The fog of war last week obscured something positive that President George W. Bush's administration was trying to promote — the recognition of outstanding scientific mentors. Ten individuals and six institutions were honoured last week in the 2002 Presidential Awards for Excellence in Mathematics, Science and Engineering Mentoring at a White House ceremony.

Mentoring as a component of one's scientific career is one of those things that most would agree are positive — at least in the abstract. But mentoring, in the concrete, is rarely recognized beyond the gratitude of the young scientists towards a senior figure who (unless they were unlucky in their choice of laboratory) helped them to publish their first paper or land their first faculty position.

The ten awardees have made a welcome escape from this vacuum of recognition. Perhaps more importantly, their efforts show that seemingly intractable problems in the make-up of the scientific and technological workforce can be addressed. For example, Robert Gray, one of the awardees, guided 11 female students towards PhDs in his electrical engineering programme at Stanford University over 16 years (for information on more awardees, see http://www.nsf.gov). In the same time period, 16 men in the programme received the degree. Gray's results — and his recognition for achieving them — are notable because the rate of female representation among his doctoral graduates is almost four times the norm in engineering. According to the US National Science Foundation's Science and Engineering Indicators 2002, engineering has the lowest representation of women — about 10% in all.

Gray's success on a small scale begs the question of what more successful mentoring could do on a larger scale — particularly for women and minorities. Despite progress, both groups are still highly underrepresented in science, according to recent reports. In the United States, for example, blacks, hispanics and native Americans together make up only 7% of the scientific academic workforce, even though they represent 24% of the population, according to the US National Science Foundation's indicators. And men far outnumber women in the physical sciences, according to the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics, which last year published a report on gender disparity.

Recognizing mentors through awards such as those presented last week is one way to encourage scientists to give guidance to their younger colleagues — and also points young scientists towards outstanding labs. Similar recognition by scientific societies and other governments could thrust mentoring further into the spotlight — and help to solve some social problems in the process.