Diana Temple
The Central Link Team has this year comprised Sarah Miller, Carrie Bengston, Frances Edwards, Colleen Drew and Diana Temple. We thank Frances Edwards for her input and wish her well in her career move to London, where she is taking up a senior lectureship at University College (see interview in this issue). We also welcome Kirstin Heiland to the team. The Editorial group headed by Jean Hollis Weber includes Heather Rossiter, Judy Mackinolty and Diana Temple, with proof-reading help also from Lucy Gillespie.
WISENET members are always welcome to help with the maintenance of the network, to assist with the Journal production and particularly to contribute articles and items of news.
Two sets of exhibition posters are available which may be borrowed by any WISENET members and groups for display at appropriate events. The posters were exhibited at the Great ANZAAS Science Show in Newcastle in September 1995, with support for the cost of the space from the Department of Industry, Science and Technology S&T Awareness Program. They were also displayed at the Great Australian Science Show in Brisbane in June 1996, arranged by Sarah Ashmore.
Some of he information collected for the setting up of the Women in Science exhibition in 1988, as well as material from WISENET Journals, has been used by the Canberra group, comprising Australian science teachers (STA-ACT) and WISENET-ACT, which formulated a school kit trialled at St Peter's Catholic College by Kate Shaw in 1995 (see article in Journal 40, February 1996).
WISENET is a member of CAPOW, the Canberra-based Coalition of Participating Organisations of Women, which keeps us informed of national and international women's issues. The Round Table Meetings, convened in Canberra by the Minister Responsible for Women's Affairs, have regularly been attended and reported in the Journal by Margaret Hartley as WISENET representative; Margaret is also WISENET's CAPOW officer. The Office of the Status of Women, which has organised the Round Table meetings, is now operating with a reduced budget and its future activities are uncertain. WISENET's application to the OSW for a continued Operations Grant for 1995-6 was unfortunately unsuccessful - the small grant received in 1994-5 transformed WISENET's administration. These grants have been discontinued from 1997.
WISENET is also part of the coalition 'Women into Politics', which in August 1995 ran in Sydney a successful Forum on Political Equality and in November a Women with Vision Dinner. Diana Temple represents WISENET on WIP.
WISENET has congratulated the new Ministers for Science and Women respectively, sending them information on WISENET. We also asked the Minister for Science about the fate of the report on Women in Science, Technology and Engineering (WISET) with which we were associated in 1995. The response to the report 'is being revised to reflect changes in programs and funding ...which flow from.... the new Government...' WISENET also wrote to deplore proposed cuts in funding to CAPOW and non-government organisations.
WISENET has sent to Ruth Lane, Senior Curator at the National Museum of Australia, a letter of support for her project on women in science in Australia, which comprises profiles of ten women scientists.
In March 1996, WISENET Sydney members were shown the facilities at the Australian Museum's new unit called Search and Discover, which is run by former Journal editor Anne Skates.
A meeting held in December 1995 was attended by WISENET members and representatives of a number of scientific societies. An item was circulated in the FASTS Newsletter (Federation of Australian Scientific and Technological Societies) calling for expressions of interest. A report on this is included in WISENET Journal 41, July 1996.
Sarah Miller has initiated the establishment of an electronic network and has formed a committee of interested members. Sarah has reported progress in WISENET Journal 41, July 1996.
Jean Hollis Weber
Since the 1995 Annual General Meeting two issues of WISENET Journal have been produced and a third is in progress. The editorial team comprises Diana Temple, Heather Rossiter, Judy Mackinolty and myself. I am paid to do the layout, but I donate most of the time I spend editing the Journal.
The October 1995 issue (32 pages) covered a wide range of topics, from profiles and personal experiences of women in science, to reports from various women's forums and the 1995 WISENET AGM, as well as our usual news and book reviews. We continued our coverage of women-related World Wide Web topics and announced that WISENET Journal is now on the Web.
The February 1996 issue (28 pages) covered discussions about networking WISENET; whether WISENET should be an umbrella group for women scientists' organisations; reports from the Fourth World Conference on Women held in Beijing, WISET, Round Table Meetings and ANZAAS 1995; more profiles of women scientists; more book reviews; and miscellaneous news.
The July 1996 issue (24 pages) has been compiled and is being prepared for the printer. It includes a summary of WISENET's activities during the first half of 1996, articles on women in non-traditional careers related to water, a book review, an authors' response to a previously-published book review, several reprints of articles that have appeared elsewhere (on affirmative action; women, engineering and children; and the new Centre for the Public Awareness of Science at ANU), work in progress, a report on female Vietnamese science students, and the Vice-Chancellor's Women's Advisory Committee at UNE.
The editorial committee is indebted to those WISENET members who write articles and reports, or who clip items of interest and send them to us for inclusion in the Journal. As always, we need more people to do this sort of work. We continue to do more and more of our communication using email, because of its convenience, speed and low cost. We are also indebted to Eric Lindsay, who does a lot of scanning of articles, converting of disks, and has been maintaining the Web pages (which CSIRO will soon be taking over).
A major issue for the Journal at the moment is whether all the articles should be put on the World Wide Web immediately, or only the list of contents (with the full articles being withheld for 12 months). Opinion is divided; we would like to hear yours. A summary of the main points was given on page 2 of issue 40 (February 1996). Because of my commitment to freedom of information (and making information as widely available as possible), my opinion is that all the news and discussion-type information in the Journal should be immediately available electronically (unless the author of a particular item requests that it be withheld).
Sarah Miller
WISENET is maintaining its financial position with $6,600 being carried to 1996. The main income for 1995 was from a DITAC grant of $11,853 which enabled WISENET to employ two people part-time to help with general administration and the journal. Normally the main source of income is from the membership subscriptions. This year the subsciptions were lower than last year ($6,429 compared to $7,300 in 1994) but were consistent with the previous two years ($6,208 & $6,165 respectively). The main expenditure was on the journal, producing 3 issues of the Journal in the calendar year at a cost of about $7,500. Since one issue of the journal was covered by the DITAC grant, the loss for the financial year was $95.
At the end of 1995 WISENET had 294 financial members, 31 of whom joined or rejoined in 1995. This means that of the 334 financial members at the end of 1994, 71 did not renew. Since WISENET reverted to annual subcriptions in 1991, the membership had risen slowly from 315 to 334. Although WISENET continues to attract new members, the large number of members not renewing needs to be addressed.
This report is accompanied by the Auditor's report, the Balance Sheet, and Income and Expenditure reports for both the General WISENET Account and the DITAC Grant Account.
I have examined the Financial Records and Statements of the Women in Science Enquiry Network - WISENET Incorporated for the period 1 January 1995 to 31 December 1995, and I am of the opinion that they represent a true and fair view of the operations for the period.
(signed)
Trevor J Chipperfield, MNIA
14 June 1996