One of the points from this week’s readings that resonated with me is the tremendous power of a singular word: confidence. Reading Eileen Pollack’s article, I was infuriated to watch how the lack of affirmation and entrenched biases amongst the male power brokers within the science fields hindered intelligent, incredibly talented young women. Eileen and other women she spoke with both expressed that had they had just one male professor express confidence in their potential to move forward in the field, they would have. Confidence—that intangible yet invaluable magic juice—has the power to propel women straight through the barriers currently limiting their progress. Yet while this key to success appears entirely internal—these woman had the intelligence, drive, and work ethic to succeed—confidence is built as much from the energy the external environment a woman finds herself in as it is from her internal disposition. In failing to believe in our women we are discouraging them from believing in themselves, and consequently denying our society from sharing in the spoils of the gifts they possess.
Yet after reading the remainder of the material and viewing Dr. Mahzarin’s talk, I was forced to consider the reality that women, too, can also play a role in enforcing the biases against them. Sheryl Sandberg captured this reality in her Ted Talk “Why We Have Too Few Women Leaders.” Often, as Sandberg expressed, women “leave before they leave.” If women are currently not receiving reinforcement from outsiders, then perhaps they must assume responsibility for creating the change they wish to see. If we wait for someone else to tell us he or she thinks we can do it, we are relinquishing our decision to succeed to the hands of another. There must first be a few brave women to believe they are enough—by themselves–before young girls can have the vital examples to turn to when they craft their visions and goals for their own future selves. Without the first snowflake, the snowball can never start its roll, producing a product far larger than its own meager being.
Tuesday, March 21, 2017 4:26 pm
While I was aware of a lot of these issues, I didn’t realize the extent of this issue. In the article, “Peering Into Universe, Spots Bias on the Ground,” made me extremely aware of the problem with sexual assault in male dominated careers. I was aware this is also a huge issue in military branches as well, but I always assumed that most of those committing the sexual assault were less educated enlisted soldiers rather than officers. In this situation, at an astrophysics convention, there’s clearly no question of education. It absolutely mind-boggling that highly educated men would have the audacity to sexually harass or assault a woman, especially at such a prestigious convention. The fact that this field is highly male-dominated could be a huge reason as to why women choose other paths. It’s extremely intimidating to spend your life as a minority and might leave women feeling extremely vulnerable. These articles also made me extremely aware of how much women are discouraged from the field. It shocked me to see the statistics of women vs men with PhDs. I assumed women had less, but not nearly by that much. Before reading these articles, I contemplated why women wouldn’t go into STEM work. I thought back to “How Remarkable Women Lead,” and questioned whether women just don’t find meaning in STEM work. When considering this, I also question if where women find meaning is a societal construct. The book mentioned that men typically find meaning in power positions while women consider what really gives them life. I shut this idea down immediately. Everyone is happier when considering what gives them life, but society has pushed men to put that to the side for power positions while women haven’t been pressured into power positions so they can truly consider their own happiness. This being said, the articles show that women truly do enjoy STEM work but they are either discouraged or not at all encouraged while men are. It’s not just a matter of meaning, but a matter of men being pushed into these kinds of careers while women are being pushed away.
Tuesday, March 21, 2017 3:56 pm
I found the profile on C. Megan Urry to be significant for several reasons. I thought her personal anecdotes were astonishing and powerful, however I found her contributions to reducing the amount of gender bias and harassment to be even more amazing. Affirmative action, though it may be a flawed system in some aspects, was designed to “level the playing field” in a sense. I think the implementation of the meeting ban goes about doing the same and a great way of raising awareness of sexual assault within the workplace. As Urry mentioned, “your career is in the hands of your adviser”. This fact alone discourages many women and men from speaking out when they are the victims of sexual assault. This is troubling and happens too often. So, to see Urry use her platform in such an effective way is encouraging and serves as a great example of what can be done not only within the field of science but in many male-dominated career fields.
Along the lines of discrimination, I also found the fact that minority women (and men) are at an even lower disadvantage in the field of science(mentioned in the Pollack article) to be startling. Recent films such as “Hidden Figures” highlights this disparity and inspires black girls/women to continue to pursue STEM careers despite the obstacles they may face. Also, organizations such as Black Girls Code go into middle schools, high schools, and communities that are majority minority and provide guidance and resources for black girls who aspire to become mathematicians, scientists, etc. I think this project is remarkable to say the least and more programs around the country should implement such opportunities.
Tuesday, March 21, 2017 3:47 pm
In this week’s readings, particularly in “C. Megan Urry, Peering Into Universe, Spots Bias on the Ground” is this revolving idea of women’s positon of inferiority to men’s superiority, especially in high levels of academe advancement. The article’s opening of “women should not have to be clones of male astronomers in order to participate in mainstream astronomical research” helps to create a reflection of the gender gap of inequality. While women are continuously performing at the same levels, utilizing the same capabilities at a capacity equivalent to those of their male counterparts, the “cloning” of their work isn’t equivalent to their counterpart’s gender. The article also highlights consistent records of sexual harassment in the workplace, “the men came and used the event to network, and the women came and sometimes found themselves worried about people propositioning them.” I thought this was an important piece of the article because of the importance of this issue within all of the spaces women occupy. From college campuses, to the workplace both white and blue collar, women are subjected to the inferiority of men in their classrooms, in their conference rooms and beyond. Sexual harassment is a reflection of the privilege and power men share as a result of perpetuated expectations divided by gender. (“There’s generally no path forward in academe for the woman who has a powerful antagonist angry at her”.) I also found it interesting that Urry’s consistent confidence throughout her young adult life begin to steadily decline once entering spaces of advancement that often lacked other women. (“I thought I’d be able to do anything with my life. I chose physics because it was clean and elegant I didn’t go through that thing that happens to teenage girls where they fall off the cliff of self-confidence and get discouraged about science. The discouraging things happened later”.) For Urry to really see the inflation of sexism and discrimination as she entered graduate school and beyond at the Space Telescope Science Institute, shows that women and girls are systemically and adamantly taught in all stages of their lives that gender equality isn’t a thing to be obtained by them.
Tuesday, March 21, 2017 3:46 pm
Gender disparity is weaved deep into our society. Often we are unable to recognize when biased behavior is occurring. As “The Effects of Gender Roles” article by Rachel Godsil identifies, this biased behavior is socially ingrained in our workforce behavior that it is subtle but it has a substantial impact on women. This issue comes to the forefront in the interview with Dr. Urry who shares her concerns with sexual harassment occurring at astronomy conferences. It is upsetting to read how prominent and typical it is for women to be ‘hit on’ by work colleagues and superiors.
In terms of gender disparity in the workplace, from the articles, it became clear how few women are found in many political positions, leadership positions, and STEM-focused jobs. It is crazy to me that we have to persuade people to hire more women when it has been proven the capabilities of men and women are equal. Yet the answer to decreasing gender disparity found in “Why are there still so Few Women in Science?” by Eileen Pollack, is to broaden the pool of females in this positions to make the culture more livable. Pollack went on to identify that this will not “lower standards” which is disheartening to me that she feels the need to point this out.
The articles acknowledged that success is entirely dependent on culture. These disparities in culture have caused the disparities among gender. I found the 1999 Math Test Study discussed in Pollack’s article to be very interesting. Clearly, cultural signals affect a woman’s ability to perform. In a society where women are faced with biased behavior, it seems only natural that women have struggled with success in the workforce. Dr. Urry shared her experience with becoming a scientist and the constant discouragement that came from her male professors and superiors. This continuous dissuasion is bound to get into the heads of many women that will begin to believe for themselves they are incapable. Gender disparities are subtle norms that are ingrained in our daily lives. This culture is the reason for success; it is not a matter of gender.
Tuesday, March 21, 2017 2:36 pm
I found the article “Why are there still so few women in Science” truly shocking when reading the disproportionate facts about women pursuing careers within sciences compared to men. I was caught by the quote “American men can’t seem to appreciate a women as a women and as a scientist; it’s one or the other.” I believe this is becoming an issue especially with the way media portrays women as either being incredibly gorgeous or extremely intelligent. There seems to never be a spot in the middle; where women aren’t judged for the way they act or dress. It is unbelievable the unequal treatment that Megan Urry had to face when pursing her career because of the fact that she is a woman. When reading this article, I thought that the reason women didn’t want to pursue sciences was because of lack of interest. After finishing it, I knew that this was naïve of me, due to the fact that that women face a great deal of criticism in STEM careers.
The other article about Megan Urry and what she has noticed with the lack of women in her workplace was a very interesting read. I did not realize that women could be put in such predicaments when harassed by their superiors who have full control over the careers of their employees. This is an issue that is hopefully becoming non-existent in the workplace. We must try to end the bias and discrimination so that women are free to pursue careers that are more mainly dominated by men. This will help change the way people think of women in the sciences.
Tuesday, March 21, 2017 2:35 pm
I found this particular piece to be so poignant because of the twofold problem that it represents. The lack of women’s participation in STEM fields is a direct manifestation of the problems that we have been studying in class, but it is also a huge problem within the STEM fields themselves. STEM is what ultimately is responsible for the major progressions in making life tangibly better for people, and the continued trend of positive development as a result of STEM jobs must be part and parcel with the expansion of the field’s vetting process to include women. It is a setback for both the STEM community and the global community when a woman is the best person for the job, but due to either institutional patriarchy within STEM fields or even the total dissuasion of taking on that career path in the first place, she does not do it.
The presence of a “boy curve” and a “girl curve” because the author’s professor thought that men and women would score similarly based on gender can only be described as baffling. How do you get such a prestigious job while still having such a fundamentally skewed vision of how the world works? This can be seen as a small portion of ultimately a much bigger problem; a social stigma outlined in one of the studies mentioned by Pollack as associating talent and interest in math as exclusively for “Asians and nerds”. This mindset is clearly hurting America, and the idea that pursuing an interest in math can lead to social ostracism will have a big, negative, and difficult to measure impact on our contributions in STEM unless it is averted soon. This is a fantastic article that informatively and concisely describes a big problem in both the professional and social realms of society.
Tuesday, March 21, 2017 3:36 am
Reader Response
One thing that I thought to be significant was the prevalence of implicit association, which most people seem to be wholly unaware of, just as I was before reading the assigned articles and watching the video. This is significant because people may truly believe themselves to be an equal and unbiased person, but actually foster subliminal beliefs that prove otherwise. I think it is important that more people, especially those in positions of power such as hiring managers, are made more aware of their potential of implicit association which could result in unfair decisions being made, potentially on a large scale, without anyone knowing that an element of unfairness or inequality had been present. My interest was piqued by the talk of the Harvard Project Implicit in the video, so I went to the website to take the test. The data from my results suggest that I have a “neutral automatic attitude toward Niffites,” however, my results may have been skewed given that I knew the intent of the study before participating in it. I would be very interested however to see how those in positions of power, without first knowing the objective of the study, would perform.
I would not be surprised to learn that many of those surveyed are in fact affected by the effects of implicit association, as Mahzarin Banaji suggested in the video. If this proved to be true, as it very well may, then I would suggest that the measures suggested in The Science of Equality: Volume 2 be more rigorously implemented. It is, however, valid to say that much is already being done in the work place to try to instill these changes, and has been for some time now, without significant improvement. I think this has much to do with men and people of certain ethnic groups being too quick to disregard these concerns of inequality. To address this, I think it is important to first make sure everyone is aware of and accepts the indisputable evidence of the existence of such inequalities and bias.’ This way, people will be less likely to wholly disregard such initiatives to achieve more fairness and equality and therefore, these initiatives will be more effective.
Tuesday, March 21, 2017 3:29 am
Between the two NY times article, it is surprising the rampant amount of sexism in the science field. The number of blatant times that the women were obviously victims of the male-dominated science world is depressing, especially considering that women outnumber men in college and often perform better in college. It is also depressing considering that one of the best schools in the world, Yale, only had one women professor in the math department in its history in 2010. The system is enabled by the professors and mentors, instead of trying to break the mold, they seem to uphold the rampant sexism that is in place in the system. Excelling in the STEM-related field is difficult for man and woman as it is a difficult field, and women do not need the added pressure and “glass-ceiling” accompanying their already complex work. Breaking through a predominantly male field, much like women in the finance firm we read about earlier this year, seems to come with uncomfortable situations. The surprising subject of the second article, about how female scientist tends to get “hit on” by their supervisors, while male scientist it was their peers, is startling and uncomfortable. To be put in a situation where the boss is making advances is a lose-lose situation for the employee. Creating tension and diminishing trust on a team leads to employees often under-performing in their roles. The situation with women scientist at conferences is also depressing when these scientists are trying to present their research and work that they may have spent months and even years on, and instead of praise or advice or interest, they receive a sexual advance, is unprofessional, to say the least.
Getting into academia and excelling in an STEM-related field is a long and difficult journey for men and women alike. However, adding blatant sexism and discrimination into the mix is a sad reality of entering into such a male-dominated world. Hopefully, the STEM field can find ways to get rid of this blatant sexism in its midst.
Tuesday, March 21, 2017 3:16 am
In the article, “Why Are There Still So Few Women in Science?,” Eileen Pollack describes the ways in which women are discouraged from pursuing careers in math and science, despite their intellectual abilities. It is amazing how society’s perceptions of you based on your gender can create a self-fulfilling prophecy, as shown by the results from the University of Michigan study. When reading the section of the article about Handelsman’s research on mentoring, I could not help but think of my mother and her interaction with her advisor in college. During the end of her college career, my mother was considering going on to law school. When my mother discussed her potential plans to become a lawyer with her advisor, instead of talking about my mother’s academic abilities, her advisor started asking her about her relationship with her boyfriend at the time (my father). After concluding that my mom was probably going to get married, my mother’s advisor said to her, “Do me a favor and don’t go to law school.” I cannot imagine that this was the only interaction that discouraged my mom from pursuing graduate school, and I always wonder whether or not she regrets never becoming a lawyer. As her daughter, I know first hand that no one has a chance of winning in an argument with her, and her passion for government never went away—she is now extremely involved in our town’s local government. Even still, whenever I’m having trouble with my academic path, my mom always recommends seeing my advisor, which goes to show how much faith is put into people who are supposed to be mentors. Listening to your advisors, teachers, and mentors seems like the logical thing to do, and students like my mother value those opinions, so gender-biases in mentoring can be very impactful. This is probably why the McKinsey Centered Leadership Project found that so many successful female leaders had sponsors. Having a positive mentor can be just as helpful as having a negative mentor can be hurtful. Handelsman is right to describe her research on mentoring “devastating,” because there are so many talented women who have the all the capabilities, but never get that extra push, or even sometimes, like my mother, get an extra knock-down instead.
Tuesday, March 21, 2017 2:56 am
