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News of Jan 6, 2007
Invisible Biases, Visible Barriers
by Elayne Clift

When Larry Summers, past president of Harvard University, stood up last year and publicly declared that women might be genetically inferior to men when it comes to math and science ability, he set off a firestorm of protest among female scientists, sympathetic psychologists, and feminists at large.

That furor – and a prior report called "The Gathering Storm" which highlighted a looming crisis in the number of Americans entering science and technology –prompted the National Academies, a Washington, D.C. based consortium of scientific, engineering, research and medical institutions, to undertake a study, "Beyond Bias and Barriers: Fulfilling the Potential of Women in Academic Science and Engineering". Eighteen members of a committee comprised of scientists, engineers and public policy specialists set about their task a year ago, chaired by Donna Shalala, president of the University of Miami and former Secretary of Health and Human Services under President Clinton.

Now, after numerous meetings, drafts, revisions and peer reviews, their preliminary report has been made available. The final report will be published in January 2007. Its findings are hardly surprising: "Women [in America] face barriers to hiring and promotion in research universities in many fields of science and engineering - a situation that deprives the US of an important source of talent as the country faces increasingly stiff global competition in higher education, science and technology, and the marketplace."

In the US, women constitute an increasing proportion of science and engineering majors at all institutions, according to the report. At the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), for example, women make up 51 per cent of its science undergraduates and 35 per cent of its engineering undergraduates. But their career path could be severely limited by existing stereotypes, hiring patterns, and tenure tracks.

"Women are a small portion of the science and engineering faculty members at research universities, and they typically receive fewer resources and less support than their male colleagues," the report says. "It is not lack of talent, but unintentional biases and outmoded institutional structures that are hindering the access and advancement of women."

Lotte Bailyn is a professor of management at MIT, an expert in organizational behavior, and a member of the committee that authored the report. "I'm still surprised at the stereotypical idea of who is a good scientist. It's shared by both men and women alike," she says. "I even see those unintentional biases in myself sometimes and it's quite scary." Bailyn is referring to the notion that good scientists are highly individualistic and competitive, are engrossed solely in their work because their wives handle everything else, and that they do extensive, uninterrupted research - a decidedly male image.

Among the significant findings outlined in the committee's report is the fact women have the ability and drive to succeed in science and engineering. "Scientific studies of brain structure and function, of hormonal modulation of performance, of human cognitive development, and of human evolution have not found any significant biological differences between men and women in performing science and mathematics."

Yet, women who are interested in science and engineering careers "are lost at every educational transition." With each step up the ladder, the representation of women drops substantially. Further, "the problem is not in the pipeline." For over three decades women have made up over 30 per cent of doctorates in social and behavioral sciences and over 20 per cent in life sciences. Yet, at top research institutes less than 16 per cent of full professors in these fields are women.
Women, the report says, are "very likely to face discrimination in every field of science and engineering. Considerable research has shown barriers limiting appointment, retention, and advancement of women. ... Well qualified and highly productive women scientists have had to contend with continuing questioning of their own abilities ... and commitment to an academic career." The report also cites "a substantial body of evidence" establishing that most people, men and women, hold implicit biases when it comes to hiring practices. In addition, "evaluation criteria contain arbitrary and subjective components that disadvantage women. Women faculty are paid less, promoted more slowly, receive fewer honors, and hold fewer leadership positions than men."

Academic organizational structures and rules are also known to contribute significantly to the under-use of women in academic science and engineering. "Structural constraints and expectations built into academic institutions assume that faculty members have substantial spousal support." In other words, as Lotte Bailyn points out, "Why isn't there child care at the National Institutes of Health (NIH)?"

Finally, the report concludes, "the consequences of not acting will be detrimental to the nation's competitiveness." As committee chair Donna Shalala put it, "Fundamental changes in the culture and opportunities at America's research universities are urgently needed. The U.S. should enhance its talent pool by making the most of its entire population."

Among its broad range of recommendations, the report calls on university officials to provide clear leadership in changing the culture and structure of their institutions to recruit, retain and promote more women, including minority women. Academic departments should be required to show evidence of having conducted fair, broad and aggressive talent searches before approving appointments and departments should be held accountable for the equity of their search processes and outcomes. The report urges higher education organizations to form collaborative, self-monitoring consortia that set standards and track compliance.
The report also calls upon government agencies, foundations that provide funding, and Congress to hold mandatory national meetings that could educate programme officers and review-panel members on ways to minimize the effects of gender bias and to find ways to support researchers who must take time out because of care-giving responsibilities. Federal enforcement agencies need to step up their surveillance and assistance toward achieving diversity and conducting compliance reviews to ensure that federal anti-discrimination laws are being upheld, while discrimination complaints are promptly and thoroughly investigated. Congress should hold oversight hearings as well.

Forty years ago, according the National Academies, women made up only three per cent of America's scientific and technical workers. By 2003, they accounted for nearly one-fifth of them. And women have earned more than half of the bachelor's degrees in science and engineering since 2000. Yet, their representation on university and college faculties fails to reflect these gains and women still report feeling devalued, restricted, and overly scrutinized.
"It's tough," concludes Lotte Bailyn. "We must create conditions that will change rules and expectations. We must improve the picture for women."  

WFSNEWS  News of Jan 6, 2007  

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