| Issue 62 (WAIS 2) Contents
|
International Update
Pauline Gallagher
Assistant Secretary
CSIRO Staff Association
All around the world women in the sciences have been coming together around disciplines, universities or employment situations. The driving force gathering momentum since the ‘70s has been a recognition that women are generally underrepresented in all areas of science, engineering, mathematics and technology. These groups are coalescing and national associations have been formed, similar to our WISENET, to help with networking and links to other groups. These links are tenuous because they have tended to be informal and dependent on active individuals.
There are too many groups and activities to review comprehensively in the time available. I will present only some landmark events in recent years, from developed countries that we in Australia look to as benchmarks.
Two important international meetings were held in 2002:
1. The International Union of Pure and Applied Physics held their first international conference on Women in Physics in Paris in March 2002. They produced a report (www.awise.org) with an extensive range of recommendations for action in physics education and research.
2. The 12th International Conference on Women in Engineering and Science was held in Ottawa in July 2002 (ICWES 12: Women in a Knowledge-based Society, Ottawa, Canada, July 27-31 2002, www.carleton.ca/cwseon/ icwes12/index.htm) and included representatives from Australia. Its proceedings provide a comprehensive overview of the state of play from many countries around the world. The proceedings are available on CD and I would recommend them to interested policymakers.
The conference also developed a plan to form an International Network of Women Engineers and Scientists (INWES), based in Canada. The network is intended to oversee a future ICWES conference, maintain a website for sharing information, importantly provide an international voice for women in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics, and develop an international base of financial support for its operations. Funding has already been secured from IBM, Bechtel and, significantly, from UNESCO.
United States
The US from the early 70s has a history of strong requirements on EEO and affirmative action. A 1992 groundbreaking academic study on gender in a number of US universities “Athena Unbound: Barriers to Women in Academic Science and Engineering” Etzkowitz, H. Kemelgor, C. Neuschatz, M. Uzzi, B (1992) was widely publicised because it identified a wide range of problems uniquely experienced by women at all stages of their careers. In this and follow-up publications they described:
• The lack of connections or isolation women were experiencing at work.
• Covert gender bias that was driving a low degree of self-confidence in postdocs and early career women.
• Marriage and children were seen to be negatives and were disparaged.
• Geographic mobility was a disincentive for continuing careers (included the 2-body problem).
• Blockages in cross-gender advising.
• Women with different working approaches, what they called instrumentals and balancers.
• Women of colour were the most
underrepresented
group.
In 1999, the faculty women in the School of Science at Massachussetts Institute of Technology released an extensive report “Report on the status of women in the School of Science” MIT, 1999. It identified:
• Women held less than 8% of the tenured positions in the School,
• Underpayment of salaries compared with men,
• Less favourable access to resources, including office and laboratory space,
• Difficulty the women were having balancing work and family,
• Marginalisation of more senior women,
• A continuing ‘Leaky pipeline’, i.e., a disproportionate loss of women at all levels up the ladder. The statistics had shown no improvement in at least 10 years.
The study was remarkable not just for what it presented but also because by raising awareness, it changed attitudes and prompted major improvements in the School. In March 2002, MIT reported a 40% increase in women faculty since 1994 and systemic changes to policy and practice.
In 2001, the US National Research Council published a wider analysis of STE women in all types of employment: “From Scarcity to Visibility: Gender differences in the Careers of Doctoral Scientists and Engineers” National Research Council, 2001. Their focus was about ensuring the best and brightest into careers in science. They found persistent inequalities, much to do with familial obligations and the ideal timing of a science career. They reported around a 30% overall difference in salaries between men and women. They identified the key to full integration of women in science and engineering as being to increase numbers, pointing to the need for affirmative action. They defined the hurdles as lying in two broad areas: the rate of attrition, and attraction to science and engineering.
United Kingdom
The UK Government are taking the issue of women in science very seriously. Their approach has been about wastage of capability: “Continuous innovation is the key to the UK’s prosperity in the increasingly competitive global markets. Although not all innovation is based on scientific R&D, the need for creativity in making discoveries, developing new products, services and processes is critically dependent on the availability of scientists, engineers and technologists, women make up more than half the UK population and we can no longer afford to ignore the under representation of women in SET.” Office of Science and Technology, Promoting SET for Women Unit (www.set4women.gov.uk/set4women/why_worry.htm)
A Government White Paper “Realising Our Potential” stated in 1993 that “Women are the UK’s single most under, most undervalued, and consequently underused human resource.” It laid the ground for a landmark 1994 report “The Rising Tide”, by the Parliamentary Committee on Women in SET. This report described the loss of girls and women to SET at every level. It identified that less than 10% of biological professors were women, comparing that women made up 60% of graduates in biosciences. It found that the proportion of grant applications from women academics was significantly lower than the proportion of women in each discipline.
In response, the UK Government set up the Promoting SET for Women Unit and started a number of initiatives. They focussed their efforts on attraction of women back to SET and better supports for returners, such as the Athena Project, Daphne Jackson Fellowships and the new Rosalind Franklin Award (which is also open to men). They have also set up programs to encourage girls into science and are working towards a target of 40% women on SET-related bodies by 2005.
If you go to the UK whole of government website (www.gov.uk) and search for women in science, you will find around 100 good matches; if you do the same for the Australian Government site (www.gov.au), you find only 2 hits and they are poor matches. (Note, tested prior to WAIS 2. It has increased by one at last check!)
European Union
The EU government is by far the best organised on the issue of women in the sciences. They have passed a number of resolutions on the issue, based on:
• The promotion of equality between men and women,
• The creation of a
knowledge-based society,
• The importance of
science and society issues,
•The need to deepen
public awareness and debate on science and society’s
needs.
They have recognised the importance of women in
achieving these aims.
Their most recent motion, “Resolution on science and
society and on women in science”, Brussels, 3 July
2001 calls on member nations to continue and
intensify efforts to promote the role of women in
science and technology, promoting gender equality.
It sets a target of 40% participation of women in
implementing and managing research programs in each
country and requires specific action to collect
gender-disaggregated statistics in science and
technology and develop indicators on progress
towards gender equality.
The
best work is being done for the EU by the Helsinki
Group on Women and Science supported by the Women
and Science Unit. In March 2002 the Group published
a report ”National Policies on Women and Science in
Europe” which set out coordinated statistics and
initiatives from 30 participating countries in
Europe (www.cordis.lu/improving/women/policies.htm).
Their scissor diagrams showing the relative
proportion of men and women in a typical academic
career path were one example of useful comparative
representation of statistics. All countries showed a crossover of male and
females, with undergraduate girls starting out
generally in equivalent or higher proportions than
their male counterparts then dropping out through
the career path (the leaky pipe).
The best performing country was Finland which reported women holding 20% of full professorial positions. Women in Finland are very highly educated and have an expectation of full participation in the workforce after graduation. Active policy measures include quotas for women since 1995 and some financial incentives, e.g. researchers with minor dependants may receive a 20% increase in scholarship for training or employment abroad.
The Helsinki Group also asked member countries to report on the following questions for preparation of a chart of equality measures:
• Does your country have
legislation on equal treatment for women and men?
• Does your country have
a statutory sex equality agency?
• Does your country have a Ministry for
Women?
•Does your country have
National Steering Committee on Women and Science?
• Does your Science
Ministry have a Women and Science Unit (or a gender
equality unit)?
• Is your Government
committed to gender mainstreaming?
• Are sex-disaggregated
statistics on women and science published regularly?
• Are there quotas for a
gender balance on public committees?
• Are there quotas for a
gender balance on university/research institute
committees?
• Are there targets for
a gender balance on university/research institute
committees?
•Are gender equality
indicators being developed in your country?
• Is Women’s Studies
taught at universities in your country?
•Is Gender Studies
taught at universities in your country?
• Do universities and
research institutes have to produce equality plans?
I am wondering how Australia would answer some of
these!
New Zealand
I want to quickly move around the globe to NZ where their Association for Women in the Sciences held its 4th conference on 3-5 July 2002. This is remarkable because they seem to have achieved over there what we are only hoping for here – a community of women researchers. This was their 4th conference in around 10 years and had more of the flavour of a reunion.
The NZ government has produced a small discussion paper on women in science “Engaging Women in Science” by Helena Barwick, September 2000, for the Ministry of Research Science and Technology. The paper was based on a limited consultation with working women scientists in New Zealand. Some of its findings were that pay rates were not good, short term contracts were problematic, and there was limited potential for career development.
The report was remarkable in that it questioned the culture of science and science itself as being gendered and unappealing to women.
In conclusion
Coming Back to the UK, I had been hoping to report on Baroness Susan Greenfield’s report on women in science for the UK House of Lords, but it is not out yet. Prof. Greenfield stated in her preliminary publicity that there are 50 000 women SET graduates in the UK not working in their respective industries. I think that these women are not entirely being wasted but are contributing in many ways to the wider community.
I think that there are two very big questions not being
asked yet:
1. On the ‘leaky pipe’ - Where are the women going and what are they doing after SET?
2. On competition vs collaboration - How much is the high level of competition for SET funding forcing the disproportionate loss of women from SET?
Dr Pauline Gallagher is the Assistant Secretary of the CSIRO Staff Association and representative of the Community and Public Sector Union (CPSU) on the ACTU Women’s Committee. A graduate of the University of Otago in microbiology and ANU in immunology, Pauline worked at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute for Medical Research and CSIRO Animal Health before stepping out of research in 1995 to take a new direction as an activist for science. Pauline is also a member of WISENET.