. Critical to this research is our ability to trace the raw materials of galaxy formation and its biproducts. These clues can be found in the gas that surrounds early galaxies. She is primarily an observational astronomer, working on the analysis and interpretation of high-resolution spectroscopy of distant quasars as well as near-infrared and optical spectroscopy of high-redshift galaxies. In addition to her scientific efforts, she is also the director of the undergraduate research program at the Carnegie Observatories. Dr. Rudie received her AB from Dartmouth College and her PhD from Caltech. She was the Carnegie Princeton Postdoctoral Fellow before becoming a Staff Astronomer.

To access our previous Career Profiles, please go to http://womeninastronomy.blogspot.com/search/label/career%20profiles

AASWomen Newsletter for January 22, 2021

From Item 2

AAS Committee on the Status of Women
Issue of January 22, 2021
eds: Heather Flewelling, Nicolle Zellner, Maria Patterson, Alessandra Aloisi, and Jeremy Bailin

[We hope you all are taking care of yourselves and each other. Be well! --eds.]

This week's issues:

1. Cross-post: We’re Past Due for a SEA Change

2. American Astronomer Nancy Grace Roman’s Legacy for Female Pioneers

3. Why Big Data Is Failing Women In STEM And How To Fix It

4. Meet the Biden cabinet’s science and tech leaders

5. ‘Picture a Scientist’ documentary showcases just how hard it is for female scientists to overcome bias

6. The 10 greatest predictions in physics

7. Dr. Andrea Ghez, Only the Fourth Woman to Win the Nobel Prize for Physics, Shows the Rarity of High-Achieving Women in Science

8. We Need STEM Mentors Who Can Reduce Bias and Fight Stereotypes

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

An online version of this newsletter will be available at http://womeninastronomy.blogspot.com/ at 3:00 PM ET every Friday.

Cross-post: We’re Past Due for a SEA Change

 By Alexis Knaub

While it’s no secret that we in physics and astronomy still have much progress to make, our field has begun the journey of addressing the disproportionate challenges faced by our colleagues from groups underrepresented in physics, including those who are Black, Latin American, Indigenous, Asian, female, LGBT+, and/or are disabled.

A major issue we must confront is that many of our learning and work environments aren’t set up for all of us to thrive as our whole, authentic selves. There are many reasons for this, ranging from systemic barriers to individual actions. There are people in physics who blatantly promote harmful beliefs or actions. There are also many people who mean well but subconsciously cause harm.

All of us have unconscious biases, beliefs, or preferences of which we are unaware and for which we lack supporting evidence. For example, the editor-in-chief of Physics World noted a time he assumed two astronomers in a story were middle-aged white men when, in fact, they were young women. As the author points out, his unconscious bias—assuming an astronomer is a middle-aged white man—can have other impacts, such as whom he selects for different jobs. Because they are not deliberate, unconscious biases are hard to unseat. Becoming aware of them and actively working on them are important first steps.

To provide the best possible environment for everyone in our departments, those who witness or learn of problematic situations have a responsibility to ensure harm doesn’t continue. We must dismantle barriers rooted in racism, sexism, homophobia, biphobia, transphobia, ableism, and more. These barriers have nothing to do with learning or working in physics and are detrimental to the progress of the field. To do so, departments must work together internally and with support from the broader community.

Read more in the Sigma Pi Sigma Fall 2020 edition of Radiations magazine at

https://www.sigmapisigma.org/sigmapisigma/radiations/fall/2020/we%E2%80%99re-past-due-sea-change 

You can read more about the AAAS SEA Change Departmental Awards at

https://womeninastronomy.blogspot.com/2019/11/physics-and-astronomy-stem-equality.html

Please email any questions about the CSWA's involvement with SEA Change to our SEA Change representative Stella Kafka at cswa_at_lists.aas.org.

AASWomen Newsletter for January 15, 2021

AAS Committee on the Status of Women
Issue of January 15, 2021
eds: Heather Flewelling, Nicolle Zellner, Maria Patterson, Alessandra Aloisi, and Jeremy Bailin

[We hope you all are taking care of yourselves and each other. Be well! --eds.]

Henrietta Swan Leavitt, from item 2.
Credit: Wikimedia Commons

This week's issues:

1. Apply for the Carnegie Astrophysics Summer Student Internship Program

2. Madam starmaker: Henrietta Swan Leavitt transformed a powerful astronomical tradition

3. Dr. Shirley Ann Jackson: A lifetime shattering glass ceilings in math and science for Black women

4. That's One Hot Job! How Kelly Korreck Became An Astrophysicist

5. Gage: Quashing the Matilda Effect

6. No Gender Bias in Peer Review: Study

7. Job Opportunities

8. How to Submit to the AASWomen Newsletter

9. How to Subscribe or Unsubscribe to the AASWomen Newsletter

10. Access to Past Issues of the AASWomen Newsletter

An online version of this newsletter will be available at http://womeninastronomy.blogspot.com at 3:00 PM ET every Friday.

Apply for the Carnegie Astrophysics Summer Student Internship Program

By Gwen Rudie

CASSI interns on the catwalk 

of the 200 inch Hale Telescope 

at the Palomar Observatory.

The Carnegie Astrophysics Summer Student Internship Program (CASSI) is a 10 week, paid internship and educational program based at Carnegie Observatories in Pasadena, CA. CASSI welcomes a diverse cohort of 10-15 undergraduates annually, most of whom are students at colleges and universities in Southern California. CASSI Interns collaborate with Carnegie astronomers on original research projects from studying exoplanets to distant galaxies. Some CASSI interns also work with Carnegie scientists and engineers on the next generation of cameras and spectrographs for our telescopes.

AASWomen Newsletter for January 8, 2021

AAS Committee on the Status of Women
Issue of January 08, 2021
eds: Heather Flewelling, Nicolle Zellner, Maria Patterson, Jeremy Bailey, and Alessandra Aloisi

[We hope you all are taking care of yourselves and each other. --eds.]

From Item 6

This week's issues:

1. Cross-post: Affecting Change in the Local and Global Astronomical Communities

2. Join the Women in Astronomy Blog Team!

3. CSWA @ the 237th AAS Meeting

4. SHIELD Webinar: Coming From Far Away Lands: How different backgrounds Shape their Careers

5. Retracting a Bad Take on Female Mentorship

6. They Decided To Debate Women’s Leadership Skills. Then It Got Worse.

7. Women in science: studying exploding binary stars, while exploding the gender binary

8. Ways to look after yourself and others in 2021

9. Call for Nominations to the Executive Committee of the Exoplanet Exploration Program Analysis Group (ExoPAG)

10. Job Opportunities

11. How to Submit to the AASWomen Newsletter

12. How to Subscribe or Unsubscribe to the AASWomen Newsletter

13. Access to Past Issues of the AASWomen Newsletter

CSWA @ the 237th AAS Meeting

by Nicolle Zellner and Jeremy Bailin

AAS meeting participants are invited to join members of the Committee on the Status of Women in Astronomy (CSWA) at their Splinter Session on January 12 (6:50 pm to 8:20 pm ET) to learn about CSWA activities. Based on input to the committee's 2019 community survey, the CSWA is beginning to develop and undertake projects to support the committee's Strategic Plan for the 2020s, which will guide the committee's efforts for the next decade. In this session, participants will learn about the committee's Strategic Plan, its focus areas, objectives, and potential projects. They will also learn about opportunities to become involved in the process of implementing the projects and assessing the outcomes.

Meet & Greet: A Strategic Plan for the Next 10 Years

Date: January 12, 2021

Time: 6:50 PM to 8:20 PM EST

Session ID # 169

We’d love to receive your questions ahead of time, so please fill out this survey. We’ll also take questions during the session itself.

Other meeting sessions that may be of interest to you include:

Be the Captain of your PhD, Jan. 7th, 12:00 pm–4:00pm ET
Grad School Fair, Jan. 10th, 11:00 am–3:00 pm ET (visit the CSWA's virtual booth!)
CSMA Panel: A Discussion on Anti-Blackness in Astronomy, Jan. 11th, 12:00–1:30 pm ET
Networking from Afar and Mastering the Informational Interview, Jan. 11th, 12:00–1:30 pm ET
Combat Impostor Syndrome, Jan. 11th, 4:10–5:40 pm ET
Enhancing Participation of Minority Serving Institutions, Jan. 11th, 6:50–8:20 pm ET
SGMA Meet & Greet for LGBTQIA Members and Students, Jan. 11th, 6:50–8:20 pm ET
NASA’s Opportunities for Scientists to Engage with Learners of all Ages, Jan. 12th, 4:10–5:40 pm ET
STARtorialist: Introduction to the Universe of Astro-Fashion, Jan. 13th, 12:00–12:30 pm ET
Evaluating a Job Offer, Jan. 14th, 2:40–3:10 pm ET


More career, networking, poster, exhibitor, and science sessions can be found on the AAS "at a glance" block schedule by clicking through the date tabs at the top.

We look forward to seeing you next week!