I'm a STEM research scientist

[JohnMcCainsDeathStare]

Early mid-career material scientist - don't want to be too identifying but ask me questions about career, life as a scientist and what it's like to be a parent too.
My second time in AMA.

Not to mention an international conference and a couple of meetings with major industrial collaborators from my laundry brig.

Hi, have you read 'Invisible Women' by Caroline Criado Perez. I'm reading it at the moment and there's a chapter on meritocracy which highlights unintentional discrimination against women. It talks about female academics/researchers being undervalued in terms of contribution to papers etc, and the default is to quote the male contribution (and assume they are the lead). Interested to know your experience of being female in a male dominated industry.

Just popping my head into the thread to say hi from one STEM woman to another.

Still despair of how few girls go into STEM and how early the rot sets in. I bumped into a couple of mates (3 women, 3 STEM PhDs between us) picking up our sons from an "enrichment day" run for primary school children by the LEA and local university. It was a maths based course (but really good fun) and we watched in horror as about 60 little boys and about 6 little girls trooped out. (To put it in context, the next course DS went on was sports journalism, hosted by the local rugby club, and there was a much better mix on that.)

Any thoughts on what could be done to improve this?

Thanks for the reply. I'm actually in Poland finnuky enough. I just don't want to miss too much of his early years!

I had that when my boys got invited to a STEM computer course at the local comp. There were about 15 children in total. NONE where girls.

For me, people vastly underestimate peer pressure and also familial pressure, even in inadvertant. This is an issue for girls in families with no university education or history of this and BAME people who haven't been to university. There can be a lack of understanding or even hostility if a girls' interests are significantly different from what is expected. I had a hostile peer group at school so I do have some empathy of this.

There is also the issue of unconsious bias amongst teachers and instructors - I haven't had this personally but I do recall there was one tutor at University who was unusual as he was a technician rather than academic staff but would clam up in panic if there was a woman in his tutor group!

As for being a female in a male-dominated field - it was rough at the beginning during my MSc during a group project from hell - it was all men with one really obnoxious one and a fetish for meetings where nothing got done. I did warn supervisors but got ignored so I kinda abdicated - NO ONE NOTICED until the feedback while as the most accountable person I got the lowest mark!

Other than that, I haven't really had any negative experiences - other than it's a bit weird when I have meetings with collaborators and I'm often the only woman (and often the youngest person) there. Sometimes people have asked who's looking after the kids when the answer is DH of course! Thing is, there are more conferences these days that do have childcare in terms of daycare and activities for children, particularly in Europe. If i'd been better organized I could have taken the DSs to Vienna last year!

I've taken DS to Vienna - it's brilliant when the really big conferences offer childcare.

I have a 17 year old applying for biomedical science next October. He really wants to pursue a career in research, preferably medical. Any tips? He had signed up for a NHS lab placement and a week work shadowing with a cancer research place close to us but both cancelled.

So really - what can he do to stand out from the crowd?

my impersonation of an NT person is rubbish I 💓 you for this statement alone!

I am interested in helping my DD find a path into STEM- she is very engineering minded, though she likes Botany a lot.
She is the only girl in her GCSE DT class and one of two girls in her GCSE computing class too, she has been in extremely 'boy heavy' primary and secondary schools (boys:girls - 4:1 primary, 3:1 secondary), and she competes in a male-dominated sport too, so she is no stranger to being the only girl in a room and is not put off by that.

I don't know what we should be looking at, or how she will get work experience during a pandemic. We looked at the women in engineering website, but she seemed to go off engineering after that, and focus more on botany!
I would like to know how to find out about botany careers please? And whether (as my gut tells me it will be) that botany is seen as a lesser discipline because it's more female dominated than other STEM disciplines, and thus financially less rewarding too (kind of a concern for me, as we will not be able to support her financially as an adult in the way some families can, e.g. paying for London accommodation whole their child does an internship etc).
She is extremely able (obviously a MN child, but on track for all 9s) but I find it hard to inspire her (she likes craft, and I think would love to open a bakery )

I have no idea about work experience - I did none when at university - it wasn't a thing then - just work to pay the bills alongside studying.

As far as a career in STEM is concered - don't necessarily focus on the career as more about why you want to do it and how you can get there. I would be cautions of overspecilizing too early on. Also read around the subject and work on maths. Curiosity and writing things down is as important as raw talent.

My caution with botany is that it is perhaps a bit specialized at this stage but as part of an overall ecology degree that would be a better fit. I can see botany becoming very important as we need to feed the world - just look at Mark Watney in the Martian.

So I would still keep up with all the core STEM subjects, particularly maths and computing since ecosystems are complex things but much fun can be had from coding a toy model.

Thank you! I have already been suggesting astrobotany!
She already intends to do maths, further maths, computing A Levels, then still needs to choose between biology, chemistry, or another. She has time to decide yet though, as only Y10.

As for a career in STEM - I've always wanted to find out how the world and the Universe work and what we can do with it. For a long time I wanted to be an artist - that was my early goal as a child. But I still am only science is my medium I communicate with and paint with. It took a long time to find my focus but I have it now.

I would think less focusing on a career at first and more focusing on what you want to do every day and what you want to come of it. There is always something a bit new, a bit different each day - it never gets old.

I'm another woman in STEM, and DH is (well, was, pretty much retired) a polymers/materials scientist. Oddly enough we watched The Martian tonight.

Your last comment re science being the medium you communicate with and paint with interested me. Do you think there's a general underestimation of the sheer creativity of being a scientist or engineer - a public perception that its dry, and that 'creativity' means the arts ...and that correcting this misconception might make more girls receptive to thinking about going into STEM?

Another female STEM PhD here, and I'm a crop scientist.

@haba for botany your daughter would need biology and a biological based degree, so probably not ecology.

I deal with the after harvest side of crops mostly, and I don't like watching The Martian because the props department introduced a huge error into the plot which anyone who works with harvested crops can tell you.

I think that the de-funding of creative arts within schools and public in general will have a strong detrimental impact on science but this won't be noticeable to meany until the end of the decade - this current government is very much into 'corporate' science where 5 years is a long time - it really isn't.

Arts without science is blind.
Science without arts is lame.

Without the arts, science is hindered since there is the lack of this space to explore new concepts and ideas outside of what is materially possible. It also enhances outreach to non-scientists and a means to induct people into scientific method via other means. I was and still am very much into arts and craft - it is useful in that I know colour theory and storyboarding for instance, which comes off surpringly often when I'm presenting.

Thank you @Magpiecomplex

I think we need to watch The Martian!

I agree it's often overlooked how creative scientists are. How do people think scientists find solutions to their hypotheses?

It's also worth noting unconscious (and more conscious) bias is very much a thing when looking for work in STEM. I was expecting a fair number of rejections but after 12 months, 10 interviews and 0 job offers I couldn't help thinking that maybe I AM being discrimiated against. Got my current job mostly through contacts.

Just saying, even highly qualified people find jobseeking sucks ass. If anything it is harder, you can have all sorts of transferrable skills but (a) they are expensive and (b) even STEM employers want more compliant types - something of a contradiction when you consider what science actually is.

What is the most interesting thing or finding you’ve learnt through out your research?

I'm also a female STEM PhD-holder - mine's physics, which causes even greater eye-glazing-over...

My job is fascinating though

Can you tell us how Brexit will affect scientific research in this country? Do you know any scientists who were in favour?

To the lady with the daughter in year 10. Look at the Etrust.org.uk website and their Headstart/Inspire courses. The year 10 courses are girls only, and if she does one of those then she would get priority for the year 11 courses which are both boys and girls. In previous years there have been a range of options from Engineering, Materials through to bioengineering, environmental science etc. They are normally 3-4 days residential at various UK universities throughout the UK during the summer holidays. My daughter did one a couple of years ago and enjoyed it.

Got that slightly wrong. Inspire is for years 10-11, Headstart for Year 12.

Brexit is going to make research more difficult for UK sciences - it will not be a disaster as the most doom-laden predictions stated but it will do nothing to help research, only hinder.
Most central facilties were built with UK involvement, some such as JET are still based in the UK for example.

It will affect research at all levels from the most basic to megaprojects such as ITER. Sending samples to the EU, travel to and from the EU for conferences not to mention that we have lost ERASMUS for now unless we make a post-Brexit analogue. Research will proceed but it will be slower and with more red tape thanks to Brexit. I suspect that not a single Brexiteer has given much thought to how Brexit would impact research as research is an inherently collaborative and international entity.

I know of no actual scientists who have voted Leave. I have colleagues who are not sure if they will be able to continue living in the UK and are not sure of their status. There are also UK people looking for EU national citizenship.
Having said that I do know of former colleagues and technicians who did vote Leave, but no actual career scientists.