Friday, April 17, 2020

AASWomen Newsletter for April 17, 2020


Image courtesy of Mark Godfrey
AAS Committee on the Status of Women
Issue of April 17, 2020
eds: JoEllen McBride, Nicolle Zellner, Heather Flewelling, Maria Patterson, and Alessandra Aloisi

[We hope you all are taking care of yourselves and each other. --eds.]
This week's issues:

1. Two Body-Problem Series: Navigating the Move

2. Webinar: Exploring the Latest Research on Women in Engineering

3. Vera Rubin Solved the Darkest Mysteries of the Universe

4. Indigenous scientists are connecting culture with science to get kids inspired

5. Six ways to juggle science and childcare from home

6. Risk Without Reward

7. Inequalities faced by women in access to permanent positions in astronomy in France

8. Mental health in physics group

9. Can you help identify unnamed women scientists of the past?

10. The pandemic and the female academic

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


1. Two Body-Problem Series: Navigating the Move
From: Katie Eckert via womeninastronomy.blogspot.com

This entry in the two-body problem series is an account of one person’s experience navigating the academic track with their partner. For context, the people in the relationship are cisgender and heterosexual. If you would like to contribute your own story to this series, please contact us at wia-blog at lists.aas.org.

When did you and your partner meet? What are your backgrounds (educational, social, cultural, etc., for context)? We met in college, in the first few days after freshman orientation. We grew up in different regions of the same US west coast state. We're both white with college-educated parents. Our first interaction was when I asked if he had a car and could drive two friends and me to the store! He kindly agreed, but we wouldn't date for over a year after that. He was two years ahead of me, and majored in engineering; I majored in physics.

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2. Webinar: Exploring the Latest Research on Women in Engineering
From: Nancy Morrison [nancyastro126_at_gmail.com]

“As SWE’s Senior Manager of Research, Roberta Rincon oversees the organization’s research activities on gender equity issues affecting girls and women in engineering, from school to career. Before joining SWE, Roberta was a Senior Research and Policy Analyst at The University of Texas System. She has over 15 years of experience in education research and policy analysis. In her current role, she shares SWE’s research on gender equity in engineering and technology with academic, industry, and policy researchers and practitioners to inform their STEM diversity efforts. Roberta holds a B.S. in Civil Engineering from The University of Texas at Austin, an MBA and an M.S. in Information Management from Arizona State University, and a Ph.D. in Educational Policy and Planning from UT Austin."

Time: Apr 23, 2020 03:00 PM in Eastern Time (US and Canada)

Register for the webinar at

https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://AWIS.informz.net/z/cjUucD9taT05MjY3MDc3JnA9MSZ1PTEwOTMyNDA5OTImbGk9NzU3NzM2ODM/index.html__;!!LoBwcKfm!wdHxxOj88ZMm4nsIp__nmp_bYiaknPvQpWXI9Jfr5kmjUqGT0V_nT5o3UBCeqHBC-Qtfcw$

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3. Vera Rubin Solved the Darkest Mysteries of the Universe
From: Heather Flewelling [heather_at_ifa.hawaii.edu]

By Kelly McSweeney

"Vera Rubin proved the existence of dark matter, the invisible substance that makes up 27% of the universe. Her work on galaxy rotation rates uncovered discrepancies between theories and observations of the universe. Ever a scientist, she asked questions that led to even more questions, and she researched and analyzed hundreds of galaxies. Rubin did this while also raising four children and facing gender discrimination."

Read more at

https://now.northropgrumman.com/vera-rubin-solved-the-darkest-mysteries-of-the-universe

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4. Indigenous scientists are connecting culture with science to get kids inspired
From: Nicolle Zellner [nzellner_at_albion.edu]

Run by Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, summer science schools are "[l]ighting curiosity ... in Indigenous students ... [who may not] know much at all about their Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander heritage. [These] activities are designed to help them build a closer connection to culture."

Read more at

https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2020-04-12/walking-together-indigenous-science-camp/12066816

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5. Six ways to juggle science and childcare from home
From: Nicolle Zellner [nzellner_at_albion.edu]

By Robin Lloyd

Scientists who have children are trying to manage their productivity as employers, universities and schools worldwide have closed in an effort to contain the COVID-19 pandemic. Here’s what six researchers are doing to navigate the tensions that arise when full-time work and full-time parenting intersect at home.

Read more at

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-01060-x

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6. Risk Without Reward
From: Alexander Rudolph [alrudolph19_at_gmail.com]

By Colleen Flaherty

“Students who are underrepresented by gender in their fields find less adoption of their novel ideas compared to those who are overrepresented, for example.“

Read moer at

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/04/16/underrepresented-scholars-outperform-majority-peers-terms-novel-research

Read the PNAS article at

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7. Inequalities faced by women in access to permanent positions in astronomy in France
From: JoEllen McBride [joellen.mcbride_at_gmail.com]

By Olivier Berné & Alexia Hilaire

"A recent national survey on behalf of the French Society of Astronomy and Astrophysics highlights the elitism and gender discrimination faced by women — particularly women educated in universities rather than grandes écoles — when applying for permanent positions in astronomy in France."

Read more at

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-020-1068-5

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8. Mental health in physics group
From: Alexis V. Knaub [aknaub_at_aapt.org] and Andrea Welsh [awelsh8_at_gatech.edu]

This is a social group peer-run (no mental health professionals) for those who identify as neurodivergent, having a mental illness, or dealing with mental health. This group is for undergraduates, graduates, post-docs, faculty, and non-academics in physics and physics adjacent fields to: Share resources Ask for advice on difficult situations Discuss articles and literature Find representation and support Plan meet-ups at conferences and workshops

Join the Google Group at

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/mental-health-in-physics

Join the Slack channel at https://join.slack.com/t/mentalhealthinphysics/shared_invite/zt-dluqqr5w-J4qzwuUPgHJPN6r7ENQnSA

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9. Can you help identify unnamed women scientists of the past?
From: JoEllen McBride [joellen.mcbride_at_gmail.com]

By Karen Kwon

"March was International Women’s History Month. And 2020 also marks the 100th anniversary of the passage of the 19th Amendment, which granted women in the US the right to vote, albeit only white women. To celebrate, the Institute decided to launch a crowdsourcing campaign to name women scientists whose identities are mystery. The initiative’s leaders, Hillary S. Kativa, Chief Curator of Audiovisual & Digital Collections at the Othmer Library of Chemical History, and Rebecca Ortenberg, Social Media Editor of the Science History Institute, are hoping that people would look at the photo and provide leads on who the women scientists could be."

Read more at

https://massivesci.com/articles/women-scientists-crowdsourcing-photos-naming-wiki-sexism-history

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10. The pandemic and the female academic
From: Heather Flewelling [heather_at_ifa.hawaii.edu]

By Alessandra Minello

Humour is one way for women in academia to face the pandemic’s consequences for their work and family lives. Last month, a viral Twitter post read, “The next person who tweets about how productive Isaac Newton was while working from home gets my three year old posted to them!”

Read more at

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-01135-9

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11. How to Submit to the AASWOMEN newsletter

To submit an item to the AASWOMEN newsletter, including replies to topics, send email to aaswomen_at_lists.aas.org

All material will be posted unless you tell us otherwise, including your email address.

When submitting a job posting for inclusion in the newsletter, please include a one-line description and a link to the full job posting.

Please remember to replace "_at_" in the e-mail address above.

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12. How to Subscribe or Unsubscribe to the AASWOMEN newsletter

Join AAS Women List by email:

Send an email to aaswomen_at_lists.aas.org. A list moderator will add your email to the list. They will reply to your message to confirm that they have added you.

Join AAS Women List through the online portal:

Go to https://lists.aas.org/postorius/lists/aaswlist.lists.aas.org and enter the email address you wish to subscribe in the ‘Your email address’ field. You will receive an email from ‘aaswlist-confirm’ that you must reply to. There may be a delay between entering your email and receiving the confirmation message. Check your Spam or Junk mail folders for the message if you have not received it after 2 hours.

To unsubscribe from AAS Women by email:

Send an email to aaswlist-leave_at_lists.aas.org from the email address you wish to remove from the list. You will receive an email from ‘aaswlist-confirm’ that you must reply to which will complete the unsubscribe.

Leave AAS Women or change your membership settings through the online portal:

Go to https://lists.aas.org/accounts/signup to create an account with the online portal. After confirming your account you can see the lists you are subscribed to and update your settings.

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13. Access to Past Issues

https://aas.org/comms/cswa/AASWOMEN

Each annual summary includes an index of topics covered.

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