In many undergrad STEM courses, high-stakes exams — such as mid-terms and finals — determine as much as 60-70% of the student’s overall grade. However, this emphasis on tests may be inadvertently putting some students at a disadvantage. Read more
Just 34 of leading universities named in this year’s annual Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings have female presidents, down 1% from the 36 that were led by women in 2017. Read more
Researchers at the University of Washington in Seattle gathered names of first and last authors from papers published from 2005-2017 in 15 major science and neuroscience journals, including Nature, Science, PNAS, Nature Neuroscience and Neuropsychology Review. Nearly 10% of the names were excluded because they were relatively gender neutral, but the rest told a clear story: In these journals, authorship is a male-dominated enterprise. Read more
A study involving interviews and online posts of 28 women in the later stages of PhD studies in engineering and physical sciences in the United States, published 31 January in the journal Social Sciences, revealed many day-to-day slights that left them feeling alienated and undervalued. Some said they were contemplating leaving research as a result. “There’s a culture in male-dominated environments,” says Bianca Bernstein, a co-author of the study and a psychologist at Arizona State University in Tempe. “Some women feel it’s not for them.” … Read more
One study suggests that the concept of “brilliance” in science might discourage some women from following certain career paths or education opportunities. Another found that women are more likely than men to offer “honorary authorships” to scientists who may not or do not deserve it—a courtesy that might obscure the magnitude of their own contributions. Read more
The study, the latest in a lengthy string of gender-disparity findings in academia, quantifies a type of discrimination to which female scientists have long objected—the low number of speaker invitations that they receive compared with male scientists. One of the most egregious examples—speaker panels comprised solely of Caucasian males—has spawned the hashtag #manel (for ‘male panel’) on Twitter. Read more
Female and Hispanic faculty representation in the United States increased significantly between 1992 and 2015, but more slowly for black and indigenous faculty members, according to a review study of personnel records from four large US land-grant institutions published in PLoS One . The small numbers of URM lack the data necessary to draw valid conclusions about retention. However, the study found, URM hiring is increasing, but not at the rate expected for the number of STEM doctoral degrees earned by the populations. Read more
You don’t look like a scientist. Read more
Springtime in Paris seems a fitting backdrop for any awards ceremony but particularly so in the case of the L’Oréal-UNESCO For Women in Science program. I recently had the honour of attending the 2017 International Awards along with 14 other early career researchers from around the globe, as part of the L’Oréal-UNESCO International Rising Talents Fellowship. Read more
Recent comments on this blog
African astronomy and how one student broke into the field
From Doctorate to Data Science: A very short guide
Work/life balance: New definitions