Sharon Ann Holgate
One of the major problems for women working in physics is how to have a family and still sustain their career. This is a problem experienced by many professional women, but it is particularly acute for those working in science. When they eventually return to the lab they can find that their research field has advanced, and they may be confronted with new experimental techniques and methods of data analysis.
In the UK, the Daphne Jackson Trust helps scientists to return to work by allowing them to retrain. The trust, set up in 1992 as a registered charity, offers two-year fellowships to those who have had to leave work for at least three years to look after their family. Fellows take up a flexible part-time appointment at a university, retraining under a supervisor in their chosen research area.
"I think the Daphne Jackson Fellowships provide an essential service, as it is very difficult to return to science after a career break," says one former fellow Dorothy Duffy, a physicist now working in the chemistry department at Reading University. "The training aspect meant I could become familiar with new concepts and techniques with less pressure to produce results," she explains.
The training is also praised by Alison Vinnicombe, registrar of Lucy Cavendish College Cambridge. The college is one of the trust's many benefactors and also plays host to fellows. Vinnicombe is delighted when fellows return to the level of research skill they had before taking a break.
Yasmin Robson, an astrophysicist and Daphne Jackson fellow at Oxford University, feels her fellowship has made a "huge difference" to her career. "I can do my research and still bring up my children," she says. However, she warns that the application procedure is complex. "It's not easy to apply - you have to make the link with the university, get a supervisor and write-up a research proposal. If you have been away from your field of research then it is hard to write a proposal for it."
In a similar scheme, "Curie" fellowships are being offered at Copenhagen University in Denmark. "[This scheme is] specifically for women who have been away from research to have children, or have moved with their husbands," says the dean of science Henrik Jeppesen. The university offers three stipends each year across the sciences.
For those who have taken a break for family reasons, but are still in the early stages of their careers, the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council in the UK allows students to carry out a PhD on a part-time basis for 5 years, with two further years to write-up their thesis.
Meanwhile in the US, the Alfred P Sloan Foundation - a non-profit institution - is piloting a scheme it hopes will make family- oriented career breaks the norm in academia. Their fellowships will be used to take full or part-time paid leave, assist returning after leave, or both. Half of the money for each fellowship will come from the applicant's institution, with the rest coming from the Sloan Foundation, which says it is expecting its first applications soon.
In some countries, however, career breaks are not a major issue. Silvana Luyckx of the Witwatersrand University in South Africa knows of no special schemes for women returning from leave, but says that "in South Africa it is probably easier than it is abroad to find part-time employment". Luyckx's former head of department allowed her initially to work for three hours a day and then increased it to four hours, and so on. "Colleagues abroad have told me that this would have been very unusual in their countries," she says.
It would certainly be unusual in Australia, according to Anna Binnie, one of the founders of the Women in Physics group of the Australian Institute of Physics (AIP). "Because the cost of living is so high in Australia, most women seem to juggle full-time work with young children in childcare," says Binnie. Although this does not allow mothers much time with their children, it is one way to keep their career intact. Indeed, a survey carried out two years ago by the AIP found that while some female physicists had experienced some adversities during their employment, they were by and large as happy as their male colleagues.
Back in the UK, child-care facilities often lag behind those on offer abroad. Duffy at Reading says that while fellowships help women get back to work, problems remain once the fellowship has been completed. "The big problem of finding suitable employment in a convenient location with flexible working hours remains," she says. Age, as well, is a problem, since some research fellowships are only available to applicants under the age of 40. In addition, those returning to work may find themselves at a disadvantage when competing for permanent research posts and lectureships, simply because their age pushes them further up the salary scale.
However, women working in industry may find things a little easier. Companies who have trained staff are generally keen to hang on to their investment. AEA Technology, British Nuclear Fuels Ltd (BNFL), British Telecom, the National Physical Laboratory and the UK AEA Fusion all offer the possibility of flexible part-time work after childbirth. Bill Anderton, a spokesman for BNFL, says that his company would consider people returning to work on a part-time basis, as long as their line-manager agrees. The firm's only requirement is that the person returning to work must fit in with the business needs of a particular project. But other than that, says Anderton, there are no restrictions.
Helpful employers and back-to-work schemes clearly make a difference to women who have a family, but there are still many barriers to be broken down. Not least is the problem of perception - many feel that "part-time science" lacks commitment. As Yasmin Robson says, "the idea of mothers and people who have taken a career break returning to science is a strange concept, certainly in physics, and it will take some time before it is accepted as normal".
Sharon Ann Holgate is a UK science writer.
This article first appeared in Physics World April 1999 and is reproduced with permission.