In the News

  • November 16 - New York Time: Data released by PayScale shows that "at the top of the income scale -- jobs paying more than $100,000 -- the salary gap between equally qualified men and women is still vast."
  • November 10 - Chronicle of Higher Ed: A UC Berkeley report "focuses on reasons why women have turned away from careers as academic scientists" and offers recommendations on how to retain women in academic sciences.
  • October 22 - AAUP: "A new report, The American College Teacher, released in 2009 by the Higher Education Research Institute (HERI), provides insights into areas of faculty work and satisfaction for men and women" at four-year colleges and universities nationwide.
  • October 21 - NIH: In response to a 2007 National Academies report that called for a national effort to maximize the potential of women scientists and engineers, the National Institutes of Health recently announced "that it will fund 14 grants focusing on factors that influence the careers of women in biomedical and behavioral science and engineering. The grants are estimated to total $16.8 million over four years."
  • October 15 - Chronicle of Higher Ed: It's not easy, but "being a department chair can be a tremendously rewarding experience...when it comes to making a difference in people's lives every day, you really can't beat it."
  • October 15 - Chronicle of Higher Ed: In an advice column, the blogger, Female Science Professor, notes that "it is possible to be a reserved soft-spoken scientist and still enjoy a talking-intensive career in academe."
  • September 29 - Inside Higher Ed: "Colleges need to embrace specific positions and also to promote flexibility if they want to recruit and retain female faculty members."
  • September 25 - The Chronicle of Higher Education: "Candidates looking at potential positions, especially for their first jobs, probably underestimate the value of a good campus climate." This article provides a short list of questions for candidates to consider when evaluating campus climate.
  • September 22 - The Chronicle of Higher Education: "Mathematics-education experts on Tuesday urged the federal government to get more involved in recruiting underrepresented minority students in science, math and engineering majors, saying such efforts are key to increasing the number of Americans working in those fields."
  • September 16 - The Chronicle of Higher Education: "A study on women doctors in academe found that 'women who do persevere and advance face the extra challenge of 'surplus visibility.'' Because the higher they go, the fewer they are, women become ever more exceptional by their mere presence on the academic scene and visible to the point of inviting critical scrutiny."
  • September 3 - USA Today: "Women gain as men lose jobs: Women are on the verge of outnumbering men in the workforce for the first time"
  • August 26 - Inside Higher Ed: Female and minority students are still often missing from the sciences. But at Grinnell College, those students are on the rise.
  • August 5 - Inside Higher Ed: A recent study has rebutted the myth that the field of engineering suffers from poor retention of female students. In fact, "women -- though a minority in [engineering] programs -- are as likely as men to remain in them."
  • July 30 - Inside Higher Ed: A study done by the Education Department's National Center for Educational Statistics "puts the outcomes of [STEM] students side by side with their peers who do not major in science fields, and finds that they compare favorably."
  • July 29 - Inside Higher Ed: "Colleges that wish to help faculty or staff improve their professional skills and increase their effectiveness would do well to formalize mentoring arrangements so that legends, myths and misinformation are replaced by facts, information, and honesty, but, with or without such programs, individuals would do well to help themselves with prudent self-mentoring."
  • July 22 - Inside Higher Ed: "The problems with -- and thus, possibly the solutions for -- getting female students involved in science begin at an early age. ... As time goes on, female students face a drop-off in interest, particularly in middle school when students become more self-conscious..."
  • July 21 - AAUP: Academe Online A recent article delved into "the root causes for the persistence of gender inequity at the highest ranks of academic leadership" with a study of a small group of female faculty at John Hopkins University.
  • July 15 - Inside Higher Ed: "Mentors serve as a 'realist' and help you put ideas and priorities into the larger context of your academic career."
  • July 14 - AACU: On Campus with Women The most recent issue of the newsletter discusses the discrepancy in diversity between higher education's student bodies and upper ranks of faculty and administration.
  • June 2 - Inside Higher Ed: "National Academies study on women in academic science finds many positive signs and little bias at research universities. Some experts say that the analysis avoided the most important questions."
  • June 1 - Chronicle of Higher Education: "Tenure-Track Jobs in Science and Math Are Open to Women, if They Want Them."
  • May 18 - Chronicle of Higher Education: "New Study Ponders the Effect of Professors' Gender on Students' Success in Science."
  • May 13 - Chronicle of Higher Education: "How to Join the Dark Side: A look at the steps faculty members can take to prepare for an administrative appointment."
  • May 7 - Chronicle of Higher Education: "Figuring Out Flexibility: The fourth in a series of what assistant professors want and need to be successful in academe."
  • April 27 - Inside Higher Ed: "'Standing Still' as Associate Profs: English and foreign language departments promote male associate professors to full professors on average at least a year" earlier than women according to a report by the Modern Language Association.
  • April 2 - Chronicle of Higher Education: "A request from a campus tenure committee for more information on your case is not necessarily a sign of trouble, but it is serious business."
  • March 27 - AACU: On Campus with Women The most recent issue of the newsletter discusses the "The Highways and Byways of Faculty Work."
  • March 27 - Inside Higher Ed: "What I Wish I'd Known About Tenure: Leslie Phinney explains nine things about the faculty promotion process that her own experience taught her, sometimes painfully."
  • March 25 - Chronicle of Higher Education: "Role Models and Mentors: Don't underestimate the importance to female graduate students of seeing successful female professors with children."
  • March 23 - Chronicle of Higher Education: "Two scientists reflect on post-tenure research productivity at a small undergraduate college."
  • March 4 - Inside Higher Ed: "Scholar gained unusually close access to the panels that award grants and fellowships -- and shares her findings about biases, disciplinary differences and the meaning of excellence."
  • March 4 - Inside Higher Ed: "As House appropriators examine boom in federal research money and foresee more, they weigh priorities and techniques for avoiding mistakes of the past."
  • March 2 - Chronicle of Higher Education: "To keep new faculty and staff hires, colleges learn they need to find jobs for spouses as well. But the recession is making that task more difficult than ever."
  • February 27 - Inside Higher Ed: "Stopping the Clock ... on Grants - Congresswoman wants to use federal research agencies to promote advancement of women in university science departments."
  • February 18 - Chronicle of Higher Education: "Presenting Your Tenure File: The best thing you can do for your tenure packet is make it as impressive in design as in content."
  • February 7 - New York Times: "Banks around the world desperately want bailouts of billions of dollars, but they also have another need they’re unaware of: women, women and women."
  • February 4 - Chronicle of Higher Education: "The Demand for Diversity: The third in a series on what assistant professors want and need to be successful in academe"
  • January 27 - Chronicle of Higher Education: "A Bad Reputation: Why are more and more graduate students turning away from careers at research universities?"
  • January 22 - Inside Higher Ed: "New report attempts to gather key data on women in higher education - students, faculty, administrators - and to analyze key issues. In just about every category, study finds progress and disappointments."
  • January 19 - New York Times: In ‘Geek Chic’ and Obama, New Hope for Lifting Women in Science.
  • January 15 - Inside Higher Ed: "Graduate students increasingly care about a “family friendly” work environment - and doubt they can find one at a research university, survey finds." The original article in Academe.
  • January 13 - Inside Higher Ed: "Editor of new collection of essays discusses the role of professors in welcoming and educating students of all types."
  • January 7 - Swimming Against the Tide: A new book by Sandra Hanson "examines the experiences of African American girls in science education using multiple methods of quantitative and qualitative research, including a web survey and vignette techniques. She understands the complex interaction between race and gender in the science domain and, using a multicultural and feminist framework of analysis, addresses the role of agency and resistance that encourages and sustains interest in science in African American families and communities." Inside Higher Ed: Interview with the author.
  • January 7 - Linda Hall Library: The Linda Hall Library, in Kansas City, is the largest privately funded library of science, engineering and technology in the world open to the public. The library is sponsoring book discussions that are free and open to the public. The discussions are listed on their website. Of particular interest is the discussion on March 28 entitled "Rosalind Franklin: The Dark Lady of DNA," a women "whose contributions to the discovery of the structure of DNA were systematically snubbed by colleagues and the two men who received the Nobel Prize for this work, Watson and Crick."
  • December 30 - Inside Higher Ed: "Most departments don’t tell tenure review committees what they aren’t supposed to consider when a tenure timetable has been put on hold."
  • December 30 - A University of Missouri News Release, reports on a study which found that "the impact of the engineering curriculum and obstacles, including self-efficacy and feelings of inclusion, can impede women’s success in the predominantly male discipline of engineering."
  • December 17 - Chronicle of Higher Education: "Female undergraduate and graduate students voted for Obama in great numbers. So what do they want from him now?"
  • December 15 - The most recent issues of Voices, the Women's & Gender Studies Department's newsletter is now available. Please contact Shelda Eggers if you would like a copy of the newsletter.
  • December 12 - A posting on the email newsletter, Tomorrow's Professor, looks at conflicting leadership roles of department chairs, roles that are often "academic leader, administrator, scholar, faculty developer, and, in some instances, mediator."
  • November 20 - Inside Higher Ed published an article, New Measures for Gender Inequities, which discusses the American Association of University Professors report "with 'gender equity indicators' for higher education as a whole and for individual campuses."
  • November 18 - On Campus with Women, a newsletter published by The Association of American Colleges & Universities, focused its current issue on examining "ways to improve student retention and engagement in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM)" and exploring "how feminist pedagogies, by connecting academic learning and personal experience, can transform cultures and classrooms to be more inclusive and hospitable to all students."
  • November 4 - The Chronicle of Higher Education published an article, Why Collegiality Matters, which highlights "what assistant professors want and need to be successful in academe."
  • October 27 - Newsweek published an article "Climbing the Academic Ladder" by Nancy Andrews, dean of Duke Medical School, on the challenges facing women in science.
  • October 22 - A posting on the email newsletter, Tomorrow's Professor, shares advice on creating more time and space for faculty.
  • October 17 - The National Science Foundation shared a list of recent awards made through the ADVANCE program.
  • October 17 - A Chronicle of Higher Education article, Balancing Act: Do Babies Matter in Science?, notes that "a true measure of gender equity in academe would look at both the career and family outcomes of female Ph.D.'s."
  • October 15 - The National Institutes of Health provides Frequently Asked Questions for grantees. The Web site outlines policies and procedures related to parental leave and child care with NIH grants.
  • October 13 - An Inside Higher Ed article, Redefining the Gender Gap, notes that "new research tries to shift discussion beyond enrollment rates to the actual experience of male and female students in college."
  • October 6 - In an article, Making a Case for Diversity in STEM Fields, Inside Higher Ed noted that "at a time when STEM fields are increasingly important to our national security, health, and competitiveness we are neither supporting the research nor producing the diverse pool of scientists and engineers we need to fuel our future."
  • October 2 - The Chronicle of Higher Education provided information on a report by a British panel about dispute resolution in colleges and universities. The report, “Taking a Fresh Look at Disputes in Higher Education,” provides "a 'toolkit' of step-by-step methods institutions can use to deal with conflicts."
  • September 22 - An article in Inside Higher Ed, discussed possible reasons why "in field after field, women either outperform or equal men — only to lag in key positions in academe."
  • September 17 -The Chronicle of Higher Education offered a column for department heads outlining some of the expectations of deans, offering "are ways to make 'the toughest job in the university' a little easier"
  • September 12 -The Chronicle of Higher Education published an article on academic bullying as well as an a list of blogs that discuss "how to resolve bullying, warnings to other scholars, and even primal cries for help."
  • August 29 -The Chronicle of Higher Education shared a list of previous columns offering "tips about advancing your career in campus administration."
  • August 25 -Inside Higher Ed published an article discussing findings from a recent NSF study which found that "for the second year in a row, federal funds for academic research in science and engineering failed to outpace inflation."
  • August -TheScientist.com published an article discussing programs that are successful "in preparing and sustaining women for leadership in the sciences."
  • August 6- Inside Higher Ed published an article stating that "academic scientists-in the natural and social sciences- are more satisfied than are their counterparts outside of higher education."
  • August 5- Inside Higher Ed published the article, "Keys to Hiring Women in Science," which provided tips to search committees who were trying to recruit "women to positions in science and engineering departments."
  • July 17- Robin Wilson of The Chronicle of Higher Education wrote that more colleges were offering professors the option to be part time, creating a more family-friendly atmosphere in the academic workplace. However, part time also has created some concerns as professors try to achieve tenure.
  • July 17- According to an article by Inside Higher Ed states that, "by many measures, women are advancing at a significant pace in academe...At the same time, in discipline after discipline, there is evidence that the careers of many women in academe stall."
  • July 15- The New York Times reporter, John Tierney, wrote that some federal agencies are now trying to get Title XI applied to women in science.
  • June 12- "Interviews with 80 female faculty members at a research university — the largest qualitative study of its kind — have found that many women in careers are deeply frustrated by a system that they believe undervalues their work and denies them opportunities for a balanced life," according to an article by Inside Higher Ed.
  • May 23- Inside Higher Ed reports on the study “Alone in the Ivory Tower: How Birth Events Vary Among Fast-Track Professionals."
  • May 15- The "ACS Career News," a newsletter from the American Chemical Society, had an article stating the importance of having a mentor and provided tips for finding one both at work.
  • May 9- From The Chroncile of Higher Education's news blog comes: "Congressional Panel Considers Call for More Female Science Professors."
  • May 2008- MentorNet News republished an interview from Inside Higher Ed on "Gendered Innovations in Science and Engineering."
  • February 17- The Chronicle of Higher Education reports on a study about how women and men in science differ in their social networks.
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