open letter to aspiring women scientists

[WillieWaggledagger]

this is so well expressed

so much of what she says is relevant beyond the STEM environment too

As a lapsed female scientist, I couldn't agree more.

Thank you for sharing that.
DD is only 11 but loves science and maths. Luckily she hasn't met with much prejudice yet but we have already talked about some people's assumptions/pre-conceptions of women both in relation to science and maths and in relation to hair colour (she's blonde). Luckily she has a very strong sense of fairness and can get rather indignant if she feels something isn't right which I think she is going to need.

Have bookmarked the link to share with her later.

Totally agree with all of this.

I graduated...oh god, quite a long time ago and things were tricky then. I'm sad that nothing much seems to have changed.

To be completely fair-I used my science qualifications in a legal job. The problems she describes are probably actually more so in this field which is, or was, very male dominated and entirely incompatible with child care.

Kids were basically seen as an exotic hobby, where I worked (and without giving myself away by being too specific, it was somewhere that really SHOULD have been good for family friendly working). DP, who works in basically the same field, found it almost impossible to be taken seriously as a father. You might as well have said "my hamster's in trouble-I need a morning off" as "I need to come in an hour late as my daughter is sick.". .

(to be completely fair ... how shall I put it... the rate of procreation where I worked was quite low and there may have been reasons for that other than, shall we say, direct personal choice. )

I love this, thank you for posting the link.

Surely there can't be many fields left where the only-woman-in-the-room thing still happens?

In my last job pre-DC, there were marginally more women in the lab than men, although the company's salaries being considerably less than industry standard might have been a factor in that...

it is a good letter.

as an active female scientist, I'd add that my work environment (RG university) is making a massive effort to be supportive of women, with several women's social groups and ATHENA SWAN and other initiatives. So it is hard, but don't that put you (or your daughters) off this career path. I have friends in other careers with similar intellectual demands (law, finance etc) who have a much much harder time with being the only woman and not getting flexibility for childcare etc.

I work in IT not Science but this still applies. There still very few young women coming into the field. In fact the numbers seem to have declined since I started 30 years ago. In my department of 80 there are about 12 women. Of those, eight of us are over 40. And yet it's a great career for women as much as it is for men.

DD has started Uni and is working towards her goal. She knows that she will probably be the only woman where ever she works as of 60 students only 2 are female including DD. We discussed this and agree that it is better that there is 1 woman fighting for recognition in her field than no one. All DDs' friends from school are doing things like media studies. Unless girls are encouraged from a young age to be interested in science we are going to see a cycle that just continues.

I will say that a simple telescope set up in the garden when DD was younger has probably been the key to her interest in science.

Unless girls are encouraged from a young age to be interested in science we are going to see a cycle that just continues

Agreed - if bright young women are aspiring to media type jobs something is going wrong!

Our last chief executive was a female scientist and we have had female board members. Other women are the greatest ambassadors and please please please can you find time to spread the word to young people.

I think we also need to show young women about science jobs outside of academia - I can never understand why so many STEM events concentrate on these, and non academic careers aren't highlighted. Especially as these may be the more family friendly long term.

I'm a physicist, on my first degree there were 90 in my year, 7 women (3 physics with music, 3 medical physics, 1 astrophysics). To my knowledge 3 of those women carried on in physics, none in academia.

In my job now, I travel the world working on the development and implementation of new radiotherapy techniques. I love what I do, and I'm proud to be a physicist. Even if people still think you might be booth totty!

Boulevard Surely there can't be many fields left where the only-woman-in-the-room thing still happens?

You'd be surprised. Happens to me all the time. I do not work in science.

I work in IT not Science but this still applies. There still very few young women coming into the field. In fact the numbers seem to have declined since I started 30 years ago. In my department of 80 there are about 12 women. Of those, eight of us are over 40. And yet it's a great career for women as much as it is for men.

Completely agree with this - and yes, the numbers are declining - the percentage of women studying Computer Science at uni has been going down for a while. I think one thing people need to understand is that IT isn't just coding and operating systems - there's a whole range of different roles. I suspect other STEM areas are the same. Plus IT is the backbone of pretty much everything these days, so women should be involved.

There's a really good women's association in my company, but it can feel like it's a separate company from my own department, where they initially tried to stop me getting involved with the women's association. (Bit disappointed they backed down on that. I was quite looking forward to watching that fight. The women would have won easily.)

sausageeggbacon sometimes I'd love NOT to be recognised. I'm in industry. If I'm in a group, I'm usually the one greeted by name, while the guys often don't get named til a farewell - ie I'm instantly recognisable, and memorable by virtue of being a girl. Sometimes I'd love to be able to fade into the background.

Now, if someone can find me PPE that doesn't involve going into the lab, finding the cork borer and putting more holes in the belt, I'd be very happy!

The male / female ratio depends on how senior the meeting, and if Marketing are involved. If its technical, and senior, I can be the only girl. If marketing or sales are involved, there are likely to be other women.

Actually in the labs, its pretty much 50:50. On the manufacturing sites (except in Italy, bizarrely), its a rare female.

I teach Primary pupils (year 6) and it constantly frustrates me how many parents, and usually mothers I hate to say, who constantly do down their daughters' abilities in STEM subjects.
"Oh she's never been good at Maths"
"Oh she's more creative than mathematical"
"I was always rubbish at Maths too."
For me, it's no coincidence that the vast majority of my highest fliers in Maths, etc have been boys.

For me the key piece of advice in the article was applying when you don't meet all the job requirements, so very true. Also the programming class comment.

I'm happy to say the article in general doesn't reflect my experience in science, the number of sexist comments I've had I can count on one hand. And I've only been asked to make notes when I've been the one running the show. One institution I worked at did have very few woman at the lecturer level or above but that was as much a reflection of its attitude to early career researchers as to women in science.

Which isn't to say its not a hard career path, especially in academic science. It's a grinding system that spits the vast majority out, men and women, and it's getting worse.

I was told - by my undergrad project supervisor, and also by my father (a lecturer) - that it's all very well to do a PhD, but then you have to choose between career and having children. I very much doubt that male scientists are ever told this.

I chose children, anyway, and am glad I did (so far) - and no plans to return to science, because it is impossible to get back into my field once you've left.

I'm 99% sure I don't regret this...

boulevard I'm a civil servant and have been the only woman in the room at many a stakeholder meeting or with senior management, partly because of the subjects I work on, but mainly because almost everyone who deals with finance is male. It was last year that I had my first all-female meeting of more than two people!

Someone said they'd seen far too many bright women go into social work and PR and far too many dull men go into business and earn twice as much, simply because the men scraped through a couple college math classes. That was America but same principle here.

Maths means Money. And money means power and being able to change the world for the better more effectively. I think the belief that wanting money isn't "nice" is actually a large part of the problem.

It is very rare indeed to be the only woman in the room these days, even in mech eng. I'm not sure it's helpful to give young girls that impression.

That said, women still get rarer the higher you go, and female professors are very rare in many fields.

As a lapsed scientist (physics) I often wonder if I'm doing the right thing when I do STEM ambassador stuff. It SHOULD be a dream career, but the fixed-term culture has made it a nightmare for both men and women who want a family. These days I would push people towards industry rather than academia, sadly.

I'd agree about industry Sicaq. I've had longer career breaks due to the fixed term contract situation than due to maternity leave and that instability is very hard to deal with. Having worked in both industry and academia, I far prefer industry for many reasons.

academia really suffers from the presenteeism kelpee mentioned up thread. One professor I knew was disappointed in all the younger academics not spending every waking minute in the lab, as he'd done. If anything he was more disappointed in the men as he had more trouble grasping they had working partners and were splitting household chores than he did with my leaving to pick children up. One of the make lecturers told me he felt he had to be seen to be online in the evening working, having picked his child up.

I found the same, chutney. I love the feel of academia and love campus society, but the freedom of research has been lost. The only people with any job security are 55+ and heading for retirement.

It is as you say hard for men too: more men these days want to be primary carers, and they too struggle with it. I'm not convinced academic science has a gender discrimination problem per se: I think it doesn't support carers (who are more often female).

I found the same, chutney. I love the feel of academia and love campus society, but the freedom of research has been lost. The only people with any job security are 55+ and heading for retirement.

It is as you say hard for men too: more men these days want to be primary carers, and they too struggle with it. I'm not convinced academic science has a gender discrimination problem per se: I think it doesn't support carers (who are more often female).

I found the same, chutney. I love the feel of academia and love campus society, but the freedom of research has been lost. The only people with any job security are 55+ and heading for retirement.

It is as you say hard for men too: more men these days want to be primary carers, and they too struggle with it. I'm not convinced academic science has a gender discrimination problem per se: I think it doesn't support carers (who are more often female).