Breaking into the Lab: Engineering Progress for Women in Science

4. New Filters for Senior Women Scientists

93   4 New Filters for Senior Women Scientists Biologist Caroline Dogman has been at her research I public institution in the Southeast for almost 25 years now. From her position as department chair, she has seen how receiving salary raises to counter offers from outside institutions works to the advantage of senior men at her institution. Yes. Targeted recruitment almost always focuses on men. I finally got our dean to acknowledge that the distinguished chairs and top salaries are all for men. There is good equity at other ranks, but virtually no really top-level women in terms of pay—quality yes, pay no. Also, women at our university tend to stay put, so the loyalty tax has greater impact. My simple answer is that what is needed is a change in belief about the value of diverse personal perspectives to science. The accumulating quantitative data on flat percentages of women scientists in academia, especially in fields such as computer science and engineering, and on obstacles and barriers, particularly in elite research universities (NAS 2007), combined with anecdotal and qualitative studies (Rosser and Daniels 2004) such as those described in earlier chapters, led NSF to consider funding approaches to encourage institutions to adopt policies and practices that would facilitate advancement of women scientists to senior positions. While continuing to fund the research of individual women scientists and engineers, the National Science Foundation recognized the importance of removing institutional and systemic barriers through its ADVANCE institutional transformation initiative (NSF 2005) to empower women to participate fully in science and technology. Earlier research I conducted analyzed the responses of more than 450 women scientists and engineers to an email questionnaire regarding specific 94  New Filters for Senior Women Scientists barriers that institutions and professional societies might remove through changes in policy and practice. The respondents had received either a NSF ProfessionalOpportunitiesforWomeninResearchandEducation(POWRE) award (Rosser 2001; Rosser and Lane 2002a) or a Clare Booth Luce (CBL) Professorship award (Rosser and Daniels 2004). I then conducted follow-up interviews with a subsample of 50 of the questionnaire respondents to better understand the qualitative context for the problems and potential solutions. The results of this research have been useful, particularly to institutions with ADVANCE grants, in identifying potential changes to remove barriers. Since the overwhelming majority of the POWRE and CBL Professors are untenured, assistant professors, the barriers they identified are particularly problematic for younger women scientists and engineers at early stages of their academic careers. Anecdotal evidence from ADVANCE institutions, as well as the MIT Report (Hopkins 1999), suggests that more senior women scientists may face a different, equally problematic, set of barriers. I used the population of AWIS Fellows, more than 100 senior, distinguished scientists and engineers, the overwhelming majority of whom are women, elected by the Association for Women in Science (AWIS) for their contributions to science and technology and for supporting women in science and engineering, to explore perceived differences of barriers for junior and senior women scientists. Population of AWIS Fellows Launched in 1996 as part of the 25th anniversary celebration for AWIS, the Fellows Program aims to recognize and honor women and men who have demonstrated exemplary commitment to the achievement of equity for women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) . . . The criteria for nomination includes (sic): 1. Nominees can be AWIS members, but membership in AWIS is not required; 2. Nominees have made significant contributions to the promotion of women in STEM through scholarship, leadership, education, mentoring, advocacy, or service; and 3. Nominees have demonstrated commitment to issues of women in STEM and/or made significant contributions to the mission of AWIS (www.awis.org/network/fellows.html). New Filters for Senior Women Scientists  95 As suggested by the criteria, most AWIS Fellows have achieved considerable success in their own careers that has brought them to a position where they have enabled women in STEM at a level worthy of national recognition. The AWIS fellows include a significant number of university presidents, CEOs of major corporations, executive directors of professional societies, foundations, or non-profit organizations, as well as deans, department chairs, professors, government agency heads, and industrial research scientists. Because I am an AWIS Fellow myself and a former member of the AWIS Executive Board, the Board gave me permission to administer the same email questionnaire that was previously given to the POWRE and CBL...