Concerns of Top Women in Science
Hi friends of women in science,
In the science section of The New York Times on Tuesday, Gina Kolata ipublished her interview with four women giving their views about being women in science, Elena Aprile, Joy Hirsch, Mary-Claire King and Tal Rabin. You can read the article here (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/07/science/07women.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&ref=education ). Aprile is a a dark matter specialist at Columbia University, Hirsch is mapping brain processes at Columbia University, King studies medical genetics of cancer and mental illness at University of Washington, Seattle, and Rabin studies crystallography at IBM, so there are three in academia and one in industry in the group.
First Kolata asked about travel and how women feel about doing as much traveling as top scientists must. Aprile said, "You have to do what the guys do, and it does not matter what it takes. It is important to be out there, and so it comes with the territory."
King suggested that it's harder for younger women, or for men, with young families. Rabin said "Even when we do make it to the conferences, I think that there is still something different about the way that we promote ourselves." She went on to describe how a male colleague boasted about himself at a conference and said she would not do that.
After some further discussion of women's reticence to brag, King said, "But women can help each other out a lot in this way because we know this about our younger women colleagues. We can introduce them to our colleagues. We can say: 'Diane has a fabulous result. She needs to tell you what it is, and don't move until she has told you.'"
Hirsch described how Yale helped young women learn to be more open about their accomplishments and said, "We must also, I think, take the responsibility of teaching our institutions to be receptive and proactive and even aggressive in this manner."
Then Kolata asked about keeping women in science after they are recruited to faculty positions. King said, ": I think the choke point is going from a postdoc to an assistant professorship to a tenure-track position. In my experience the largest remaining obstacle is how to integrate family life with the life of a scientist." She continued, "At institutions where there is child care on site, where it is subsidized, where there are enough places for assistant professors to have their children, women do well. And at institutions where it is assumed that you will make your own arrangements, women do less well. There is good data on this. We need institutional commitment." So child care is a major issue, and its possible to check out the way an institution supports it before going there to work.
Aprile emphasized that combining career and family is possible for women in science, saying "It is by example that young women see that you can be both a successful scientist, the best, but also the best mother and the lover, and the wife. You can do everything, so I think you need to have more examples of those." As we've discussed, more articles and biographies are needed to show young women this reality today. Rabin brought up that if young women have a child and rush back to lab, they will miss things about the childhood that can never be regained, while lab work can wait.
Kolata asked if the women would encourage their daughters to be scientists. Hirsch's answer, to which Aprile agreed, was, "If my daughter has to ask 'Should I be a scientist?' the answer is no. But if my daughter says to me, 'I was born to be a scientist. I can't be anything else. This is my life,' then you say, 'You go, girl.'"
Rabin, though, said something I found myself in tune with: "I think that the life of a scientist is a fantastic life. I think it is exciting because every day there is something new that you can go and think of." Without that feeling, it would not make sense to put up with the bias and barriers women in science encounter, in my way of thinking. But there was clear disagreement among the women about whether it was fair to invite their daughters into science unless they started out with a passion for the field.
What do you think about scientific travel for women, whether it is really true that family-career balance is commonly managed by women in science today, and whether one should advise one's daughter to do into science?
Laura,
I may have come off a bit strong; there are a lot of comparisons between women in industry and academia, and I appreciate your efforts to delve into the studies you do. For some reason, the family-work issue seems to have gotten more press for academics than others. Perhaps because professors are more visible? I don't know.
One rarely reads of an advocacy group taking on a company because they fail to promote women to upper management, but we do hear about groups who get involved when women don't make tenure. Wonder why that is? Could it be because academia is more public?
My kids: I thought they should find out what science was, at least. I made sure they got science camps, museums, field trips that might make it alive for them. But my son loves history and is a lawyer (and plays a mean electric bass), while my daughter loves music and baseball and is in an MBA program thinking about sports management. Talk about a field with a thick glass ceiling! She has been interviewing women in top layers of baseball management recently and hearing all kinds of encouragement but also shocking stories of bias and barriers. It's not just in science!
cheers,
Laura
Hi Marian for Math,
I do have to remind myself to think about industry, but this time my material was from 3 academics and 1 industry scientist so I was pushed in the direction I come from. Apologies.
I am happy to do more with/for women in industry. Ideas welcome. I am quite impressed with the family flexibility I discovered in biotech companies once while writing an article for AWIS Magazine. Please point me towards industry kudos and issues I should be covering.
cheers,
Laura
My daughter was brilliant at math but, in her mid teens, decided her passion lay elsewhere. She is "technically competent", meaning has completed calculus, basic linear algebra, statistics, and two years of AP physics; she enjoyed it as an intellectual endeavor but pursued other fields. I was good with that; she has other gifts and passions. She loves her work and is very good at it. My "artsie" son made it through math and physics and recognizes its value, though he has no love for it. He does find the analytical training useful in his field but he was never cut out for science.
Your writeup is heavy on scientist = academia, which I find objectionable. Most people is science aren't in academia, and we need to keep that in mind in these discussions. I gave up the academia path -- two body problem plus kids. I was not willing to accept living away from my husband and commuting cross-country. But, I am very much a scientist!
As a scientist in industry I have traveled as much as twice a month. Yes it is hard. I am blessed with a caring husband who helped out. My two (now 20-something) kids are self-reliant adults with two feet on the ground. My kids knew (and know) I'm always there for them and that they come first.
Since I live in a community where most Moms don't work, traveling became no harder than leaving for work each morning. It is all a matter of perspective.
I firmly believe that the barriers to women are much harder than coping with family issues.
Family-career balance is a struggle and some feel on top of it but others do not. I have felt both ways about it, depending on what's going on in my life. Sick child and conference presentation pending is a terrible combination, for example, but it does happen. I guess it just has to be lived through. I would NOT say all the problems are solved, though.
I have to travel a lot more than I'd like, and I do have a 2 year old child who does not accept my absence well. It's very guilt-laden for me, but I must do it or my career won't go well. Yes, my husband has to travel too and he agonizes too. But somehow I think the mother-child bond delivers more guilt to me than to him for being away.
I agree that unless my daughter has a passion for science, I will not push her to go into it. I have enjoyed the science part but there have been so many frustrations. They may be small but they happen all the time. I would hate for her to put up with that unless she really loves science, which can make it worthwhile to persist.
