Women In Astronomy: AASWomen Newsletter for December 7, 2018

AAS Committee on the Status of Women AAS Committee on the Status of Women
Issue of December 07, 2018
eds: Nicolle Zellner, Heather Flewelling, Maria Patterson, JoEllen McBride, and Alessandra Aloisi (guest ed.)

Today's guest editor is Alessandra Aloisi. Alessandra studies stars and gas in nearby star-forming galaxies with UV/optical/NIR imaging and UV/optical spectroscopy to infer their chemical and evolutionary state. She received her PhD from Bologna University (Italy) in 1999. She then landed in the US and launched her career as postdoc at the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI), and as associate research scientist at Johns Hopkins University. Alessandra joined the research staff at STScI in 2003, working first for the European Space Agency (ESA) and transferring to a position with the Association of the Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA) in 2009. At STScI, Alessandra started as instrument scientist for the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph and the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph on the Hubble Space Telescope, and became the lead for the team responsible for the calibration, operations, and user support of these spectrographs just before the Hubble Servicing Mission 4. She then moved to be the Deputy Division Head of the Operations & Engineering Division, and is now the Head of the Science Mission Office where she oversees the science career and infrastructure of STScI as well as HST and JWST science policies.

This week's issues:

1. A Planetary Scientist in Industry
2. Nancy Grace Roman Advances Space Astronomy with Hubble Space Telescope
3. L’Oréal USA For Women In Science Fellowship Program
4. Nobody Believed Neil deGrasse Tyson's First Accuser. Now There Are Three More.
5. Perth NASA InSight mission researcher breaks new ground for women in science
6. Celebrate IAU100 Women and Girls in Astronomy Day in Your Country
7. Girls in STEM: Top STEM toys for the holidays
8. America's Top 50 Women In Tech 2018
9. Senate passes bill to recognize ‘Hidden Figures’ women
10. Lawsuit Alleging Misconduct At Dartmouth Raises Concerns About Treatment Of Women In STEM
11. What science has gotten wrong by ignoring women
12. Turns Out We Still Have a Huge TV Scientist Stereotype Problem
13. How Hollywood brought women of STEM & arts together so they are no longer ‘Hidden Figures’
14. Women have been written out of science history – time to put them back
15. Job Opportunities
16. How to Submit to the AASWomen Newsletter
17. How to Subscribe or Unsubscribe to the AASWomen Newsletter
18. Access to Past Issues of the AASWomen Newsletter

1. A Planetary Scientist in Industry
From: Elizabeth Frank via womeninastronomy.blogspot.com

“I’ve come to dislike the cliché interview question “where do you see yourself in five years?” Five years ago, I was in my last year of grad school at the University of Colorado at Boulder studying planetary geochemistry. Had I been asked to predict my future, there’s no way I would have guessed it would include an asteroid mining company, unemployment, and a systems engineering start-up.

Since high school, I knew I would become a scientist. I had long had a desire to work on a NASA mission, and an internship at JPL during grad school confirmed that interest in spades. By the end of my Ph.D., however, I’d started to become disenchanted with academia.”

To learn more, please read

http://womeninastronomy.blogspot.com/2018/12/a-planetary-scientist-in-industry.html#more

2. Nancy Grace Roman Advances Space Astronomy with Hubble Space Telescope
From: JoEllen McBride [joellen.mcbride_at_gmail.com]

By Marsha James

"The field of astronomy has often been dominated by men. However, Nancy Grace Roman changed that. Roman is the first chief of astronomy in the Office of Space Science at NASA, the US national space agency."

3. L’Oréal USA For Women In Science Fellowship Program
From: Rachel Pacifico [rachel.pacifico_at_loreal.com]

Applications for the 2019 L’Oréal USA For Women in Science fellowship program are now open and will close on Friday, February 1, 2019. The L’Oréal USA For Women in Science fellowship program honors female scientists at a critical stage in their careers with grants of $60,000 each. Since 2003, we’ve awarded 75 postdoctoral women scientists nearly $4 million in grants. We’re seeking five exceptional female scientists looking to advance their research and serve as role models for the next generation of girls in STEM.

To apply, please read at https://lorealfwis.aaas.org/login/indexA.cfm

4. Nobody Believed Neil deGrasse Tyson's First Accuser. Now There Are Three More.
From: JoEllen McBride [joellen.mcbride_at_gmail.com] and Heather Flewelling [heather_at_ifa.hawaii.edu]

By Azeen Ghorayshi

“No one believed Tchiya Amet when she said Tyson had raped her in the 1980s. Now, three other women tell BuzzFeed News that he harassed them, including one who’s sharing her story publicly for the first time.”

5. Perth NASA InSight mission researcher breaks new ground for women in science
From: Alessandra Aloisi [aloisi_at_stsci.edu]

By Miriam Fisher

“When NASA confirmed the successful landing of its InSight mission on Mars early Tuesday morning, Dr Katarina Miljkovic heaved a sigh of relief.
The planetary scientist is the sole Australian researcher on NASA’s InSight team. And with a lifelong fascination with the Red Planet driving her efforts, the Curtin University fellow was heavily invested in the groundbreaking mission’s safe landing.”

Read more at

https://thewest.com.au/news/wa/perth-nasa-insight-mars-mission-researcher-breaks-new-ground-for-women-in-science-ng-b881037044z

6. Celebrate IAU100 Women and Girls in Astronomy Day in Your Country
From: Richard Tresch Fienberg [rick.fienberg_at_aas.org]

“The IAU100 Secretariat encourages the organization of activities around the United Nations’ International Day of Women and Girls in Science in February 2019.”

Read more at

https://www.iau-100.org/women-and-girls-in-astronomy-day

7. Girls in STEM: Top STEM toys for the holidays
From: JoEllen McBride [joellen.mcbride_at_gmail.com]

By Betsy Kling

"As the holiday gift buying gets into full swing, the good folks at Toy Insider share their top pics for STEM toys."

[Read last week’s post about STEM gifts at http://womeninastronomy.blogspot.com/2018/11/startorialist-2018-holiday-gift-guide.html --eds.]

8. America's Top 50 Women In Tech 2018
From: Alessandra Aloisi [aloisi_at_stsci.edu]

By Helen Popkin

“From Ada Lovelace to Anita Borg, the history of STEM is a history of women. Yet the historical narrative predominantly focuses on men. When the modern news cycle turns its attention to women, more often than not, it’s to note the paucity of females in the increasingly vital fields of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM).”

9. Senate passes bill to recognize ‘Hidden Figures’ women
From: Nicolle Zellner [nzeller_at_albion.edu]

The Senate recently passed bipartisan legislation to award "Congressional Gold Medals to Katherine Johnson and Christine Darden, posthumously award Congressional Gold Medals to Dorothy Vaughan and Mary Jackson and award a Congressional Gold Medal to recognize the contributions of all women who worked at NASA or its predecessor, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, during the Space Race."

[Coming to the CSWA blog soon: a post and a petition to support the nomination of the First Lady Astronaut Trainees, aka The Mercury 13, for a Congressional Gold Medal. --eds.]

10. Lawsuit Alleging Misconduct At Dartmouth Raises Concerns About Treatment Of Women In STEM
From: Alessandra Aloisi [aloisi_at_stsci.edu]

By Zoe Mitchell & Deborah Becker

“Seven women from Dartmouth College have filed a lawsuit that describes a science department at school as a “21st-Century Animal House.” The women allege that the school was aware of a culture of pervasive sexual misconduct that had been created by three now-former professors in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences. The suit is seeking $70 million in damages.”

11. What science has gotten wrong by ignoring women
From: Alessandra Aloisi [aloisi_at_stsci.edu]

By Catherine Zuckerman

“Angela Saini knows what it’s like to be the only woman in the room, especially when that room is a science lab. In college, she was the only female in her engineering class. Before that, she’d been the only girl in her math class and her chemistry class. She went on to get two masters degrees, one in engineering and the other in science and security. Now an award-winning journalist, Saini is shining a light on the history of science, a field which, for all its good, has done a disservice to women - and to research - by largely dismissing them.”

12. Turns Out We Still Have a Huge TV Scientist Stereotype Problem
From: Alessandra Aloisi [aloisi_at_stsci.edu]

By Carly Cassella

“Black Panther. Gravity. Annihilation. Hidden Figures. In the past few years, the big screen has been graced by some truly awe-inspiring female scientists and engineers. But even though we now have Shuri to outsmart Bruce Banner and all seven of his PhD's, data shows that media portrayals of scientists are still reinforcing an outdated early 20th century stereotype of what a scientist is.”

Read more at

https://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-on-tv-just-reinforce-all-the-classic-stereotypes

13. How Hollywood brought women of STEM & arts together so they are no longer ‘Hidden Figures’
From: Alessandra Aloisi [aloisi_at_stsci.edu]

By Nandita Jayaraj

“Over three weeks this October-November, 50 women who work in science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics (S.T.E.A.M.) in 50 countries and territories around the world travelled across the United States for a one-of-a-kind exchange programme aimed at evening out the gender gap in these fields. ‘Hidden No More’, one of the US State Department’s international visitor leadership exchange programmes, is the first to be inspired by a Hollywood movie.”

Read more at

https://theprint.in/culture/how-hollywood-brought-women-of-stem-arts-together-so-they-are-no-longer-hidden-figures/159124

14. Women have been written out of science history - time to put them back
From: Alessandra Aloisi [aloisi_at_stsci.edu]

By Claire Jones

“Can you name a female scientist from history? Chances are you are shouting out Marie Curie. The twice Nobel Prize-winning Curie and mathematician Ada Lovelace are two of the few women within Western science to receive lasting popular recognition.

One reason women tend to be absent from narratives of science is because it’s not as easy to find female scientists on the public record. Even today, the numbers of women entering science remain below those of men, especially in certain disciplines. A-level figures show only 12% of candidates in computing and 22% in physics in 2018 were girls.”

15. Job Opportunities

- Postdoctoral positions and fellowships, Department of Astronomy, University of Massachusetts Amherst https://jobregister.aas.org/ad/cbeec3d5

- Instructor, Department of Physics & Astronomy, University of Hawaii https://www.governmentjobs.com/careers/hawaiiedu

For those interested in increasing excellence and diversity in their organizations, a list of resources and advice is here: https://cswa.aas.org/#howtoincrease

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