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38–258PS 2008

WOMEN IN ACADEMIC

SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON RESEARCH AND

SCIENCE EDUCATION

COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE AND

TECHNOLOGY

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

OCTOBER 17, 2007

Serial No. 110–65

Printed for the use of the Committee on Science and Technology

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.house.gov/science

(II)

COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

HON. BART GORDON, Tennessee, Chairman

JERRY F. COSTELLO, Illinois

EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas

LYNN C. WOOLSEY, California

MARK UDALL, Colorado

DAVID WU, Oregon

BRIAN BAIRD, Washington

BRAD MILLER, North Carolina

DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois

NICK LAMPSON, Texas

GABRIELLE GIFFORDS, Arizona

JERRY MCNERNEY, California

LAURA RICHARDSON, California

PAUL KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania

DARLENE HOOLEY, Oregon

STEVEN R. ROTHMAN, New Jersey

JIM MATHESON, Utah

MIKE ROSS, Arkansas

BEN CHANDLER, Kentucky

RUSS CARNAHAN, Missouri

CHARLIE MELANCON, Louisiana

BARON P. HILL, Indiana

HARRY E. MITCHELL, Arizona

CHARLES A. WILSON, Ohio

RALPH M. HALL, Texas

F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER JR.,

Wisconsin

LAMAR S. SMITH, Texas

DANA ROHRABACHER, California

ROSCOE G. BARTLETT, Maryland

VERNON J. EHLERS, Michigan

FRANK D. LUCAS, Oklahoma

JUDY BIGGERT, Illinois

W. TODD AKIN, Missouri

JO BONNER, Alabama

TOM FEENEY, Florida

RANDY NEUGEBAUER, Texas

BOB INGLIS, South Carolina

DAVID G. REICHERT, Washington

MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas

MARIO DIAZ-BALART, Florida

PHIL GINGREY, Georgia

BRIAN P. BILBRAY, California

ADRIAN SMITH, Nebraska

PAUL C. BROUN, Georgia

SUBCOMMITTEE ON RESEARCH AND SCIENCE EDUCATION

HON. BRIAN BAIRD, Washington, Chairman

EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas

DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois

JERRY MCNERNEY, California

DARLENE HOOLEY, Oregon

RUSS CARNAHAN, Missouri

BARON P. HILL, Indiana

BART GORDON, Tennessee

VERNON J. EHLERS, Michigan

ROSCOE G. BARTLETT, Maryland

RANDY NEUGEBAUER, Texas

DAVID G. REICHERT, Washington

BRIAN P. BILBRAY, California

RALPH M. HALL, Texas

JIM WILSON Subcommittee Staff Director

DAHLIA SOKOLOV Democratic Professional Staff Member

MELE ́ WILLIAMS Republican Professional Staff Member

MEGHAN HOUSEWRIGHT Research Assistant

(III)

C O N T E N T S

October 17, 2007

Page

Witness List ............................................................................................................. 2

Hearing Charter ...................................................................................................... 3

Opening Statements

Statement by Representative Brian Baird, Chairman, Subcommittee on Research and Science Education, Committee on Science and Technology, U.S.

House of Representatives .................................................................................... 9

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 10

Statement by Representative Vernon J. Ehlers, Ranking Minority Member,

Subcommittee on Research and Science Education, Committee on Science

and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives ............................................... 11

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 12

Prepared Statement by Representative Russ Carnahan, Member, Subcommittee on Research and Science Education, Committee on Science and

Technology, U.S. House of Representatives ....................................................... 12

Witnesses:

Dr. Donna E. Shalala, Professor of Political Science; President, University

of Miami

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 13

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 16

Biography .......................................................................................................... 20

Dr. Kathie L. Olsen, Deputy Director, National Science Foundation

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 21

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 23

Biography .......................................................................................................... 26

Dr. Freeman A. Hrabowski, III, President, University of Maryland, Baltimore

County

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 27

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 29

Biography .......................................................................................................... 33

Dr. Myron Campbell, Chair, Physics Department, University of Michigan

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 34

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 36

Biography .......................................................................................................... 38

Dr. Gretchen Ritter, Professor of Government; Director, Center for Women’s

and Gender Studies, University of Texas at Austin

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 40

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 41

Biography .......................................................................................................... 49

Discussion ................................................................................................................. 49

Appendix: Answers to Post-Hearing Questions

Dr. Donna E. Shalala, Professor of Political Science; President, University

of Miami ................................................................................................................ 62

Dr. Kathie L. Olsen, Deputy Director, National Science Foundation ................. 64

Page

IV

Dr. Freeman A. Hrabowski, III, President, University of Maryland, Baltimore

County ................................................................................................................... 67

Dr. Myron Campbell, Chair, Physics Department, University of Michigan ....... 69

Dr. Gretchen Ritter, Professor of Government; Director, Center for Women’s

and Gender Studies, University of Texas at Austin ......................................... 70

(1)

WOMEN IN ACADEMIC SCIENCE AND

ENGINEERING

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 17, 2007

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON RESEARCH AND SCIENCE EDUCATION,

COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY,

Washington, DC.

The Committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:10 a.m., in Room

2318 of the Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Brian Baird

[Chairman of the Subcommittee] presiding.

2

3

HEARING CHARTER

SUBCOMMITTEE ON RESEARCH AND SCIENCE

EDUCATION

COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

Women in Academic

Science and Engineering

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 17, 2007

2:00 P.M.–4:00 P.M. 2318 RAYBURN HOUSE OFFICE BUILDING

1. Purpose

On Wednesday, October 17, the Subcommittee on Research and Science Education

of the House Committee on Science and Technology will hold a hearing to examine

institutional and cultural barriers to recruitment and retention of women faculty in

science and engineering fields, best practices for overcoming these barriers, and the

role that federal research agencies can play in disseminating and promoting best

practices.

2. Witnesses

Dr. Donna Shalala, President, University of Miami.

Dr. Kathie Olsen, Deputy Director, National Science Foundation.

Dr. Freeman Hrabowski, President, University of Maryland Baltimore County.

Dr. Myron Campbell, Chair of Physics, University of Michigan.

Dr. Gretchen Ritter, Professor of Government, University of Texas at Austin.

3. Overarching Questions

• What is the current status of women in academic science and engineering?

How do recruitment, retention, promotion and attrition rates differ for men

and women in these fields? How and why do these data vary by discipline

and type of institution?

• What are the greatest barriers to gender equity in academic science and engineering? What have we learned about what works and doesn’t work to recruit

and retain top female scientists and engineers into tenure-track positions? To

what extent are best practices in recruitment and retention already being implemented?

• What can the federal research agencies do to help identify, promote and disseminate best practices across the country? What responsibility do the agencies have to hold funded institutions accountable for subtle cultural barriers?

4. Overview

• Although women earn half of the Bachelor’s degrees in science and engineering (S&E), they continue to be significantly under-represented at the faculty

level in almost all S&E fields, constituting 28 percent (in 2003) of doctoral

science and engineering faculty in four-year colleges and universities and only

18 percent of full professors.

• In 2006, the National Academies produced a report entitled, ‘‘Beyond Bias

and Barriers: Fulfilling the Potential of Women in Academic Science and Engineering.’’ The report was largely in response to the outcry over then Harvard President Lawrence Summers’ 2005 remarks, in which he argued that

biological differences may help explain female under-representation in academic S&E.

• The National Academies panel, in addition to dismissing the relative significance of any biological differences, made a series of recommendations to all

stakeholders, including universities, professional societies and the Federal

4

1 In the case of assistant professor appointments, the available pool is the sum of Ph.D.’s

earned by women in the six-year period preceding appointment. 2Figure and related data is this section from National Academies report, ‘‘Beyond Bias and

Barriers.’’

Government, to address cultural and institutional gender bias in academic

S&E.

• The National Academies panel main recommendation to Congress was to

carry out regular oversight hearings to investigate enforcement activities.

Most of the experts contacted in preparation for this hearing agreed that

while the Federal Government could do a better job with enforcement of antidiscrimination laws at universities, the more subtle cultural barriers present

a much greater challenge to women seeking academic careers.

• The National Science Foundation (NSF) established the ADVANCE program

in 2000 to develop approaches for increasing the representation and advancement of women in academic science and engineering careers. While previous

NSF programs for the advancement of women focused on support for individual scientists, the goal of ADVANCE grants is institutional transformation.

5. Current Status of Women in Academic Science and Engineering

According to data compiled by NSF, in 2003, women held nearly 28 percent of all

full-time science and engineering (S&E) faculty positions. Specifically, they constituted 18 percent of full professors, 31 percent of associate professors and 40 percent of junior, or assistant professors.

Most of the social science disciplines and psychology are already dominated by

women at both the graduate level and in faculty positions. The percentage of women

earning Ph.D.’s in other S&E fields has grown steadily in the last 30 years, and has

already exceeded 50 percent in the life sciences. However, in 2003 women constituted 34 percent of assistant professor appointments in the life sciences, and

slightly less at research universities. Half of this drop-off can be accounted for by

including only the available pool of Ph.D.’s1 in the life sciences: 42 percent in 2003.

But attrition is still high in the step from completion of training to faculty appointment. Female under-representation in life sciences faculties continues through the

associate and full professor levels. Notably, while the physical sciences continue to

have low representation at the graduate level (20 percent), relative to the available

pool of Ph.D.’s the physical sciences actually show better representation for women

in tenure-track faculty positions than the life sciences and other fields with a greater percentage of women Ph.D.’s. The figure below shows these data for assistant and

associate professor positions across all fields.2

5

Women who start out on academic pathways in S&E fields leave for other career

paths at higher rates than their male counterparts, even though for the fields in

which attrition is highest, women show increased representation at the postdoctoral

level. Postdoctoral positions are a necessary prerequisite to faculty jobs in most S&E

fields. From among those who leave post-faculty appointment but pre-tenure review,

men are more likely to move into other employment sectors and women are more

likely to move into adjunct positions. However, in most fields, women and men faculty who are reviewed receive tenure at similar rates. As faculty move up in rank,

there are again differences between men and women, this time in promotions,

awards and even salary.

6. Institutional and Cultural Bias and Barriers

In 2006, the National Academies produced a report entitled, ‘‘Beyond Bias and

Barriers: Fulfilling the Potential of Women in Academic Science and Engineering.’’

The report was largely in response to the outcry over then Harvard President Lawrence Summers’ 2005 remarks, in which he attributed what many thought to be a

6

3 Critics of the NAS report disparage the panel for dismissing the significance of biology before

all of the scientific evidence is in. 4 Currently, 42 percent of women in tenure and tenure-track careers have children, while 50

percent of their male colleagues have children. 5Sweden has been named by the United Nations as a world leader in gender equity.

6While the reasons are unclear, it appears that women are more likely to engage in interdisciplinary and collaborative research, and to put more energy and time into teaching and mentoring activities than their male colleagues.

greatly exaggerated level of significance to a biological explanation for female underrepresentation in academic S&E. The NAS panel reviewed the existing literature on

gender differences in cognition and biology and concluded that, ‘‘if systematic differences between male and female scientific and mathematical aptitude and ability

do exist, it is clear that they cannot account for women’s under-representation in

academic science and engineering.’’ 3 Instead, the panel focused on the need to fix

institutional, social and cultural bias and barriers.

To this end, the National Academies panel made a number of recommendations

to all stakeholders. The panel called on university presidents and provosts to provide clear leadership in changing the culture and structure of their institutions, and

deans and department chairs to take responsibility for implementing changes to recruiting, hiring, promotion, and tenure practices. They recommended that higher

education organizations form an inter-institution monitoring organization and that

scientific and professional societies help set professional and equity standards across

the activities they lead, such as awards and conferences. The recommendations

made to the Federal Government ranged from rigorous enforcement of federal antidiscrimination laws by enforcement agencies to provision of workshops to minimize

gender bias by NSF and other federal funding agencies. The full list of recommendations is in the report summary available from the National Academy Press: http:/

/books.nap.edu/catalog.php?record¥id=11741

The status of women in academic S&E has improved appreciably in the last three

decades, and institutions across the country are continuing to address institutional

barriers to gender equity. However, the National Academies panel argues that

changes in institutional policies are necessary but not sufficient—even many policies

that appear on the surface to be equitable in fact disadvantage women. For example, many women who want children struggle with the intersection of the tenure

clock and their biological clock. Many more men are also making work/life balance

career decisions.4 In order to attract top faculty candidates who want both career

and family, a number of universities offer the possibility of an extension of the tenure clock—the number of years to tenure review—for assistant professors who have

a child while under the clock. But in most cases young faculty feel pressure not to

request this extension for fear that they will be judged differently in the tenure review process. In this case, cultural norms undermine a well-intentioned policy, and

women, who are more often the primary caregivers for infants (especially if they

breast feed), are disproportionably disadvantaged. Some universities have instituted

an automatic rather than voluntary extension of the tenure clock in an attempt to

overcome those cultural barriers.

The report also discusses at length a phenomenon known as ‘‘implicit bias,’’ in

this case an implicit assumption of what a scientist is supposed to look like, i.e.,

a man, and probably a white man. The panel cites a Swedish5 study of peer-review

scores, in which men received systematically higher competence ratings by their

peers than equally productive women. In fact, women postdoctoral fellowship applicants included in that study had to be twice as productive (as measured by defined,

quantitative measures of productivity) than their male counterparts to be judged

equally competent. This field of research is still relatively young, but the collection

of evidence supporting the notion of implicit gender bias in academic S&E continues

to grow. Minority-group women, as members of two major demographic groups historically excluded from the scientific enterprise, face their own unique set of challenges.

The list of cultural norms that appear to disadvantage women also includes the

favoring of disciplinary over interdisciplinary research and publications, and the

only token attention given to teaching and other service during the tenure review

process.6 Thus it seems that it is not necessarily conscious bias against women but

an ingrained idea of how the academic enterprise ‘‘should be’’ that presents the

greatest challenge to women seeking academic S&E careers. Overcoming these cultural barriers is much more difficult than just enforcing anti-discrimination laws or

making university policies more family friendly. And even among those who passionately advocate for change, there is no consensus about how or if to modify some

of those core practices that have defined the academic enterprise for generations.

7

7. NSF ADVANCE Program

The National Science Foundation established the ADVANCE grant program to develop approaches for increasing the representation and advancement of women in

academic S&E careers through institutional transformation. Nearly 30 institutions

have been awarded five-year ADVANCE grants since 2001. While previous NSF programs for the advancement of women focused on support for individual scientists,

the goal of ADVANCE grants is to tackle the institutional and cultural barriers to

all women. These grants have enabled funded institutions to experiment with innovative recruitment and retention policies, as well as targeted mentoring, workshops

on implicit bias, and other activities to raise awareness among departmental chairs

and S&E faculty at large about the existence of real barriers to women scientists

and engineers. As the witnesses in today’s hearing will testify, the ‘‘rubber hits the

road’’ at the departmental level, where Department Chairs are responsible for implementing the policies and goals established by their institutions’ leaders.

Many of the activities funded under the ADVANCE program were cited by the

National Academies panel as examples of policies and programs that seem to be

making a difference. In particular, they recommended workshops to minimize gender bias, and NSF and other research agencies have already hosted such workshops

in the physics and chemistry communities. Grantees share those and other best

practices through their websites and annual meetings of principal investigators, and

NSF plans to award Partnerships for Adaptation, Implementation, and Dissemination (PAID) Awards in 2008. Two of the witnesses on today’s panel are at universities that have or had ADVANCE grants.

8. Questions for Witnesses

Donna Shalala

• Please describe the findings and recommendations of the National Academies

report, Beyond Bias and Barriers, in particular the recommendations directed

toward the Federal Government and that are relevant to issues of faculty recruitment, retention and promotion.

• What are the biggest challenges and most promising solutions to achieving

gender equity in academic science and engineering?

• As President of a university, what policies have you instituted on your own

campus to ensure gender equity, and how to do you ensure compliance at the

departmental level?

Kathie Olsen

• Please describe what the National Science Foundation (NSF), through its ADVANCE program for institutional transformation, has learned about the biggest challenges and most-promising solutions to achieving gender equity in

faculty recruitment, retention and general climate in science and engineering

fields.

• What is NSF doing to broadly disseminate and encourage best practices identified through the ADVANCE program?

• In addition to the activities already described, what else can NSF and other

federal research agencies do to promote and ensure a more favorable environment for women in academic science and engineering fields?

Freeman Hrabowski

• Please describe the programs that you have been able to carry out through

your university’s ADVANCE grant. What are the biggest challenges and

greatest successes in trying to achieve institutional change toward greater

gender equity on your campus? How do you ensure compliance at the departmental level?

• The National Academies report, Beyond Bias and Barriers, described a ‘‘conspiracy of silence’’ regarding minority-group women. What are the greatest

challenges faced by minority-group women scientists and engineers? Have you

been able to identify institutional policies or practices that successfully mitigate these challenges?

• Beyond funding ADVANCE grants at a handful of universities, what can the

National Science Foundation and other federal funding agencies do to help

identify and encourage best practices in faculty gender equity across the country?

8

Myron Campbell

• Please describe the efforts you have undertaken as Chair of your Physics Department to recruit and retain women faculty. How did you come to take this

on as a priority? What are your biggest challenges and greatest successes?

• Beyond funding ADVANCE grants at a handful of universities, what can the

National Science Foundation and other federal funding agencies do to help

identify and encourage best practices in faculty gender equity across the country?

• Please describe the purpose of the American Physical Society (APS) workshop

on gender equity that you participated in last May. What can APS and similar societies do to help promote gender equity in science and engineering

fields?

Gretchen Ritter

• Please describe efforts on your own campus to identify and address any barriers to recruitment and retention of women faculty, especially in science and

engineering departments.

• What are the biggest challenges and most promising solutions to achieving

gender equity in academic science and engineering across the country?

• Beyond funding ADVANCE grants at a handful of universities, what can the

National Science Foundation and other federal funding agencies do to help

identify and encourage best practices in faculty gender equity across the country?

9

Chairman BAIRD. Good afternoon and welcome to our guests. Our

distinguished panel is here, and we are joined by my dear friend

and colleague, Ranking Member Dr. Vern Ehlers. This is a particularly exciting meeting—and I am supposed to—I guess I should say

the hearing will come to order. So now, having said that, we can

get to what really matters.

It is particularly exciting for all of us here on this committee,

which has a passionate interest in science education. The Speaker

of the House Nancy Pelosi is particularly committed to this issue

as is our Full Committee Chairman Bart Gordon. And I want to

also single out Eddie Bernice Johnson, who was previously the

Ranking Member of this subcommittee. Sadly, Ms. Johnson cannot

be with us today due to the death of her mother. We send our condolences to Eddie B. She is a dear friend and a tireless champion

of women and minorities in science, and it is a deeply unfortunate

juxtaposition of events that the hearing which she has long labored

to help put together, she is unable to attend, but she wants us to

send all of you here her regards, and we will convey to her, of

course, testimony that we receive today.

Women are receiving Ph.D.s in steadily increasingly numbers. In

fact, in some fields, women have achieved parity with men at the

graduate level. Unfortunately, however, they still hold only 28 percent of full-time science and engineering faculty positions, and only

18 percent of full professor positions.

Today’s hearing will explore what happens to the available pool

of women who have stuck it out all of the way through a Ph.D.

Those accomplished women leave academia in greater numbers

than men, and those who stay in academia continue to be promoted, recognized for academic achievement, and paid at lower

rates than their male colleagues.

A National Academies panel recommended that the Department

of Justice and other enforcement agencies put more effort into enforcing anti-discrimination laws on university campuses; however,

the same panel implied that the most intractable barriers to

women in academic science and engineering are intractable precisely because they will not be overcome through even the most rigorous enforcement of the law. These are barriers created not by

willful individuals or institutions. Rather, they are barriers created

by the collective effect of many small and usually subtle incidents

of subconscious bias on the part of well-intentioned individuals and

even by some of the seemingly gender-neutral practices in academic science and engineering.

We invited today’s witnesses to help us understand exactly what

the barriers are, how we might continue to break them down, and

specifically how the federal research agencies can improve the status of women in academic science and engineering.

We cannot afford to continue losing our best and brightest

woman, or minorities, for that matter, from academic science and

engineering careers. The seeds of progress in U.S. competitiveness,

security, and well being are formed in our college and university

research laboratories. The interaction and collaboration of diverse

individuals with differing perspectives enriches the entire process

and stimulates even greater discovery and innovation.

10

I am particularly interested in the importance of role models and

mentors, both for minority students and women students, because

I believe that is absolutely critical. Most of us who went on and got

doctorates can point to someone in the pipeline who inspired us

and led us to believe that we, too, could do what they are doing

and that it is worth the effort and time and price to get there, and

so I am particularly interested in your thoughts on that as well

today.

I also want to note that this is the first in multiple hearings that

we plan to hold in this committee to look at the involvement of

women in STEM fields. In fact, we will hold a hearing soon on how

we might encourage more girls to stick with math and science studies through high school, college, and beyond, since attrition occurs

at every step of the way. Today we are looking at the attrition at

the completed end of the continuum, so to speak, folks who have

obtained Ph.D.s, but there are so many qualified young girls and

women who have the mental capacity and the interest, but for

some various reasons along the way, we lose from the pipeline in

the STEM fields, and we want to do what we can to stop that and

encourage greater continuation of the studies.

So I want to thank all of the witnesses—as you can see, we will

introduce them in a moment—a particularity capable and impressive panel.

[The prepared statement of Chairman Baird follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN BRIAN BAIRD

Good afternoon and welcome to this hearing on Women in Academic Science and

Engineering. I want to thank my dear friend Ms. Johnson for requesting this hearing and for her tireless work over the years to increase diversity in science and engineering. Sadly, Ms. Johnson cannot be with us today due to the death of her mother.

Women are receiving Ph.D.s in steadily increasing numbers. In fact, in some

fields, women have achieved parity with men at the graduate level. Unfortunately,

however, they still hold only 28 percent of all full-time science and engineering faculty positions, and only 18 percent of full professor positions.

Today, we want to explore what happens to the available pool of women who have

stuck it out all the way through a Ph.D. These accomplished women leave academia

in greater numbers than men, and those who do stay in academia continue to be

promoted, recognized for academic achievement, and paid at lower rates than their

male colleagues.

A National Academies panel recommended that the Department of Justice and

other enforcement agencies put more effort into enforcing anti-discrimination laws

on university campuses. However, the same panel implied that the most intractable

barriers to women in academic science and engineering are intractable precisely because they will not be overcome through even the most rigorous enforcement of the

law. They are barriers created not by willful individuals or institutions. Rather, they

are barriers created by the collective effect of many small and usually subtle incidents of subconscious bias on the part of well-intentioned individuals and even by

some of the seemingly gender-neutral practices in academic science and engineering.

We invited today’s witnesses to help us understand exactly what those barriers

are, how we might continue to break them down, and specifically how the federal

research agencies can help improve the status of women in academic science and

engineering.

We cannot afford to continue losing our best and brightest women, or minorities

for that matter, from academic science and engineering careers. The seeds of

progress in U.S. competitiveness, security and well-being are formed in our colleges

and universities’ research laboratories. The interaction and collaboration of diverse

individuals with differing perspectives enriches the entire process and stimulates

even greater discovery and invention.

I also want to note that this is the first in multiple hearings that we plan to hold

to look at the involvement of women in STEM fields. In fact, we will hold a hearing

11

soon on how we might encourage more girls to stick with math and science studies

through high school, college and beyond, since attrition occurs at every step along

the way.

I thank all of the witnesses for being here today and I look forward to your testimony.

Chairman BAIRD. And at this point, I will recognize my dear

friend and colleague Dr. Ehlers. I think we have been joined by

Ralph Hall, the senior Member of our committee. Ralph, thank you

for joining us. Dr. Ehlers?

Mr. EHLERS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, thank you very much for

holding this hearing. It is a very important topic.

Understanding the difficulties that female faculty faces is challenging. The climate is changing, but it is still an uphill battle to

get faculty of either gender to have frank conversations about this

historically valid, volatile topic. Nevertheless, as the National

Academies’ 2006 Beyond Bias and Barriers report pointed out,

higher education must change both the culture and structure of its

institutions so that obstacles to women advancing in science and

engineering are removed.

I have spent a lot of my time in Congress working to improve

STEM education at the K–12 levels. And I have to comment that

today’s topic is not as distanced from elementary and secondary

education as you might think. Without role models along every step

of the way, we face an impossible task to encourage young girls to

pursue careers in science and engineering, and it is very important

to have elementary and secondary schoolteachers who are female,

and obviously, enjoy math and science. The best role models tend

to be happy ones, not women who are regretting their decision to

stick it out in science and engineering because they are perhaps

subject to pervasive negative attitudes from their colleagues. Students are quick to recognize which professors like their jobs, and

students will be influence, accordingly, about their own career

goals.

I have been fortune to have female colleagues in physics from the

time I was an undergraduate student at Calvin College, straight

though my graduate studies and to my time as a Physics Professor.

But of course, these women were always far outnumbered by their

male colleagues. Even through significant progress has occurred

since I left academia, many institutions are still in need of dissolving antiquated perceptions and the actions that come with

them about the appropriateness of women in science and engineering. And female students, occasionally, must also dissolve their perception.

I have always made a point in speaking to my students and to

the public about this issue to point out how strange it is in America. You go to China, roughly 50 percent of the scientists are female. You go to Russia, you go to many other countries, and it is

the same. It simply can’t be true that American women are less capable in math and science than the women of Russia, China, and

a number of other countries. It has to be a cultural issue, and we

have to change our culture and recognize the problems of the culture and change the culture accordingly.

And I don’t want to bore my colleagues here, but I have an example I have often given with my daughter, who had As all the way

through elementary school, in every subject for that matter, but esVerDate 11-MAY-2000 15:09 Feb 06, 2008 Jkt 038258 PO 00000 Frm 00015 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 C:\WORKD\R&SE07\101707\38258 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
12

pecially in math. She got to high school, started Algebra, got an A

on the first test, A-minus on the second, B on the third and so

forth. And I said we have to have a little talk. What is going on

here? She said well, you know girls can’t get math. We had never

had that perception through eight years of education. She got to

high school, that was the perception, and she felt she had to meet

it. But after a little conversation, she went back to conquer the

world and got As the rest of the way through and took calculus in

college and became an English major, which was perfectly fine with

me. I didn’t expect her to major in science, but at least get enough

so that it will help you in every career you have taken. And this

happened to both of our daughters, and they both have done extremely well, partly because of the facility they learned in taking

calculus, and also I asked them to take computer programming.

Those are skills, those are ways of thinking, that are of value in

almost any position you might take today.

I look forward to haring from our witnesses about some of the

innovative programs that are making a difference in recruiting and

retaining female faculty, and how we can build upon these innovative programs. Thank you very much, and I yield back.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Ehlers follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF REPRESENTATIVE VERNON J. EHLERS

Understanding the difficulties that female faculty face is challenging. The climate

is changing, but it is still an uphill battle to get faculty of either gender to have

frank conversations about this historically volatile topic. Nevertheless, as the National Academies’ 2006 ‘‘Beyond Bias and Barriers’’ report pointed out, higher education must change both the culture and structure of its institutions so that obstacles to women advancing in science and engineering are removed.

While I have spent a lot of my time in Congress working to improve STEM education at the K–12 levels, today’s topic is not as distanced from elementary and secondary education as you might think. Without role models along every step of the

way, we face an impossible task to encourage young girls to pursue careers in

science and engineering. The best role models tend to be happy ones, not women

who are regretting their decision to stick it out in science and engineering fields because they are subject to pervasive negative attitudes. Students are quick to recognize which professors like their jobs and be influenced accordingly about their own

career goals.

I have been fortunate to have female colleagues from the time I was an undergraduate student at Calvin College straight through to my time as a Physics Professor, but of course, these women were always far outnumbered by their male colleagues. Even though significant progress has occurred since I left academia, many

institutions are still in need of dissolving antiquated perceptions—and the actions

that come with them—about the appropriateness of women in science and engineering.

I look forward to hearing from our witnesses about some of the innovative programs that are making a difference in recruiting and retaining female faculty, and

how we can build upon them.

Chairman BAIRD. Thank you very much, Dr. Ehlers.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Carnahan follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF REPRESENTATIVE RUSS CARNAHAN

Mr. Chairman, thank you for hosting this hearing to examine institutional and

cultural barriers to the recruitment and retention of women faculty in science and

engineering fields. It is important for the Federal Government to encourage best

practices to overcome these barriers.

Women earn half of the Bachelor’s degrees in science and engineering (S&E), but

they continue to be significantly under-represented at the faculty level in almost all

S&E fields. It is important that Congress provide oversight to tackle this discrepVerDate 11-MAY-2000 15:09 Feb 06, 2008 Jkt 038258 PO 00000 Frm 00016 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 C:\WORKD\R&SE07\101707\38258 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
13

ancy in order to be sure that the country benefits from having the best-and-thebrightest doing research and teaching.

Today we are going to follow through on the National Academies recommendation

that Congress oversee the efforts to break-down the biases that are impeding women’s entry and retention in science and engineering academia. We are going to find

out what is working and learn what challenges remain. We hope to help spread the

best practices and encourage the continued progress towards a more representative

scientific faculty.

To all the witnesses—thank you for taking time out of your busy schedules to appear before us today. I look forward to hearing your testimony.

Chairman BAIRD. At this time, I want to introduce our witnesses,

and I want to thank, particularly, our staff on the Science Committee for helping invite such a distinguished panel of witnesses.

And our protocol here is that you have five minutes to offer your

comments. Obviously, each of you could probably give us an insightful half-day or full-day or multiple-day discussion of this issue,

but we can keep the opening responses fairly brief, then we can

have a good give and take. And it is a friendly committee here, and

we look very much forward to your comments.

Our first speaker—I will introduce all of the witnesses, and then

following that, each will offer their comments. Dr. Donna Shalala

really needs no introduction. She is President of the University of

Miami, before that, served for eight years as Secretary of Health

and Human Services and has a long, distinguished career prior to

that as well.

Dr. Kathie Olsen is the Deputy Directory at the National Science

Foundation. Dr. Freeman Hrabowski is president of the University

of Maryland Baltimore County; Dr. Myron Campbell, Chair of the

Department of Physics, at the University of Michigan; and Dr.

Gretchen Ritter, Professor of Government and the Director of the

Center for Women’s and Gender Studies at the University of Texas

at Austin. Thank you to all of you for being here. Our witnesses,

as I mentioned, will have five-minute testimony, and if any other

Members wish to offer comments, they will be invited to do so. We

have been joined by Dr. Jerry McNerney from California.

We will start now with Dr. Shalala. Thank you.

STATEMENT OF DR. DONNA E. SHALALA, PROFESSOR OF

POLITICAL SCIENCE; PRESIDENT, UNIVERSITY OF MIAMI

Dr. SHALALA. Thank you very much, Chairman Baird, Ranking

Member Ehlers, and Members of the Subcommittee. Thanks for the

opportunity to testify, and I am going to specifically testify on the

report of the National Academies’ Beyond Bias and Barriers, Fulfilling the Potential of Women in Academic Science and Engineering, a panel that I chaired for the National Academy of Sciences.

I am a member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies.

The report finds that while the U.S. clearly must take steps to

maintain its scientific and engineering leadership in a climate of

increasingly economic and educational globalization, we cannot

take advantage of our talent and our human capital because

women face significant barriers in every field of science and engineering. This crisis calls for a transformation of the academy,

which requires action by educational leaders and the support of

federal funding agencies, foundations of government agencies and

of Congress.

14

Eliminating gender bias in universities requires immediate and

overreaching reform and decisive action by university administrators, by professional societies, by government agencies and by Congress. Let me talk a little about our findings. I don’t want to take

too much time from my other very distinguished colleagues.

We found that women have the ability to and drive to succeed

in science and engineering. Women who are interested in science

and engineering careers are lost at every educational transition,

which is a point that you made, Mr. Chairman. The problem is not

simply that loss through the pipeline because in the rank of full

professor at the top research universities, women, on the average,

hold less than 15 percent of tenured faculty positions in the social,

behavioral, and life sciences and dramatically less than that in all

of the other fields of science and engineering. Women are likely to

face discrimination in every field of science and engineering, and

a substantial body of evidence establishes that most people—this is

a very important finding: both men and women hold implicit biases.

Evaluation criteria contained arbitrary and subjective components that disadvantage women because women faculty are paid

less, promoted more slowly, receive fewer honors and hold fewer

leadership positions than men. Academic organizational structures

and rules contribute significantly to the under-use of women in

academic science and engineering. The consequences of not acting

will be detrimental to this country’s competitiveness.

Our recommendations are many, and let me just summarize

them. We recommend to federal funding agencies and foundations

to federal agencies and to Congress as follows: federal funding

agencies and foundations should counter these biases and begin to

make full use of our full talent pool in this critical area by making

sure that all rules and regulations support the full participation of

women. All science research funding agencies should provide workshops on and expand research support for gender bias, collect,

store, and publish composite information for all funding applications and awards, provide funding opportunities for dependent care

support including attendance at work-related conferences and

meeting and interim technical or administrative support during dependent-care-related leaves of absence. The Packer Foundation and

NIAID have funded such programs that could be models for other

granting agencies. And expand support for research on the efficacy

of organizational programs designed to reduce gender bias and access and advance a funded model program.

Federal agencies should also lay out clear guidelines, leverage resources and rigorously enforce antidiscrimination laws in all institutions of higher education to increase the science and engineering

talent developed in this country.

On this point, I want to make a point as a leader of an institution that has a football team. I hear more about gender equity in

our sports programs from a combination of federal agencies and the

NCAA than I do about gender bias in the hiring and promotion of

women at the institution. And one of the recommendations that we

made here, which very much came out of my experience with

sports—Freeman, luckily, doesn’t have to worry about a football

team, right? Chess—is that we need a similar kind of organization

15

like the NCAA that holds us accountable and that has incentives

to make sure we are doing what we should be doing. I am an expert on NCAA rules. I know a lot about Title IX, but more because

of sport programs than because of educational programs, and that

is something that Congress can clearly fix.

Congress, because of the insidious ways in which bias can permeate even an environment that aspires to transparency, like the

Academy, has to direct its full attention, as this committee is, to

enforcing those antidiscrimination laws, including regular oversight

hearings to investigate the enforcement activities of the Department of Education, the EEOC, the Department of Labor, and the

science-granting agencies.

We discovered many challenges, but also promising solutions to

the problems we identified. The most significant challenge is how

deeply ingrained gender and racial biases are in our society. Too

many excellent scientists and engineers opt out because of what

they perceive as a hostile climate for women in hiring, tenure, promotion, and compensation. But ongoing efforts to identify and examine biases have begun to change recruitment, hiring, and retention processes at many universities, and they show a great deal of

promise.

Let me give you some examples: in 2006, NSF, NIH, and DOD

hauled in 60 department chairs of chemistry department, and

worked with them to identify strategies that chemistry departments, universities and federal agencies could implement to encourage and enable broader participation of women in academic research careers. We recommended that NIH, DOE, and NSF do that

in other disciplines. That is a pretty simple, straightforward process: bring in the department chairs and talk to them about what

the research shows and what they might do to transform their own

department. An NSF advanced funded program at the University

of Wisconsin Madison provides onsite workshops for department

chairs and search committee chairs. And an uncommonly effective

model which I developed as the Chancellor of the University of

Wisconsin at Madison is the Women in Science and Engineering

Leadership Institute, a centralized, highly visible, administrative

structure to address a number of impediments to women’s academic achievement. It is endorsed by top-level administrators, and

it uses the UW Madison as a living laboratory to study the problem

and implement solutions.

For me as President of the University of Miami, my strategy is

to do everything you can think of because we don’t know one program is affected. They call me Boom-Boom because I believe in

using strategy that anyone has successfully used to try to do something.

Last year, our faculty committee on women and minorities produced a report on diversity and tenure-tracked faulty, focusing exclusively on the areas of science, technology, engineering, math,

and medicine. We did, recently, hire an associate dean for faculty

diversity, which will work with the Provost, focused on our medical

school in particular. We have a bridging program. We have a postdoc funding program. We run workshops for our search committees

as well as for our faculty. We are focused, not just on gender, but

also on race, and our workload relief program provides release from

16

teaching responsibilities for primary caregivers after the birth or

the adoption of a child and for a one-year extension of their tenure

clocks.

We can’t afford to operate the old ways. I was once in Japan, recently, actually, and they kept saying to me what are you going to

do to really be competitive with the rest of the world, and my answer was we are going to do something the rest of them are not

going to do. We are going to use all of our talent. The only way

the U.S.A. can be competitive, we have to reach women and minorities. We have to use all of our talent to be competitive.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

[The prepared statement of Dr. Shalala follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF DONNA E. SHALALA

Chairman Baird, Ranking Member Ehlers, and Members of the Subcommittee,

thank you for the opportunity to testify on the Report of the National Academies:

Beyond Bias and Barriers: Fulfilling the Potential of Women in Academic Science

and Engineering. The report finds that while the United States clearly must take

steps to maintain its scientific and engineering leadership in a climate of increasing

economic and educational globalization, it cannot take advantage of all of its human

capital, because women face significant barriers in every field of science and engineering.

This crisis clearly calls for a transformation of academic institutions. That requires action by educational leaders and also the support of federal funding agencies

and foundations, governmental agencies, and Congress.

We must remove the obstacles that are holding women back in science and engineering fields. Eliminating gender bias in universities will require immediate, overarching reform and decisive action by university administrators, professional societies, government agencies, and Congress. Nothing less than a coordinated effort

across public, private, and governmental sectors will achieve the reforms necessary

for America to retain its competitiveness on the global stage.

Findings

The report finds that:

• Women have the ability and drive to succeed in science and engineering

• Women who are interested in science and engineering careers are lost at

every educational transition

• The problem is not simply that loss through the pipeline, because in the rank

of full professor at the top research institutions women on average hold less

than 15 percent of tenured faculty positions in the social, behavioral, and life

sciences, and dramatically less than that in the all other fields of science and

engineering

• Women are very likely to face discrimination in every field of science and engineering

• A substantial body of evidence establishes that most people—both men and

women—hold implicit biases

• Evaluation criteria contain arbitrary and subjective components that disadvantage women because women faculty are paid less, promoted more slowly, receive fewer honors, and hold fewer leadership positions than men, and

these discrepancies aren’t based on any of the standard measures of performance

• Academic organizational structures and rules contribute significantly to the

under-use of women in academic science and engineering

• The consequences of not acting will be detrimental to the Nation’s competitiveness

Recommendations

The report’s recommendations to federal funding agencies and foundations, to federal agencies, and to Congress are as follows:

Federal funding agencies and foundations should counter these biases and begin to

make full use of our full talent pool in this critical area, by making sure that all

17

rules and regulations support the full participation of women. All science research

funding agencies should:

• Provide workshops on, and expand research support for, gender bias

• Collect, store, and publish composite information for all funding applications

and awards

• Provide funding opportunities for dependent care support—including attendance at work-related conferences and meetings, and interim technical or administrative support during dependent care related leave of absence—the

Packard Foundation and NIAID have funded such programs that could be

models for other granting agencies

• Expand support for research on efficacy of organizational programs designed

to reduce gender bias. NSF and ADVANCE have funded model programs.

Federal agencies should lay out clear guidelines, leverage resources, and rigorously

enforce existing anti-discrimination laws in all institutions of higher education to increase the science and engineering talent developed in this country.

Congress, because of the insidious ways in which bias can permeate even an environment that aspires to transparency, like the academy, must direct its full attention to enforcing anti-discrimination laws, including regular oversight hearings to

investigate the enforcement activities of the Department of Education, the EEOC,

the Department of Labor, and the science granting agencies.

Challenges and Solutions

In preparing this report we discovered many challenges, but also, promising solutions to the problems of achieving gender equity in academic science and engineering. The most significant challenge is how deeply ingrained gender and racial biases

are in, and part of the fabric of, our society. People—both men and women—for the

most part intend to be fair, but act on unexamined biases when evaluating others.

Many excellent scientists and engineers are opting out of the academic career path

because of the perceived hostile climate for women—in hiring, tenure, promotion,

and compensation—particularly those who wish to combine family or community

service with research and teaching. We are losing too many who could contribute

to the Nation’s science and engineering enterprise, and who could increase our

chances of maintaining our position as a global leader in these critical areas.

But the landscape also includes some promising solutions. Ongoing efforts to identify and examine biases have begun to change recruitment, hiring, and retention

processes at universities. One example is a 2006 meeting, http://

www.chem.harvard.edu/groups/friend/GenderEquityWorkshop/, co-sponsored by

NIH, DOE, and NSF, during which 60 chairs of chemistry departments were

brought together for a two-day session to identify strategies that chemistry departments, universities, and federal agencies could implement to encourage and enable

broader participation of women in academic research careers. The session covered

demographics of the training ‘‘pipeline,’’ research on biases that affect recruitment

and hiring, and development action items. An NSF ADVANCE-funded program at

the University of Wisconsin, Madison, provides on-site workshops for department

chairs, http://wiseli.engr.wisc.edu/, and search committee chairs. These three-session workshops provide chairs an opportunity to explore the climate in their department, identify key issues, develop action plans, and discuss the impact of changes

they have made. These examples are models that can be adopted across the country.

Another uncommonly effective model, developed when I was Chancellor of the

University of Wisconsin, the Women in Science and Engineering Leadership Institute (WISELI), http://wiseli.engr.wisc.edu/, is a centralized, visible administrative

structure with a mission to address a number of impediments to women’s academic

advancement.

• The center structure of WISELI allows the institute to bring the issues of

women scientists and engineers from obscurity to visibility

• It provides an effective and legitimate means of networking women faculty

across departments, decreasing isolation, advocating for and mentoring

women faculty, and linking women postdoctoral fellows in predominantly

male environments with a variety of women faculty

• WISELI’s long-term goal is to have the gender of the faculty, chairs, and

deans reflect the gender of the student body

• To accomplish these goals, WISELI will be a visible, campus-wide entity, endorsed by top-level administrators, which will use UW–Madison as a ‘‘living

laboratory’’ to study the problem and implement solutions.

18

A Case in Point: The University of Miami

For me, as President of the University of Miami, the problem is very close to

home. Leadership on this issue must begin at the top, but it can’t be simply legislation from the top. It requires buy-in and accountability at every link in the chain

of command. Within the past two years at the University of Miami, I have put in

place an almost completely new senior leadership and decanal team, and we have

made one of our very top priorities the task of addressing the issues of gender (and

other) biases, and redressing inequities, in recruitment, hiring, promotion, retention,

and compensation.

Our report provides a Scorecard that allows universities to track and evaluate

their progress on these issues, and the University of Miami’s is included in my written statement. It is a humbling experience indeed to complete one of these scorecards, even in a place in which there is the commitment and leadership we have

in place here, but our completed scorecard is helping us as we move forward on

these issues. Our strategies and programs to address the issues include the following:

• Last year, our Faculty Senate’s Committee on Women and Minorities, produced a report on diversity and equity in the tenured and tenure-track faculty, by job class and gender in all the schools and divisions. We focused explicitly on the areas of science, technology, engineering, math, and medicine.

• We hired an Associate Dean for Faculty Diversity and Development for our

Miller School of Medicine, who also will work with the Provost and me on university-wide programs and assessment.

• We developed a Bridging Program through which the Provost’s office provides

funding between the period of an opportunity/diversity hire, and the time that

a tenure line opens within a department.

• Our Post Doc Funding Program is designed to identify promising new women

and minority Ph.D. graduates who are prospective faculty hires, but not as

accomplished in their research agenda as we would like. The participants are

hired with the expectation that following the postdoc year—during which they

will receive research and mentoring support and augment their scholarly profiles—they will enter a tenure-track position.

• Salary equity issues are being addressed directly by the Provost, who for two

years has been working directly with the deans to first systematically identify

inequities, and then to work with the Provost to address them.

• Our Workload Relief Program provides for a release from teaching responsibilities for up to one semester following a birth or adoption for faculty members who are the primary caregiver for the child, and they also are eligible

for a one-year extension of their tenure clocks.

• The Provost has instituted a workshop for deans and associate deans to discuss in depth the university’s performance in the area of recruitment and retention of women and minority faculty, and of the need to focus on and improve in this area. This renewed focus has yielded tangible results.

Conclusion

We can no longer afford to operate according to the old status quo. If the United

States truly wants to maintain its lead in the global scientific and engineering marketplace, then policies must be geared to attracting and retaining the best and

brightest—regardless of whether they are male or female.

The fact that women are capable of contributing to the Nation’s scientific and engineering enterprise, but are impeded from doing so because of gender and racial/

ethnic bias and outmoded ‘‘rules’’ governing academic success is deeply troubling

and embarrassing. It also must be a call to action. All of us—faculty, university

leaders, professional and scientific societies, federal agencies and the Federal Government—must unite to ensure that all our nation’s people are welcomed and encouraged to excel in science and engineering in our research universities. Our nation’s future depends on it.

Working Data for University of Miami Scorecard

D1—Formal Mentoring Programs for:

• Undergraduates—no

• Graduate Students—no

• Postdoctoral Scholars—no

• Pre-tenure Faculty—no

19

• Tenured Faculty—no

D2—Provide management training or workshops with an integrated component that

addresses gender, and ethnic and racial equity for:

• Undergraduates—no; informal through student groups

• Graduate Students—no

• Postdoctoral Scholars—no

• Pre-tenure Faculty—no

• Tenured Faculty—no

• Department Chairs—yes

• Search Committee Chairs—no

• At our most recent academic leadership workshop the Provost spoke at length

with supporting data on the university’s performance in the area of recruitment and retention of women and minority faculty, and of the need to focus

on this area.

D3—Is there a university-wide grievance policy?—No, but we have separate policies

that deal with faculty, students and staff.

D4—Does the grievance policy apply to:

• Undergraduates—yes, please see:

http://www6.miami.edu/umbulletin/info/serv/ombuds.htm

• Graduate Students—yes, please see:

http://www6.miami.edu/umbulletin/info/serv/ombuds.htm

• Postdoctoral Scholars—yes, please see:

http://www6.miami.edu/UMH/CDA/UMH¥Main/

1,1770,13610-1;14550-3,00.html

• Pre-tenure Faculty—yes, please see Section B4.10:

https://www6.miami.edu/faculty-senate/FACULTYMANUAL07-08/

FacultyManualFall2007-08.doc

• Tenured Faculty—yes, please see Section B4.10:

https://www6.miami.edu/faculty-senate/FACULTYMANUAL07-08/

FacultyManualFall2007-08.doc

D5—Is there an office or person designated to grievances?—Yes; Vice Provost for

Faculty Affairs.

D6—To whom/what are sexual harassment cases brought? Vice Provost for Faculty

Affairs.

D7—What percentage of sexual harassment cases were forwarded for action? 100

percent.

D8—Does the university have a central, written policy and budget to allow parttime appointments for faculty:

• Tenure-track—no

• Tenured—no

D9—Does the university have a university-wide written policy and budget to allow

temporary relief from teaching or other modifications of duties with no reduction in

pay for faculty:

• Family care—yes, please see Section C17.7:

https://www6.miami.edu/faculty-senate/FACULTYMANUAL07-08/

FacultyManualFall2007-08.doc

• Personal disability—no written policy; handled collegially

D10—Does the university have university-wide written policies providing full or

partial replacement pay:

• For new biological mothers during leaves for disability related to pregnancy

and childbirth during the academic year—yes, please see Section C17.7:

https://www6.miami.edu/faculty-senate/FACULTYMANUAL07-08/

FacultyManualFall2007-08.doc

• For adoptive mothers—yes, please see Section C17.7:

20

https://www6.miami.edu/faculty-senate/FACULTYMANUAL07-08/

FacultyManualFall2007-08.doc

• For biological fathers—yes, please see Section C17.7:

https://www6.miami.edu/faculty-senate/FACULTYMANUAL07-08/

FacultyManualFall2007-08.doc

• For adoptive fathers—yes, please see Section C17.7:

https://www6.miami.edu/faculty-senate/FACULTYMANUAL07-08/

FacultyManualFall2007-08.doc

• For unmarried partners—yes, please see Section C17.7:

https://www6.miami.edu/faculty-senate/FACULTYMANUAL07-08/

FacultyManualFall2007-08.doc

D11—Does the university have a formal pregnancy leave policy for:

• Undergraduates—no

• Graduate Students—no

• Postdoctoral Scholars—yes, please see:

http://www6.miami.edu/UMH/CDA/UMH¥Main/

1,1770,13610-1;14652-3,00.html

• Pre-tenure Faculty—yes, please see Section C17.7:

https://www6.miami.edu/faculty-senate/FACULTYMANUAL07-08/

FacultyManualFall2007-08.doc

• Tenured Faculty—yes, please see Section C17.7:

https://www6.miami.edu/faculty-senate/FACULTYMANUAL07-08/

FacultyManualFall2007-08.doc

Donna E. Shalala, President of the University of Miami and former Secretary of

Health in the Clinton Administration, chaired a committee of the National Academies that wrote the 2007 report Beyond Bias and Barriers: Fulfilling the Potential

of Women in Academic Science and Engineering. The report is available on-line at

http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record¥id=11741

BIOGRAPHY FOR DONNA E. SHALALA

Donna E. Shalala became Professor of Political Science and President of the University of Miami on June 1, 2001. President Shalala has more than 25 years of experience as an accomplished scholar, teacher, and administrator.

Born in Cleveland, Ohio, President Shalala received her A.B. degree in history

from Western College for Women and her Ph.D. degree from The Maxwell School

of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University. A leading scholar on the

political economy of State and local governments, she has also held tenured professorships at Columbia University, the City University of New York (CUNY), and the

University of Wisconsin–Madison. She served as President of Hunter College of

CUNY from 1980 to 1987 and as Chancellor of the University of Wisconsin–Madison

from 1987 to 1993.

In 1993 President Clinton appointed her U.S. Secretary of Health and Human

Services (HHS) where she served for eight years, becoming the longest serving HHS

Secretary in U.S. history. At the beginning of her tenure, HHS had a budget of

nearly $600 billion, which included a wide variety of programs including Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Child Care and Head Start, Welfare, the Public Health

Service, the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Centers for Disease Control

and Prevention (CDC), and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). One of the

country’s first Peace Corp volunteers, she served in Iran from 1962 to 1964.

As HHS Secretary, she directed the welfare reform process, made health insurance available to an estimated 3.3 million children through the approval of all State

Children’s Health Insurance Programs (SCHIP), raised child immunization rates to

the highest levels in history, led major reforms of the FDA’s drug approval process

and food safety system, revitalized the National Institutes of Health, and directed

a major management and policy reform of Medicare. At the end of her tenure as

HHS Secretary, The Washington Post described her as ‘‘one of the most successful

government managers of modern times.’’ In 2007, President George W. Bush handpicked Shalala to co-chair with Senator Bob Dole the Commission on Care for Returning Wounded Warriors, to evaluate how wounded service members transition

from active duty to civilian society.

21

As Chancellor of the University of Wisconsin–Madison, she led what was then the

Nation’s largest public research university. She successfully strengthened undergraduate education, the university’s research facilities, and spearheaded the largest

fund-raising drive in Wisconsin’s history. In 1992, Business Week named her one of

the top five managers in higher education.

She served in the Carter Administration as Assistant Secretary for Public Development and Research at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

In 1980, she assumed the presidency of Hunter College of the City University of

New York.

She is a Director of Gannett Co., Inc., UnitedHealth Group, Inc., and the Lennar

Corporation. She also serves as a Trustee of the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation.

President Shalala has more than three dozen honorary degrees and a host of

other honors, including the 1992 National Public Service Award, the 1994 Glamour

magazine Woman of the Year Award, and in 2005 was named one of ‘‘America’s

Best Leaders’’ by U.S. News & World Report and the Center for Public Leadership

at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government. She has been elected to the

Council on Foreign Relations; National Academy of Education; the National Academy of Public Administration; the American Academy of Arts and Sciences; the National Academy of Social Insurance; the American Academy of Political and Social

Science; and the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences.

Chairman BAIRD. Thank you. Dr. Olsen.

STATEMENT OF DR. KATHIE L. OLSEN, DEPUTY DIRECTOR,

NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION

Dr. OLSEN. Thank you, Chairman Baird, Ranking Member

Ehlers, and Members of the Subcommittee. Thank you.

We need the strength of our nation’s full diversity in our science

engineering and technological workforce, and as Dr. Shalala said,

it is vital to our nation’s continuing prosperity. There is no longer

an issue of debate or lengthy discussion. Simply put, it is critical

for all of us.

I would like to begin with a little story on how I ended up at the

National Science Foundation, an agency where inclusiveness is at

the very core of our vision and our mission. In 1986, I was a traditional faculty member, and I was writing an invited chapter for a

very important publication. That was in the days when most of us

only had DOT matrix printers—and I don’t know if you remember

that. But the secretary had the one and only crisp, laser printer

that could produce a polished manuscript. So my department chair

walked in when she and I were working on my manuscript, and he

asked me poignantly, can’t you type in front of the whole department. Now, I want to know how many men have been asked that

question. Well, I can type, and I laughed it off, but what I did is

I went in and typed a letter and printed it out on my DOT matrix

printer, to the National Science Foundation, where I had spent

time as a visiting scientist. They had recently asked me to consider

returning permanently, and I knew that my contributions were valued there. So I used, as I said, my DOT matrix printer to print a

letter to send to NSF, and I subsequently moved to Washington.

I want you to know that I have never forgotten that incident—

obviously, I am telling it. I am proud of the work the National

Science Foundation has done to improve the environment in

science and engineering for the entire women of today and tomorrow and grateful for the opportunity that I have had to contribute.

I am particularly proud that NSF is an example of the principles

that we advocate. NSF has numerous senior women in scientific

and administrative roles, serving on our advisory committees, our

22

committee of visitors, as reviewers and as principal investigators

on our major grants. We take the advice of our committee on equal

opportunities in science and engineering, very seriously CEOSE—

Dr. Bement and I just spent an hour with them today. We are constantly improving in order to stay in the forefront of inclusive management.

All of our managers and supervisors are trained in and are held

accountable for good diversity management, and our newly instituted ongoing merit-review training for program officers will include discussion of implicit bias, based on your report, both its potential impact on the review processes they shepherd, but also on

their own decision-making.

I am also very proud of ADVANCE, NSF’s premier funding program, aspiring to improve the climate for women in science and engineering enterprise. From its inception in 2001, ADVANCE funding has gone to 58 institutions of higher education, all different

types of sizes and institutions in 36 states, the District of Columbia

and Puerto Rico. We know that what works in one institution or

in one place may not work for all. Therefore, we have been careful

to diversify these initial grants to ensure that, in total, the lessons

learned will have broad applicability.

The idea behind ADVANCE is simple: sweeping intuitional

transformation is the best hope for creating truly women-friendly

environments in science and engineering. Like sleeping giants and

like my former chair and my friend, entire campuses have been

dozing on this issue. Funding targeted at individuals within institutions simply didn’t go far enough. We learned that from our earlier programs like the research opportunities for women and career

advancement awards. We realized that what needed was full institution-wide shakeup to bring about concrete changes. Already, ADVANCE results are measured in an increased number of female

faculty hires, advancement towards salary parity and other tangible progress, as you can see from my testimony.

The new ADVANCE partnership for adaptation implementation

and dissemination, PAID, was initiated in response to our community’s identification of the growing need for the broad distribution

of ADVANCE knowledge, strategies and results. PAID insures that

ADVANCE successes can be duplicated across the country.

In fashioning welcoming environments for women in science and

engineering, we are also fostering a better environment for other,

under-represented groups and for men as well. Ultimately, our goal

is to transform institution by institution, the entire culture of

science and engineering in America and to be inclusive of all for

the good of all.

Mr. Chairman, again, thank you for inviting me here today. NSF

look forward to working with you to ensure that women continue

to become leading scientists and engineers, Nobel laureates, CEOs,

presidents of major universities, cabinet secretaries, and even

Members of Congress. Our nation’s future depends upon it.

And I just want to add, I can type, and now I am about 60 words

per minute. I think it was a little faster when I was younger. And

I will be happy to answer all of your questions. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Dr. Olsen follows:]

23

PREPARED STATEMENT OF KATHIE L. OLSEN

Chairman Baird, Ranking Member Ehlers, and distinguished Members of the

Subcommittee, thank you for the invitation to testify on the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) role in advancing women’s participation in academic science and engineering. The NSF considers this topic central for the continued vitality of the Nation’s scientific enterprise.

The focus on women in science and engineering constitutes a longstanding and

important component of NSF’s strategic investment portfolio. A high priority within

that portfolio is broadening participation of groups under-represented in science and

engineering, namely, women, minorities, and persons with disabilities. Thus, some

of the many NSF programs aimed at broadening participation in S&E focus specifically on women. These programs address the Learning goal in the NSF FY 2006–

2011 Strategic Plan, Investing in America’s Future: to cultivate a world-class, broadly inclusive science and engineering workforce, and to expand the scientific literacy

of all citizens.

Increasing the number of women at all levels of the science and engineering academic workforce offers many benefits, including new and diversified perspectives to

drive scientific research, as well as mentors and role models for undergraduate and

graduate students that better represent the makeup of the student body. At the National Science Foundation, we are confident we can make an impact at the faculty

workforce level because there is no shortage of scientific talent; women are earning

doctorates in science and engineering in increasing numbers, but are currently less

likely than their male peers to enter tenure track academic positions. For example,

women have earned 23 percent of the doctoral degrees in the physical sciences since

1997, yet held only 14 percent of academic physical science faculty positions in 2003.

1. Describe what NSF through ADVANCE IT has learned about the biggest

challenges and most promising solutions to achieving gender equity in

faculty recruitment, retention, and general climate in science and engineering fields.

The most significant challenges to achieving gender equity in academic science

and engineering include:

• The continuing importance of well-established networks from which women

have been excluded historically

• The impact of implicit bias

• The feeling of isolation when there are only a few women in equivalent positions within academic Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics

(STEM) settings

• Unclear hiring, tenure, and promotion policies

• The ‘‘two-body problem,’’ which arises from the finding that women scientists

and engineers are more likely than their male colleagues to have partners

who are also scientists and engineers.

Traditional networking routes used for faculty recruiting can hinder increasing

the representation of women professors in STEM fields. Many faculty and academic

leaders chairing search committees come from male-dominated educational and professional experiences; when they turn to their informal networks to recruit faculty

talent, they tend to create disproportionately male applicant pools. Further, when

the perception exists that qualified women are very rare, it is often assumed that

a woman candidate will not accept an offer—and so an offer is not made.

Implicit bias in recruitment and reappointment committees also creates a challenge to improving the representation of women in STEM faculty positions, where

committee members are not aware of their misperception of the achievements and

potential of women candidates and colleagues. Greater service obligations placed on

women faculty, such as disproportionate participation on department committees

and undergraduate advising loads, are quite common. This is particularly likely for

a department eager to make its gender diversity visible. Participation in these activities detracts from time available for research activities, and colleagues frequently see performance of service obligations as an indicator of a weak commitment to scholarship.

Isolation is also a barrier to women. Studies have shown that informal mentoring,

which many departments rely on to assist junior faculty, is offered less often to

women than to men. In addition, fewer opportunities are presented for the informal

socializing that leads to important academic information sharing and the building

of collaborations.

24

Many academic institutions do not have clear personnel policies and practices. In

these situations, information is often circulated through informal networks, and

thus is less accessible to faculty who are not a part of the informal communication

loop. This lack of clear, inclusive communication not only leads to misinformation

about policies and procedures, but also to confusion and a greater feeling of isolation. Unclear personnel policies can ultimately lead to mistaken career decisions,

low morale, and inequitable treatment by decision-makers who are themselves unclear or misinformed about the policies.

There are significant barriers to the recruitment rates of women faculty in STEM

fields that can continue to be barriers to retention, once they have been hired, which

makes addressing these barriers doubly important. For instance, there is a greater

likelihood that a woman will have a partner in an academic STEM field, and women

continue to have greater responsibility for dependent care than do men. These realities make finding spousal employment and quality dependent care arrangements

more crucial to the recruitment of new women faculty, as well as to the retention

of women whose family situations change. When competing for promising candidates

or for the retention of faculty members, industrial employment opportunities may

offer significantly improved possibilities than academia for women’s spousal placement and/or dependent care arrangements.

Potential solutions to these and other challenges have been developed by awardees of NSF’s ADVANCE-Institutional Transformation Program, which began in

2001. Institutional transformation occurs through a top down, bottom up approach:

when a committed senior leadership establishes policies that enhance the recruitment and retention of women and an institutional commitment to diversity, in cooperation with the individual members of the institution who initiate and incorporate change in their daily practice. The ADVANCE program will begin a multiyear program-level evaluation in 2008 in order to document the efficacy of the

project level solutions that have been developed and implemented at the ADVANCE

grantee sites. We know anecdotally that peer institutions, that have not received

funding from ADVANCE, have adopted many of the solutions developed by ADVANCE Institutional Transformation grantees and we expect the program level

evaluation will demonstrate this to be true.

ADVANCE awardees have become national leaders in the development of training

experiences for department chairs, deans, recruitment committees, and tenure and

promotion committees. Evidence indicates that awareness of research findings on

implicit bias (one common focus of such trainings) has a significant impact on an

individual’s future decision-making. For example, those that evaluate faculty and

write letters of reference for students become more cognizant of the impact of using

gendered language (excitable vs. passionate) to describe an individual and their academic potential. Other initiatives focus on the development of mentoring programs,

with training for people on both sides of the mentoring relationship.

Institutional changes have occurred with policies that ensure more thorough development of candidate pools, review of national information on the availability of

candidates from diverse groups, and procedures that build in the use of effective approaches to successful recruitment. Many examples can be found by browsing individual awardee websites (http://www.nsf.gov/crssprgm/advance/itwebsites.jsp). In

the case of ADVANCE at Hunter College in New York, women accounted for only

27 percent of new hires in the natural sciences before the Gender Equity Project,

but from 2003 to 2006, after significant institutional change, women accounted for

61 percent of new hires.

Policy changes aimed specifically at work-family challenges include: allowing or

automatically initiating a tenure-clock stop for faculty with new children or other

emergent family obligations such as elder care. For example, Virginia Tech, a recipient of an ADVANCE grant, recently initiated part-time tenure track positions to

better suit the long-term work-family arrangements of some faculty. Columbia University, another ADVANCE institution, is offering small grants to faculty for the additional child care costs that arise when traveling to professional meetings.

2. What is NSF doing to broadly disseminate and encourage best practices

identified through ADVANCE?

In order to disseminate information, we employ two main strategies: the strategic

design of the ADVANCE program itself, and the NSF’s leadership role in the scientific community.

The ADVANCE program has evolved from its start in 2001. Our approach is to

build upon what we have learned about institutional transformation and increased

participation of women in academic STEM careers. Proposals for new institutional

transformation grants are required to incorporate lessons learned from current ADVANCE grantees as well as relevant social science research. This ensures that new

25

grantees do not use time and resources reinventing the basics of institutional transformation. Instead, they build on what has been learned and use that to further innovate, contributing to our increased understanding of institutional change.

It is important to recognize that best practices and effective policies will differ depending on the type of institution. One of the great strengths of ADVANCE is that

we have institutional transformation grants in a wide diversity of institutions, from

public to private, small to large, primarily undergraduate to research intensive, and

different levels of selectivity. To further our goal of greater dissemination of successful strategies from this wide variety of institutions, we established the Partnerships

for Adaptation, Implementation and Dissemination (PAID) component of ADVANCE

in 2006. Some PAID awardees are disseminating best practices through regional or

national training. For example, the University of Wisconsin ADVANCE–PAID program provides training for teams from colleges and universities on ways to increase

the hiring of women into STEM faculty positions. The University of Washington’s

ADVANCE–PAID provides leadership training workshops for STEM department

chairs to improve their departmental climate. The workshops integrate issues of diversity throughout the meeting instead of holding a separate session on gender and

minority issues. This ensures that diversity becomes an integral part of the everyday management and decision-making process.

ADVANCE Institutional Transformation awardees have developed a rich variety

of materials that are available through their websites and the ADVANCE–IT web

portal. For example, the ‘‘ADEPT’’ website at Georgia Tech is designed to train individual promotion and tenure committee members by utilizing an interactive training

experience about the implicit biases that often interfere with gender equitable decision-making.

In addition, both PAID and IT awardees disseminate best practices at disciplinary

conferences and at conferences for college and university leaders. Some PAID

awards support groups of women in a particular STEM discipline nationally or within a region. PAID awardees disseminate best practices (such as effective mentoring)

through meetings held concurrently with larger disciplinary conferences, and

through the development of web-based alliances.

For the research communities that look to NSF and other federal agencies to support their work: along with the National Institutes of Health and the

Department of Energy, we have co-sponsored a national workshop focused on gender

equity for the department chairs of fifty major chemistry departments and another

for the department chairs of fifty major physics departments.

At the request of the NSF Division of Chemistry, the University of Michigan ADVANCE IT grantee developed a brief training about implicit bias. The Chemistry

Division at NSF has received training on this topic and it is now implemented at

all Chemistry Division ‘‘panels’’ (groups of experts who meet together to review and

make funding recommendations for proposals in their field). Through this effort in

the Chemistry Division, hundreds of peer reviewers will be trained each year and

will return to their home institutions with a new understanding of the ways that

implicit bias diminishes equity in decision-making. Dissemination to other units in

NSF is underway, including mandatory program officer training on implicit bias

during the merit review process.

3. In addition to activities already described, what else can NSF and other

agencies do to promote a more favorable environment for women in academic science and engineering fields?

Commitment to this goal must be reflected broadly across the organization and

at every level within the organization. At NSF, the commitment to workplace diversity and enhancing opportunities for women and other under-represented minorities

in STEM fields is prominently reflected in both our Strategic Plan and in our practice. In the senior leadership, besides myself, there are two female Assistant Directors, and the agency Inspector General is also a woman. We make it a priority to

ensure that women are well represented at all levels throughout the scientific and

support staff, on our advisory committees, our committees of visitors, and among

our reviewers. To further focus attention on this important subject, our Committee

on Equal Opportunities in Science and Engineering (CEOSE) advises us on how well

we are doing and where we could do better.

The Science and Technology Equal Opportunities Act of 1980 authorizes the NSF

to make awards to encourage the education, employment, and training of women in

science and technology. This testimony discusses several such awards, including, of

course, the entire ADVANCE program. Additionally, I want to emphasize that in all

our grants policies and practices, NSF is committed to the fair inclusion of women,

and indeed, has been successful in maintaining a high standard. The 2005 Rand

26

study ‘‘Gender Differences in Major External Federal Grant Programs’’ found that,

at NSF, there were no gender differences in the amount of grant funding requested

or awarded. Additionally, our recent internal study on the Impact of Proposal and

Award Management Mechanisms found that women and minorities have also not

suffered disproportionately in the recent overall reductions in proposal funding rate.

Within the Foundation, both the Biology and the Social and Behavioral Sciences Directorates have implemented practices to ensure women’s participation in numbers

appropriate to their representation in the field in all conferences, meetings, workshops, and international congresses for which those directorates provides funds.

Part of NSF’s role as a leader in the scientific community is the communication

of the importance of broadening the participation of women and other under-represented groups such as minorities and persons with disabilities in the science and

engineering enterprise. Internally, this is communicated on an on-going basis

through training opportunities and seminars. NSF has recently instituted a new requirement for on-going training in merit review for program officers. One goal of

this training will be to ensure that the peer review process is free from the influence

of implicit bias and to ensure agency staff are aware of the potential impact of implicit bias in their own decision-making. An example of how NSF leads the external

community can be found in the most recent solicitation for chemistry-related instrumentation acquisitions, which requires a departmental plan for broadening participation as an addendum to each proposal. This demonstrates to the scientific community that NSF takes diversity seriously.

Finally, because of the global nature of the scientific enterprise and the growing

importance of international scientific collaboration we see an international leadership role for NSF based on what has come from the ADVANCE IT sites. Dr. Bement

and I, together with the Assistant Directors and leaders from the Directorate for

Education and Human Resources have been actively participating in international

meetings, bringing the lessons learned at NSF and from ADVANCE grantees to a

global audience. We believe that NSF’s international role in women’s increased participation in academic science and engineering is in its early stages; we envision it

expanding significantly through continued institutional commitment at NSF and

through the ADVANCE Program.

Conclusion

Mr. Chairman, thank you again for the opportunity to testify before you today on

this extremely important topic.

As you are well aware, NSF research and education efforts contribute to the Nation’s innovation economy and help keep America at the forefront of science and engineering. At the same time, NSF supported researchers produce leading edge discoveries that can serve society and spark the public’s curiosity and interest. Discoveries coming from dozens of NSF programs and initiatives are enriching the entire

science and engineering enterprise, and making education fun, exciting and achievement-oriented.

NSF is committed to cultivating a science and engineering enterprise that not

only unlocks the mysteries of the universe, but that also addresses the challenges

of America and the world. To echo the findings of the NAS Beyond Bias and Barriers report, our nation cannot afford to neglect the lack of women in STEM careers.

In order to preserve our competitive edge, we are firmly committed to aggressively

pursuing and offering opportunities for everyone within the STEM enterprise—

women and men.

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee, I hope that this brief overview

conveys to you the extent of NSF’s commitment to advancing science and technology

in the national interest. I look forward to continue working with you, and would be

happy to respond to any questions that you have.

BIOGRAPHY FOR KATHIE L. OLSEN

Dr. Kathie L. Olsen became Deputy Director of the National Science Foundation

(NSF) in August 2005.

She joined NSF from the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) in the

Executive Office of the President, where she was the Associate Director and Deputy

Director for Science and responsible for overseeing science and education policy including physical sciences, life sciences, environmental science, and behavioral and

social sciences.

Prior to the OSTP post, she served as the Chief Scientist at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) (May 1999–April 2002) and the Acting

Associate Administrator for the new Enterprise in Biological and Physical Research

(July 2000–March 2002). As NASA Chief Scientist, she served not only as the AdVerDate 11-MAY-2000 15:09 Feb 06, 2008 Jkt 038258 PO 00000 Frm 00030 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 C:\WORKD\R&SE07\101707\38258 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
27

ministrator’s senior scientific advisor and principal interface with the national and

international scientific community but also was the principal advisor to the Administrator on budget content of the scientific programs.

Before joining NASA in May 1999, Dr. Olsen was the Senior Staff Associate for

the Science and Technology Centers in the NSF Office of Integrative Activities.

From February 1996 until November 1997, she was a Brookings Institute Legislative Fellow and then an NSF detail in the Office of Senator Conrad Burns of Montana. Preceding her work on Capitol Hill, she served for two years as Acting Deputy

Director for the Division of Integrative Biology and Neuroscience at the NSF, where

she has worked and held numerous other science-related positions.

Dr. Olsen received her B.S. with honors from Chatham College, Pittsburgh, Pa.,

majoring in both biology and psychology and was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. She

earned her Ph.D. in Neuroscience at the University of California, Irvine. She was

a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Neuroscience at Children’s Hospital of

Harvard Medical School. Subsequently at SUNY–Stony Brook she was both a Research Scientist at Long Island Research Institute and Assistant Professor in the

Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science at the Medical School. Her research on neural and genetic mechanisms underlying development and expression

of behavior was supported by the National Institutes of Health.

Her awards include the NSF Director’s Superior Accomplishment Award; the

International Behavioral Neuroscience Society Award; the Society for Behavioral

Neuroendocrinology Award for outstanding contributions in research and education;

the Barry M. Goldwater Educator Award from the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics–National Capital Section; the Barnard Medal of Distinction, which is the college’s most significant recognition of individuals for demonstrated excellence in conduct of their lives and careers; and the NASA’s Outstanding Leadership Medal. She has also received honorary degrees from Chatham

College, Clarkson University, and University of South Carolina.

Chairman BAIRD. I think 60 words a minute is faster than my

old DOT matrix printer used to print.

Dr. Hrabowski.

STATEMENT OF DR. FREEMAN A. HRABOWSKI, III, PRESIDENT,

UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND, BALTIMORE COUNTY

Dr. HRABOWSKI. I should start by saying, as I look at the quote

‘‘where there is no vision, the people perish,’’ my own vision is to

see an African American one day at the Nobel laureate level in

science, an African American woman.

The most important point I can make today, as I am PI, is that

the under-representation is not a women’s issue. It is an American

issue. Just as we have been able to make substantial progress on

our campus, the fact is that it is not a minority issue that we are

talking about.

As I talk, I want you to think about this parallelism between

what happens with women and what happens with minorities, and

what we have learned is that the success we have had in producing

minorities in science has been a great foundation for producing——

Chairman BAIRD. Your microphone.

Dr. HRABOWSKI. Sorry.

Chairman BAIRD. You speak so eloquently and loudly, we didn’t

even notice.

Dr. HRABOWSKI. Big mouth. I come from Birmingham. We do

that. The fact is that, as I think about it, the truth of the matter

is that our successes come because we look at institutional change,

first, from the perspective of the performance of African Americans

28

1 Appended for the record by Dr. Freeman Hrabowski, III. ‘‘UMBC is recognized as the Nation’s leading predominantly white university for producing African American undergraduates

who go on to earn Ph.D.s in science and engineering.’’

on our campus in science, and we are now leading the country in

producing Blacks who go on to actually earn Ph.D.s.1

The success at the advanced level is especially significant. Let

me give you one statistic: we have had a 48-percent increase in the

number of women faculty in tenure-track positions since the beginning of the ADVANCE grant. Now, in comparison, we have had

only a four-percent increase in the male faculty size. Now, in terms

of the base, we have gone from 29 to 43 women, and for men, from

137 to 142. We know for a fact that that increase has everything

to do with practices and policies that have been changed as a result

of the NSF ADVANCE grant.

Most important, we have been working to change the culture of

the institution. Let me just give you several of the most important

points of culture change for us. Having the ability to conduct ongoing discussions with people, with chairs, with senior faculty with

deans, and with others has been very important. Most critically,

having the change to listen to the voices of those women—if you

think about what Donna Shalala said about perceptions and biases,

well, it is important to hear the voices of both men and women. To

some people’s surprise, they were very different in the way they

thought about the climate in their environment.

Interestingly enough, usually junior men though more similarly

to women. Senior men tended to say things were okay, and so the

challenge was to—and the big challenge—and we can talk about

this later—is to help the climate, to foster a climate in which people can say what they really think without being criticized or censured, to not have people thinking that because a woman talks

about family issues that she is not a serious scientist, and to think

about ways of developing policies that can help both men and

women because we don’t want backlash, which is the same issue

you face with minorities, because what have learned is things that

help minority students in science can help students, in general in

science. Many of the practices that can help junior women can help

junior men. So clarity of expectation, looking at the pathways that

are expected for those people, ongoing discussions of faculty development plan for every faculty member, women and men, something

we have done for all, family leave policy is much more flexible than

what the State had talked about. Sometimes it may be a faculty

member who has problems with a sick parent. Other cases, it may

be about a child, so you never know. So the idea is much more

flexibility there, but robust and honest discussions about the issues

without people becoming defensive. It is amazing how defensive

people can become if you can’t build that trust.

And the most important point from my perspective is thinking

about how to the get the faculty buy-in. The power rests in the

hands of white males, and I don’t say that to be negative, to be disparaging. It is a fact. The point is how we pull them into that, and

what has made the difference on our campus in terms of producing

minority scientist, in terms of increasing the number of women

going on and moving up the ladder has been just that, getting the

guys on board, having them understand that mentoring is what the

29

1Stapes, Brent, ‘‘Why American College Student Hate Science,’’ The New York Times, May

25, 2006. 2 National Science Foundation, WebCASPAR Integrated Science and Engineering Resources

Data System.

old boy network is all about. We just want everybody to have that

kind of networking possibility.

The most important thing that people can do is keep building on

these practices to give people incentives to ensure that many more

institutions look at themselves in the mirror. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Dr. Hrabowski follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF FREEMAN A. HRABOWSKI, III

UMBC as a National Model: The University as Mentor

My campus colleagues and I see the issue of advancing women and minorities in

science and engineering as an issue about which all Americans should be concerned.

Consequently, when we were considering the opportunity to apply for a National

Science Foundation (NSF) ADVANCE grant, we concluded that I should serve as

the Principal Investigator (PI) to emphasize the importance of this initiative to the

entire campus and also the importance of men becoming more knowledgeable about

the challenges women scientists and engineers face in the academy.

UMBC (the University of Maryland, Baltimore County) is recognized as a national

leader in supporting and advancing women and under-represented minority (URM)

students in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). We are a

public research university, emphasizing graduate programs in the sciences, engineering, and public policy, and building on a strong undergraduate liberal arts and

sciences core. We enroll more than 12,000 students (9,500 undergraduate and 2,500

graduate), employ approximately 550 full-time faculty, and receive $85 million in external support annually for research-and-training contracts and grants. We are distinctive because of our demonstrated record of achieving diversity and excellence,

particularly in science and engineering. It was especially gratifying when a recent

New York Times editorial recognized UMBC for ‘‘rocking the house when it comes

to the increasingly critical mission of turning American college students into scientists.’’ 1

Producing well-prepared scientists and engineers for our increasingly diverse

workforce is perhaps our most important and lasting contribution to the Nation’s

economic development and national security. Thousands of Maryland’s physicians,

scientists, engineers, information technology (IT) workers, policy-makers, and other

STEM professionals are among UMBC alumni. The National Security Agency

(NSA), for example, employs hundreds of UMBC math and computer science graduates. We rank third nationally (based on NSF data2 ) in the number of computer

science and IT degrees awarded and have been designated a Center of Academic Excellence in Information Assurance by the NSA. The campus has twice received the

U.S. Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics and Engineering

Mentoring.

UMBC has become a national model for diversity at a time when both the Nation

is focused intensely on securing and strengthening its position in the global economy, and America’s demographic profile is shifting dramatically. Our student body

is among the most diverse nationally (40 percent minority, including 21 percent

Asian, 15 percent African American, and four percent Hispanic and Native American). Particularly noteworthy are data from the American Society of Biochemistry

and Molecular Biology (ASBMB) showing that UMBC ranked first nationally in

total number of undergraduate biochemistry degrees awarded to African Americans

in 2004–2005 (18 degrees). (The ASBMB also ranked UMBC seventh nationally in

overall biochemistry degree production, with 63 degrees, and fourth nationally in

the total number of biochemistry degrees awarded to Asian Americans, with 23 degrees.) Overall, we are recognized as the Nation’s leading predominantly white university for producing African American undergraduates who go on to earn Ph.D.s

in science and engineering.

With the support of our NSF ADVANCE grant, we have used our success in producing minority scientists and engineers, particularly those involving women of

color, to develop mentoring initiatives designed to increase the participation of

women faculty in STEM fields and to advance them through the faculty ranks and

30

3 Bass, S., Rutledge, J.C., Douglass, E.R., Carter, W.Y., ‘‘The University as Mentor: Lessons

Learned from UMBC Inclusiveness Initiatives,’’ Council of Graduate Schools, 2007. 4 Nelson, D.J., Rogers, D.C., ‘‘A National Analysis of Diversity in Science and Engineering Faculties at Research Universities,’’ National Science Foundation, January, 2005.

into leadership positions. This comprehensive ‘‘university as mentor’’ 3 approach is

designed to embed focused, continuous support of women scientists at all levels—

undergraduate and graduate students and faculty throughout the ranks—into the

fabric and foundation of the university’s culture.

Framing Success for Women Faculty in STEM

The small numbers of women faculty in STEM is a long-standing national problem. A 2005 study shows that women faculty in the top 50 research universities are

under-represented at all ranks, especially as full professors. The study also reveals

that under-represented minority women ‘‘are almost non-existent in science and engineering departments at research universities’’ and are less likely than Caucasian

women, or men of any race, to be awarded tenure or reach full professor status.4

The UMBC ADVANCE Program uses a comprehensive approach based on lessons

learned in producing minority scientists to meet these challenges. Our framework

includes (1) developing, revising, and institutionalizing policies and practices, and

allocating resources, in ways that support the recruitment, hiring, and advancement

of women—including particularly minority women—for the faculty at all ranks; (2)

engaging the campus broadly in ongoing discussions, informal and formal, that address issues of racial and gender diversity in STEM fields; and (3) establishing a

system of targeted mentoring programs designed to create a clear and understandable pathway for STEM women to achieve tenure and promotion, and to transition

to academic leadership positions at the university.

Since the inception of the ADVANCE Program at UMBC, the number of female

tenure-track faculty has increased 48 percent from fall 2003 (N=29) to fall 2007

(N=43) compared to a four percent increase in male tenure-track faculty (fall 2003

N=137, fall 2007 N=142). Additionally, with the support offered through ADVANCE,

the numbers of STEM women at the assistant professor and associate professor

ranks have increased substantially—assistant professors by 58 percent (fall 2003

N=12, fall 2006 N=19); associate professors by 33 percent (fall 2003 N=12, fall 2006

N=16); full professors by 40 percent (fall 2003 N=5, fall 2007 N=7). These outcomes

reflect the university’s determination to make progress in this area coupled with

31

constituency education activities and changes in policies and practices that the campus has implemented over the course of the ADVANCE Program at UMBC.

Supporting Minority Achievement in STEM: Applying Lessons Learned to

the Structural Components of ADVANCE at UMBC

It is difficult to understand and appreciate fully the challenges that women and

minorities face in the sciences and engineering. Until quite recently, American higher education was relatively silent about these challenges—not simply because there

was a lack of understanding about the issues, but also because of the discomfort

many experienced when discussing issues having to do with gender and race. Today,

however, there is growing recognition among leaders in the science community—at

NSF and other agencies, for example—of the need to understand these challenges

and address them though such initiatives as ADVANCE. Much of the work of our

ADVANCE grant is based on our success over the past two decades in producing

minority scientists and engineers though our Meyerhoff Scholars Program. What we

have learned about institutional transformation—including culture change, the need

for mentoring, and the importance of creating a strong sense of community—has

made it possible for us to have the conversations necessary to address these challenges. These conversations have engaged faculty, students, and campus leaders,

and have been instrumental in building trust, creating community, and focusing on

the facts about the serious under-representation of women in STEM.

Preparing and Educating the Campus at All Levels

One successful strategy for developing a culture of inclusion for women faculty

has been a campus-wide Distinguished Speaker Series, spotlighting the contributions of top women research scientists and focusing on issues that women faculty

in STEM face in the academy. Modeling success, especially the achievements of top

minority women scientists, provides a compelling demonstration of diversity and excellence for the entire campus. The distinguished speakers also give a special seminar on their research at the departmental level to highlight targeted impact on the

field.

We have worked to engage all levels of campus administration and each STEM

department in developing and implementing ADVANCE initiatives. Chairs and

Deans Meetings are held at least once a semester to focus on progress and challenges. These meetings provide a regular forum for education and debate about best

practices and highlight departmental success in creating supportive work climates

for women. Outside experts regularly present current research to the Chairs and

Deans on gender issues in science and engineering, with special attention to the

particular experiences of minority women faculty. Chairs also raise issues based on

their own efforts to affect departmental climate change and advance women and minority faculty in their departments. The STEM departments are further involved

with ADVANCE through Faculty Liaisons, an initiative that includes nine and female faculty members, one from each STEM department, who serve as advocates

for the ADVANCE program within their departments. In addition, individual meetings among each Chair and the ADVANCE Director and Lead Co-PI focus on providing targeted information for the department and identifying ways the program

could most effectively support their faculty. Finally, through its ADVANCE Excellence Awards, the program regularly recognizes the contributions of individuals (including administrators and Chairs) to the success of women in STEM.

Recruiting and Supporting Minority Women in STEM

UMBC is committed to creating an environment of support and success that is

attractive to the Nation’s top prospective women and minority faculty in STEM. Accordingly, the Provost requires all departments planning to conduct a faculty search

to submit a written Faculty Diversity Recruitment Plan for attracting a broad and

diverse pool of applicants. This requirement is coupled with annual training on diversity recruitment presented by the Provost, Lead Co-PI, Director of Human Relations, and Senior Associate Dean of the Graduate School. Additional guidance is provided to departments by their respective Dean. Special attention is given to strategies and techniques for attracting applications from women and minority candidates

and demonstrating a culture of inclusion to all candidates who visit campus. All female candidates for STEM faculty positions meet with faculty from WISE (our chapter of Women In Science and Engineering) and with representatives of the ADVANCE Program to make them aware of the resources and support available at

UMBC. All male and female candidates meet with the Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs, who discusses support for balancing work and family issues, including information about UMBC’s Family Support Policy and flexible tenure timelines for family

and medical leave. In addition, the campus leadership (including the President, in

his role as ADVANCE PI) is available to candidates to discuss these issues. The ADVerDate 11-MAY-2000 15:09 Feb 06, 2008 Jkt 038258 PO 00000 Frm 00035 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 C:\WORKD\R&SE07\101707\38258 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
32

VANCE Research Assistantships for Chairs help STEM departments in successfully

recruiting new women STEM faculty by offering one-year research assistantships

which are added to the recruitment packages for these candidates.

Mentoring Minority Women for Success in STEM

Demonstrating a clear and successful path to promotion and tenure is central to

the work of our ADVANCE Program. The Faculty Horizons Program was created

with support from ADVANCE to help participants become successful faculty members in STEM, with particular attention focused on attracting women from underrepresented groups. This initiative builds on lessons learned through the undergraduate and graduate Meyerhoff bridge program experience, and our Graduate Horizons Program.

This intensive two-and-a-half-day workshop focuses on mentoring. The program

targets senior-level graduate students and post-doctoral fellows, particularly women

interested in becoming tenured STEM faculty. The workshop has been held annually since 2003 and has attracted 252 participants, including 237 women, 118 of

whom have been under-represented minority. Our Faculty Horizons Program re- ceives more than 250 applications for each of its annual workshops and has been

duplicated at Virginia Tech and Rice University.

The Eminent Scholar Program facilitates mentoring relationships between all new

female STEM faculty and prominent researchers in their fields. This relationship is

tailored to meet the specific needs of the junior scholar based on how effectively she

has been mentored up to that point. ADVANCE also works closely with the WISE

group on campus, an informal university network of STEM women, including a

number of women of color, which meets monthly to provide a community of exchange

and support. Before the ADVANCE initiative, the WISE group initiated an informal

exchange of mentoring information through its monthly meetings. ADVANCE has

expanded to develop this informal mentoring activity into a formal Faculty ADVANCEment Workshop Series, providing monthly workshops for all STEM faculty

members on topics related to the tenure process, grant writing, resource negotiations, departmental politics, press relations, work/family issues, effective communication, and lab management.

Through ADVANCE, we also have learned a great deal about some of the special

challenges women in STEM fields face, particularly minority women, because of the

numerous campus and community demands that are made on their time. Maintaining a productive research agenda is one such challenge, and to avoid attrition of minority women from doctoral programs and academic positions, institutions need to

be supportive of these promising scholars and help to protect their research agendas

as they move toward either completing their doctorates or achieving promotion and

tenure. In this connection, the ADVANCE Research Assistantship Program for Current Faculty provides competitively awarded funding for a research assistant (RA)

to female and male faculty who actively support the advancement of women and minorities in STEM fields. These RA awards are intended to support associate professors who are close to promotion, compensate for high service loads, and serve as

bridge money for faculty between grants. Further support is available through the

33

ADVANCE Faculty Sponsorship Committee, consisting of senior men and women

faculty, which identifies and advises STEM women as they approach important

milestones in their academic careers. The Committee offers guidance to STEM

women about dossier preparation, balancing research and service obligations, and

developing effective teaching portfolios as they anticipate third-year review or tenure with promotion. Together, these activities create a web of support that helps to

guide women on a clearly defined path to success.

‘‘Not Going It Alone’’

‘‘My soul was hungry for support.’’ These are the words that Dr. Kristi Pullen, a

brilliant young African American women and former Meyerhoff Scholar, wrote to me

two years ago as she contemplated her future after earning her Ph.D. in biochemistry at one of the Nation’s leading research universities. She had performed

superbly in her doctoral program, solving protein structures using x-ray crystallography. But Dr. Pullen seriously considered leaving science for policy work in response to the profound sense of isolation she had experienced during her graduate

studies. At this critical point in her career, reflecting on what ‘‘going it alone’’ had

meant to her, Dr. Pullen concluded, ‘‘I had all but completely given up on the idea

of going into bench science [and] didn’t particularly want to engage in it any longer.

I have found this road to be a particularly lonely one, and I couldn’t see myself walking it anymore.’’ Fortunately, Kristi has remained in science, in part because of the

support and encouragement she received from my colleagues.

Moving forward, though, it’s important to ask ourselves how can we create a culture of inclusion and a community of support to encourage talented minority women

like Kristi Pullen to thrive as scientists and engineers in our universities? A university’s institutional culture reflects its values, and inclusive academic cultures promote the advancement of women in STEM fields by identifying and addressing institutional barriers to success wherever they exist, and by cultivating a community of

support. A culture of inclusion provides visible leadership and attends to climate

and attitudes in all sectors of the campus—engaging faculty, administrators, staff,

and students. A community of support listens carefully to the voices of women scientists, including women of color, and maintains a climate of openness that encourages the expression of wide-ranging views without concern of censure. Inclusion, in

this sense, captures more than just a sense of possibility. Inclusion encourages an

environment of high expectation and support, provides clear pathways to advancement, establishes best practices in mentoring, develops viable networks and communities of shared interests, prepares women to contribute to society as top researchers, and, in so doing, strengthens the experience for all faculty.

BIOGRAPHY FOR FREEMAN A. HRABOWSKI, III

Freeman A. Hrabowski, III, has served as President of UMBC (The University of

Maryland, Baltimore County) since May, 1992. His research and publications focus

on science and math education, with special emphasis on minority participation and

performance.

He serves as a consultant to the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, and universities and school systems nationally. He also sits on several corporate and civic boards. Examples include the Carnegie Foundation for the

Advancement of Teaching, Constellation Energy Group, the France-Merrick Foundation, Marguerite Casey Foundation (Chair), McCormick & Company, Inc., Mercantile Safe Deposit & Trust Company, and the Urban Institute.

Examples of recent awards or honors include election to the American Academy

of Arts & Sciences and the American Philosophical Society; receiving the prestigious

McGraw Prize in Education, the U.S. Presidential Award for Excellence in Science,

Mathematics, and Engineering Mentoring, and the Columbia University Teachers

College Medal for Distinguished Service; being named a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and Marylander of the Year by the editors

of the Baltimore Sun; and being listed among Fast Company magazine’s first ‘‘Fast

50 Champions of Innovation’’ in business and technology. He also holds a number

of honorary degrees, including most recently from Princeton University, Duke University, the University of Illinois, the University of Alabama-Birmingham, Gallaudet

University, Goucher College, the Medical University of South Carolina, and Binghamton University.

He has co-authored two books, Beating the Odds and Overcoming the Odds (Oxford University Press), focusing on parenting and high-achieving African American

males and females in science. Both books are used by universities, school systems,

and community groups around the country.

34

A child-leader in the Civil Rights Movement, Dr. Hrabowski was prominently featured in Spike Lee’s 1997 documentary, Four Little Girls, on the racially motivated

bombing in 1963 of Birmingham’s Sixteenth Street Baptist Church.

Born in 1950 in Birmingham, Alabama, Dr. Hrabowski graduated at 19 from

Hampton Institute with highest honors in mathematics. At the University of Illinois

at Urbana-Champaign, he received his M.A. (mathematics) and four years later his

Ph.D. (higher education administration/statistics) at age 24.

Chairman BAIRD. That buzzer is the Pavlovian way of telling

Vern and the rest of us and myself that we have got to go vote in

about 15 minutes. We will have time, actually, for the rest of the

testimony, and then we will have to adjourn briefly, or recess briefly and then come back to ask some questions.

It is outstanding testimony so far. We will surely want to come

back. So Dr. Campbell.

STATEMENT OF DR. MYRON CAMPBELL, CHAIR, PHYSICS

DEPARTMENT, UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN

Dr. CAMPBELL. Thank you, Chairman Baird and Ranking Member Ehlers for inviting me here to talk about this issue which is

very important to me. I am the Chair of the Physics Department

at the University of Michigan, and in this role, I have become

much more aware of the hurdles, in spite of our best intentions,

women have to overcome in order to be able to fully participate in

careers in science and technology. As other members have said, we

need all of our talents to move forward.

In your opening statements, you mentioned that in STEM fields,

women comprise about 18 percent of the senior faculty, and in

physics, I am sorry to say, it is worse. It is about five percent, probably one of the lowest. The physical sciences have many stages between student and practitioner that people have to go through, undergraduate, graduate, post-doc, assistant professor and so on, and

it was pointed out there is a disproportionate attrition at every single stage. Consequently, the fraction of women who become full

professions, as it is, is now about four percent.

And in trying to understand these issues and how to work on addressing these issues, I have come to four key understandings

about the problems. And as you have just said, the first one is all

of us have a responsibility to remove the barriers and effect

change. I was at faculty meeting when this topic came up, and all

heads turned towards the few women who were in the faculty

meeting, saying what are you going to do about this issue. And it

is not their responsibility. It is all of our responsibilities to work

on this.

Second, there is not a single, magic-bullet solution that is going

to fix this. There are going to be many small steps required to be

taken to address this issue.

Thirdly, it is not just about the numbers. It is not just the five

percent or the 18 percent. It is about the climate and it about how

women are treated. I would like to share with you an anecdote. I

am going to follow your DOT matrix story. When I became chair,

one of the things I looked into was a—what written records we had

about how the women in our department were treated. And one of

the first things I did as the new chair was to go to everyone and

apologize on behalf of the department for things that had happened

to them that I though, if that had happened to me, I would have

35

quit. Truly, there are many issues like this that come up, so the

climate is very important.

And finally, all of the things that we value in our physics department, our first-rate research, our excellence in teaching, our community outreach, all of this is being placed at risk by us not dealing with these climate issues.

Many of the other comments I had were the same—I want to

talk about some of the impact, specifically, that ADVANCE has had

in how we conduct our business in the physics department. One of

the key things is understanding better how to do searches for new

faculty. And many different aspects come into play here.

One is an understanding of how to read letters of recommendations. And once I looked at that a little bit and went back and

looked at letters of recommendation from people that I know do

know better, there is a lot of bias, still, in the letters of recommendation that has to be stripped away before you can accurately evaluate a candidate. The second thing is that we need to

have a large pool of candidates. We cannot do a narrow search

where we are looking in a field that may only have two or three

candidates per year in the whole country. We need to look broadly.

Implementing these solutions over the last four years, the numbers of offers we have been making have gone equally to men and

women. Unfortunately, the acceptance ratio to Michigan for those

offers has not been that. And that caused me to say, well, we now

have to turn our attention towards what do we need to do to bring

more women to the stage of being able to apply for faculty positions. And that is going to bring me briefly to my recommendations.

One is encourage NSF to continue the ADVANCE program. It is

been extraordinarily valuable. The second is I would also encourage

NSF or other funding agencies to provide post-doctoral fellowships

in the same way that they provide graduate fellowships. The key

thing here is it changes the way in which the post-docs are selected. Currently, we are still in the model of selecting post-docs by

looking at only a handful. By having a national competition for

post-doctoral fellowships, we will have a broadened pool, and we

can try to accomplish there what we have done with selecting our

faculty.

And the third thing is a new awareness that scientists are now

having babies, and our rules for doing such things—we have already mentioned this. For example, the American Physical Society

is now offering grants to allow women with infants or small children to attend conferences, pay for daycare while they are there.

These are small grants. They are $200. And if anyone thinks that

taking a baby along to a conference is a luxury—but agencies cannot do this. They cannot support this, either in direct or indirect

costs, because of the 821 Rule, so in my written testimony, I have

specific recommendations for which 821 Rule should be modified to

remove this particular prohibition.

Again, thank you for the opportunity to be here today.

[The prepared statement of Dr. Campbell follows:]

36

1http://www.aps.org/programs/women/index.cfm

2 Advertisement in Physics Today, September 2007, page 101.

PREPARED STATEMENT OF MYRON CAMPBELL

Introduction

Chairman Baird, Ranking Member Ehlers and Members of the Subcommittee,

thank you for the invitation to testify today. It is an honor for me to be able to contribute to the discussion of women in physics, and talk about the necessity of removing barriers to allow any member of our society to contribute to our nation’s real

and pressing needs in science and technology.

I joined the University of Michigan in September 1989 as an Assistant Professor.

Prior to coming to Michigan I worked eight years at the University of Chicago, and

prior to that I was a graduate student at Yale University. I was promoted to Associate Professor after three years and to Professor in 1998. My area of research is

High Energy Physics and I am co-author on over 300 scientific papers, mostly with

the CDF collaboration. I was appointed Chair of the Physics Department in 2004.

Women in Physics

My own appreciation of the issues of women in physics and some of the barriers

came about four years ago during an unsuccessful attempt to hire a female assistant

professor. During this process I became aware that the issue was about more than

just the number of female faculty; that there were real barriers and biases which

made it more difficult for talented women to participate in science.

Activities at Michigan

Three and a half years ago I was appointed the Chair of the Physics Department.

Shortly after becoming Chair I invited the Committee on the Status of Women in

Physics (CSWP)1, a committee of the American Physical Society (APS), to conduct

a site visit to assess the climate for women in our department. Over the last seventeen years CSWP has visited and evaluated over forty institutions. The overall assessment from the site visit report was that the climate at Michigan for women in

physics needs serious improvement. There were several key points from the report

I have used to understand how to proceed:

• It is not the responsibility of the women in the Department to effect change.

Improvements will have to be driven by the combined efforts of the senior faculty.

• Problems exist at all levels and areas, and there is not a single solution or

‘magic bullet.’ Improvements will come from a large number of modest accomplishments.

• It’s not just about the numbers. A major problem is the climate and how the

women are treated. Bringing in additional female faculty must be accompanied by improving the climate.

• All of the Department’s accomplishments—first rate research programs, excellent undergraduate and graduate education, and successful community outreach—are placed at risk by climate issues.

With these points in mind, we took specific steps to improve the environment for

undergraduate students through renovation of our introductory courses and providing student-led study sessions for advanced courses. We are more closely monitoring the graduate students, and taking early intervention for students who might

otherwise drop out of the program. We have changed some of the graduate program

requirements to reduce the stress graduate students feel, without reducing our

standards. We have taken steps to improve the climate for female faculty. We have

also modified the way we conduct searches for new faculty—searches are now open

across all sub-fields of physics represented in the department.2 This change has resulted in our department making offers to nine women over the last four years, although, only one accepted.

Much of this effort has been through Departmental and University initiative and

support, along with support from funding agencies for programs such as ADVANCE.

To increase the number of women in faculty ranks it is necessary to increase the

number of women participating at all levels which lead to careers in science—high

school, undergraduate education, graduate school, and postdoctoral positions. A key

area of difficulty is the postdoctoral position, the transition from graduate student

to assistant professor. One of the ways to create diversity in the workplace is to create a broad pool of applicants. The current practice for hiring postdocs runs counter

to this—often a faculty member will select a postdoc from only a few candidates,

37

3http://www.aps.org/programs/women/workshops/gender-equity.cfm

4http://sitemaker.umich.edu/advance/home

5http://www.aip.org/statistics/trends/highlite/women05/figure11.htm

since the work the postdoc is required to do is narrowly defined. The few institutions which have privately funded postdoctoral fellowships (Chicago, Caltech,

Princeton, Berkeley, Harvard, MIT) are able to draw a large application pool, and

have been successful at bringing in a talented and diverse group of postdocs.

I attended a workshop on gender equity3 held by the American Physical Society

in May, 2006 where I shared some of my experiences with chairs and heads of other

physics departments. The summary and recommendations from the workshop have

been posted on the APS gender equity website. The department chairs attending the

conference focused on four categories: Recruiting Students, Building a Respectful

Environment, Faculty Hiring, and Faculty Retention. The consensus goal from the

workshop was to double the number of women in physics over the next 15 years,

which will require increasing the number of women working at all steps leading to

a career in science.

Recommendations

I have several recommendations to the Subcommittee. The first is to encourage

the NSF to continue the program ADVANCE: Increasing the Participation and Advancement of Women in Academic Science and Engineering Careers. I know firsthand this program has been of great benefit at the University of Michigan.4 The

practices, policies and procedures that have been developed at ADVANCE institutions should be integrated both into the NSF and other research and education institutions.

My second recommendation addresses the ‘pipeline issue,’ as illustrated in the

chart provided by the American Institute of Physics.5 The figure shows the decline

in the percentage of women at various ranks, and the prediction in yellow based

on the number of Bachelor’s degrees awarded to women in the past. This chart

shows that the pipeline explains the small numbers of women in physics and that

the pipeline is the problem, highlighting the need for eliminating gender bias at

every career stage. Universities such as Michigan can work on some stages of the

pipeline on their own, for example promotion from assistant professor to associate

professor, or improvement in undergraduate education. One of the findings of ADVANCE was that open, broad based, as opposed to narrow, searches provides a larger, more diverse pool of applicants. While our Department has been able to do this

for graduate admissions and assistant professor searches, we have not been able to

do this at the postdoctoral level. I recommend that NSF expand their Postdoctoral

38

6http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/circulars/a021/a021.html

7 ‘‘Education in Nuclear Science,’’ a report to the DOE/NSF Nuclear Science Advisory Committee, pp. 4–15 (November 2004), http://www.sc.doe.gov/henp/np/nsac/docs/

NSAC¥CR¥education¥report¥final.pdf

Fellowships program to include Physics, similar to the existing programs in Astronomy and Biology. Such a program would draw a large pool of applicants.

My third recommendation is to eliminate some of the barriers to women, especially women with young children, which is codified in OMB circular A–21.6 Section

J.32 on Meetings and Conferences should be modified to specifically allow for

women to take infants or small children to conferences and the cost of childcare during the conference should be an allowable direct or F&A expense. Section J.53 in

a similar way should allow for the travel costs associated with having small children

be an allowable direct or F&A expense. Section J.42 on recruiting costs should be

modified to recognize that attracting top talent, either male or female, now often

requires spousal recruitment,7 which should be either an allowed direct or F&A cost.

Conclusion

Thank you again for the opportunity to testify today. I hope I can continue to be

of service on this issue. Advances in science and engineering require the talent,

hard work, and ingenuity of a large and diverse workforce. Women represent about

half of our entering undergraduates interested in science and engineering, yet they

represent a much smaller fraction of our scientific workforce. We all must work to

remove barriers.

BIOGRAPHY FOR MYRON CAMPBELL

Education

1977–1982—Yale University, New Haven, CT; Ph.D., Physics Advisor Robert K.

Adair

1973–1977—Otterbein College, Westerville, OH; B.A., Physics

Employment

2004–Present—University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI; Chair, Physics Department

1998–Present—University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI; Professor

1992–1998—University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI; Associate Professor

1989–1992—University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI; Assistant Professor

1989—University of Chicago, Chicago, IL; Senior Scientist

1985–1989—University of Chicago, Chicago, IL; Senior Research Associate

1982–1985—University of Chicago, Chicago, IL; Research Associate

1982—Yale University, New Haven, CT; Research Associate

Awards

Fellow of the American Physical Society, 1998

LS&A Excellence in Education Award, 1996

A.P. Sloan Fellow, 1990–1991

A.H. Compton Lecturer, University of Chicago, 1985

Professional Service

1990–present—CDF Executive Board

1993–1994—Femilab Users Executive Committee

1990–1993—SDC Technical Board

Departmental Committees (selected)

1998–1999—High Energy Theorist Search Committee; Undergraduate Concerns

Committee

1996–1998—High Energy Experimental Search Committee, Chair

39

1994–1997—Undergraduate Concerns Committee; Undergraduate Laboratory Committee

1993–1994—Department Computing Committee, Chair

1992–1993—HEP Spin Physics Search Committee

1991–1994—Graduate Admissions

College and University Committees (selected)

2003—LS&A Executive Committee

1997–1998—CRLT Advisory Board

1995–1999—LS&A Curriculum Committee

1994—University Task Force on Research Computing

Research Activities

My research activities are in the area of high energy hadron collisions. I am involved in the CDF (Collider Detector at Fermilab). My efforts in this collaboration

have been in the area of triggering, i.e., identifying events of interest. My analysis

efforts are directed towards studies of top production and decay systematics.

Chairman BAIRD. I appreciate the comment. My wife, a Ph.D.

economist, is traveling to Seattle now for a conference, and I am

40

in care of two two-year, seven-month-old twins. It is not a luxury

to leave them behind either.

I did acknowledge earlier, Mr. Neugebauer from Texas, as well,

and I should inform my colleagues, I misspoke earlier. The Pavlovian conditioning is too strong in me. We aren’t voting yet. We

are just going back into session in a few minutes, so we have a little more time and less time pressure, which is good news.

Dr. Ritter, please.

STATEMENT OF DR. GRETCHEN RITTER, PROFESSOR OF GOVERNMENT; DIRECTOR, CENTER FOR WOMEN’S AND GENDER

STUDIES, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN

Dr. RITTER. Good afternoon. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, other

Subcommittee Members. I am please to be with you today to talk

about ways to increase women’s participation in academic science

and engineering.

It has been 35 years since the passage of Title IX, yet women

continue to lag behind men in academic achievement, particularly

in the STEM disciplines. Research suggests that these disparities

are not due to differences in aptitude or native interest between

men and women. Rather, the causes lie elsewhere, in the institutional structure and culture that discourage women’s participation

in science and engineering in limits their potential for success in

those fields. While the era of explicit sex discrimination in higher

education may be fading—hopefully fewer DOT matrix moments—

implicit bias continues to play a significant role in determining opportunities for entry and advancement for women as well as minority faculty members.

There remain four great barriers to women’s advancement in

higher education: climate, which we have talked about today; professional assessment and rewards; work-family balance; and the

absence of senior women. On this last barrier, I contend that the

presence of women in senior ranks has a large impact on the overall institutional climate, on the strength of mentoring programs, on

the impact of implicit bias and assessment, on the visibility of positive role models, and on the creation of a family-friendly institutional culture.

In addressing these barriers, universities should design a program that emphasizes four features: accountability, assessment,

continuity, and leadership. Assessment will allow universities to

determine whether their efforts to recruit and retain women faculty

are successful, and if not, how they may be redesigned to increase

the likelihood of success.

Regarding continuity, effort to increase women’s participation

takes sustained, continuous commitment to make a lasting difference. All too often, institutions put together a program. They do

a good job. And then they stop. And when they stop, progress in

recruiting and retaining women stops as well. We have to keep

going. We have to sustain these efforts for the long-term. It is not

a short-term effort.

What role can the Federal Government play? First, the NSF

should expand the ADVANCE program beyond individual campuses, into other fields where women and minority faculty are

under-represented, particularly, I would argue with social sciences,

41

1The author wishes to thank Janet Ellzey, Kiersten Ferguson, J Strother Moore, Shelley

Payne, Linda Reichl, Bev Vandegrift, Gregory Vincent, and Sharon Woods for their assistance

in the preparation of this testimony.

because that will help with other areas. Social scientists really supply us with much of the research we need to understand these institutional barriers.

Second, the Federal Government should use Title IX enforcement

as a means of advancing women in under-represented field. The

original intent of Title IX was to ensure equal educational opportunity for both sexes. Yet relatively little has been done outside of

athletics to make that mandate meaningful when it comes to addressing opportunities for advancement and achievement in traditionally male-dominated fields in higher education.

Like Dr. Shalala, I am on the women’s athletic council at UT and

we just went through out NCAA recertification. If we gave that

kind of attention to gender equity and equal opportunity in academic fields, we would be doing so much better.

We now know that the academic achievement of young women in

math, science, and engineering, depends on the presence of positive

female role models and on women peers in the classroom. To support educational opportunity for women, we ought to leverage federal education and research funding to mandate Title IX compliance. Creating equal opportunity for women faculty will allow

younger women to imagine themselves as the next generation’s

great scientists and inventors.

Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Dr. Ritter follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF GRETCHEN RITTER1

Executive Summary

1. The largest remaining barriers to women’s advancement in academic science and

engineering include:

a. Climate—Even when universities are successful in recruiting women and minority faculty, they tend to leave at greater rates due to climate concerns.

b. Professional Assessment and Rewards—The professional assessment and reward structures of universities often allow for unconscious or implicit bias

to play a role in providing disparate opportunities and rewards for equally

qualified male and female faculty.

c. Work-Family Balance—Within academia, our expectations about tenure, career trajectories and productivity, and the conduct of research and professional service to one’s department and discipline, still presume that the fulltime faculty are unencumbered by family responsibilities or caregiving expectations for children, partners, or elderly parents.

d. Absence of Senior Women—The presence of women in the senior ranks has

a large impact on climate, mentoring, the role of implicit gender bias in faculty assessment, the visibility of positive role models, and the creation of a

family friendly institutional culture.

2. Universities should focus on the following in addressing these barriers:

a. Accountability—Universities should implement procedures that promote accountability in their efforts to recruit and retain women faculty.

b. Assessment—Universities should also assess their efforts to increase recruitment and retention of women in order to identify which efforts are most successful and which efforts are not.

c. Continuity—These efforts take sustained, continuous commitment to make a

substantial difference. Too often, when successful programs end, so does

progress in the recruitment and retention of women faculty.

42

2STEM is an acronym that stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math.

3See the National Academies, Beyond Bias and Barriers: Fulfilling the Potential of Women

in Academic Science and Engineering (Washington, DC: the National Academies Press, 2006).

d. Leadership—The universities that have made substantial gains in recruiting

women faculty in under-represented fields are the ones that have a president

or a provost who is forthright, articulate, and visibly committed to the value

of having a diverse and equitable faculty.

3. The Federal Government should:

a. Expand the ADVANCE initiative to include minorities and women in other

under-represented fields, especially in the social sciences.

b. Use Title IX enforcement as a means of advancing women in academic

science and engineering.

I. Introduction

It has been 35 years since the passage of Title IX of the Educational Amendments

of 1972, yet women continue to lag behind men in educational achievement, particularly in the STEM2 disciplines. Research suggests that these disparities are not due

to differences in aptitude or potential interest between men and women. Rather, the

causes lie elsewhere—in the institutional structures and culture that discourage

women’s participation in science and engineering, and limit their potential for success in those fields.3 While the era of explicit sex discrimination in higher education

may be fading, social science research suggests that implicit bias continues to play

a significant role in determining opportunities for entry and advancement for

women (as well as minorities) in higher education. The barriers to women’s achievement remain significant.

We cannot afford to tolerate women’s continued exclusion from these fields. The

absence of women in academic science, social science, and engineering has a negative impact in a variety of important areas. Having a diverse higher education faculty is important to the Nation’s well-being. If the United States is to remain a

world leader economically, and in scientific and technological innovation, we must

recruit talented people from all sectors of our society to become scientists and engineers. If we want to encourage women to become engineers, African American men

to become elementary school teachers, and Hispanic women to be business professionals and lawyers, then we need a faculty that shows our students that women

and people from different racial and ethnic backgrounds can achieve and succeed

in every field. Too often, I have had women students tell me that they came to college wanting to be scientists or engineers, but left that field because they felt isolated or discouraged when they had no women classmates or women professors.

We also need to have a diverse faculty in order to advance academic excellence.

If we fail to recruit and retain women in economics or physics, then we deny ourselves the opportunity to benefit from the talent and insights of half of the population. If we have no black or Hispanic senior faculty in psychology or government,

then we might have a faculty that is less motivated to exploring issues such as the

impact of racial stereotyping on social achievement or the role that black churches

play in national politics. Recruiting faculty from all sectors of the population allows

us to draw on a broader pool of talent in building academic excellence. Retaining

a diverse faculty means we benefit from having researchers and teachers whose approach to knowledge is shaped by a range of social experiences and interests.

Women are more likely to enter technological and scientific fields because of their

interest in social issues, like advancing children’s health, or improving the lives of

the disabled. So recruiting a more diverse faculty is likely to shape the research

agenda and scientific innovations of the next generation.

Finally, it is worth remembering that American universities have always played

a vital role in the development of our nation’s economic, political and social leadership. It is part of the mission of public universities in particular to provide access

to educational opportunities as a means of developing a diverse leadership for a

democratic nation. With the advent of globalization, it is more important than ever

that we encourage the development of leaders who operate well in an interconnected

world marked by differences of race, religion, gender and culture. Public universities

can provide both a social climate and an intellectual environment that is supportive

of diversity and leadership. Since advances in fields like information technology will

shape our economy and our society in decades to come, it is essential that women

and minorities be recruited into those fields, as scientific leaders in a sector that

will shape our nation’s future. We will all benefit if the Michael Dells, Bill Gates,

43

4These figures are calculated from the 2006–7 Statistical Handbook (Office of Information

Management and Analysis, UT Austin). Please see table FS 8, pp. 119–120. For the College of

Natural Sciences, the faculty in the Department of Human Ecology were not included in the

calculation, since these are primarily social scientists. 5Martha S. West and John W. Curtis, AAUP Faculty Gender Equity Indicators 2006 (Washington, DC: AAUP, 2006). See Figures 4 & 5, pp. 8 & 10.

and Steve Jobs of the next generation come from a more diverse cross section of our

community. Our universities can help to make that happen.

II. Efforts at the University of Texas at Austin to Recruit and Retain

Women in Science and Engineering

Currently, at the University of Texas at Austin, women make up 10.6 percent of

the tenured and tenure track faculty in the College of Engineering, and 12.7 percent

of the tenured and tenure track faculty in the College of Natural Sciences.4 Among

assistant professors, women make up 19 percent of the faculty in Engineering and

Natural Sciences. Overall, at the university as of 2006, women constitute 18 percent

of the full professors, 38 percent of the associate professors, and 39 percent of the

assistant professors. Further, 24 percent of the tenured faculty are women at the

university. So while there are fewer women in science and engineering, women are

under-represented within the tenured and tenure track faculty university wide. According to the AAUP Faculty Gender Equity Indicators 2006 report, the comparable

figures for the proportion of women faculty at doctoral universities nationwide are

19 percent of the full professors, and 40 percent of the assistant professors.5 This

same report indicates that 26 percent of the tenured faculty are women at doctoral

institutions nationwide. So the University of Texas at Austin is close to these national averages, but slightly below those averages.

There are programs at the University of Texas at Austin that seek to address the

under-representation of women in academic science and engineering. The College of

Engineering created the Women in Engineering Program (WEP) in 1992. This program seeks to recruit women students, and increase the proportion of women receiving undergraduate degrees in engineering at the University. The primary focus of

their efforts has been to provide academic and peer support to first and second year

women undergraduates. Within the College of Natural Sciences, the Women in Natural Sciences program (WINS) focuses primarily on issues facing women students

at the undergraduate level. One successful WINS initiative that began in 2001 is

the Honors Residential Program for women undergraduates in natural science. The

students who participate in this program are found to have a higher level of academic success and retention than female students in natural sciences who do not

participate in the program. The College of Engineering now offers a similar residential program for first year students, called WELD.

Both WEP and WINS offer K–12 programs as well, designed to encourage interest

in sciences and engineering among middle school and high school girls. The ‘‘Science

in Action Program’’ is aimed at area schoolgirls between the ages of 11–15. This

day-long program allows students to participate and observe science demonstrations

at the college’s research labs. WINS also supports the work of Girlstart, a local nonprofit organization which promotes science and math learning among elementary

and middle school girls. Likewise, each February, the College of Engineering hosts

the ‘‘Introduce a Girl to Engineering Day,’’ which attracts over 1,000 area schoolgirls

to participate in demonstrations and workshops designed to promote interest in engineering. In addition to these efforts, the Center for Women’s and Gender Studies

(CWGS) has a school partnership agreement with the Ann Richards School for

Young Women Leaders. The Ann Richards School is a public, all girls middle school

that focuses on success in the STEM disciplines. Under the partnership agreement,

CWGS provided mentoring and professional development support to the faculty and

staff at the school. CWGS faculty also conduct research at the school to assess the

effectiveness of its programs.

Less has been done at the graduate or the faculty level to promote the recruitment and retention of women in engineering and science. In the late 1980s and

1990s, Target of Opportunity funding was made available through the provost’s office to assist in recruiting women and minority faculty in fields where they were

under-represented. This funding made a substantial difference in the number of

women faculty hired. In the College of Engineering, for instance, the number of

tenured or tenure track faculty increased from just eight in 1987 to 21 in 1997.

When this funding was withdrawn, hiring and retention efforts stalled, so that in

2002 there were still only 21 women faculty (nine percent of the total) in the College

44

6These figures were obtained from a powerpoint presentation made by Dr. Sherry E. Woods,

(Director of Special Projects in the College of Engineering), dated November 1, 2002.

of Engineering.6 With the help of leadership by the dean and various department

chairs in recent years, the number of women faculty in the college has now risen

to 26, which still represents under 11 percent of the total tenured/tenure track faculty in the college. Within the College of Natural Sciences, over the past five years

WINS has sponsored five workshops for chairs, executive assistants, and search

committee members on best practices for diversity recruiting and has created an online faculty recruiting handbook. Three CNS departments have implemented these

best practices, under the leadership of a strong Chair or search committee chair,

and all three have doubled their representation of women faculty. Apart from these

workshops and chair led efforts in particular departments (such as Computer

Science), relatively little has been done to promote increased recruitment and retention of women faculty. To date, UT Austin has not participated in the ADVANCE

program.

At the level of the university as a whole, efforts have been made to address the

needs of women faculty and the situation of women in under-represented fields. In

1999, a report was done on the status of women, which revealed some faculty salary

inequities by gender. The provost’s office set aside funding to address those inequities in 2000. One barrier to professional achievement for women academics nationally involves work-family balance issues. Overall women are still more likely to have

primary responsibility for addressing dependent care needs within families. Further,

women academics are also more likely to be married to male academics (and to male

professionals), which makes dual career issues of greater importance to women academics. UT Austin has sought to address these concerns in recent years by expanding the amount of university provided childcare that is available to faculty, and by

reserving some spots at the childcare center for use in faculty recruitment. Funding

is also available from the provost’s office for faculty spousal hiring. Further, the university now offers a modified instructional duties policy, which is intended to allow

faculty with substantial caregiving responsibilities for newborns to be relieved of

their obligation to teach full-time for a semester while still receiving their full salaries.

In 2006, the university created the Division of Diversity and Community Engagement which is charged with promoting diversity and gender equity for students,

staff, and faculty. This division is working with the provost’s office to promote hiring

that will increase the number of women and minorities on the faculty. The provost’s

office also recently created the Gender Equity Task Force which is charged with examining the situation of women faculty on campus and recommending policies that

promote gender equity. The task force (which I co-chair, along with Dr. J. Moore,

Chair of Computer Science) is expected to complete its work and issue its report

next spring.

These efforts are important, but more remains to be done. Nationally, many universities have become aware that the advancement of women faculty in under-represented fields requires focused and continuous effort by the institution as a whole.

UT Austin does not currently have a clear and effective leader on gender equity in

our central administration. While the president and the provost have voiced support

for gender equity, there need to be mechanisms created that will hold deans and

department chairs accountable for their achievements in this domain. There also

needs to be someone with authority in the higher administration whose primary responsibility includes oversight of efforts to increase the university’s recruitment and

retention of women in under-represented fields. Finally, more effort should be given

to assessment, so that we know whether the programs and policies that we sponsor

are effective and should be sustained.

III. Remaining Challenges, Promising Solutions

Nationally, there have been substantial increases in the number of women obtaining undergraduate degrees in the sciences, social sciences and engineering. The

numbers of doctorates awarded have also increased substantially in many disciplines, yet this has not translated into comparable increases in the proportion of

women faculty in these fields. What are the major barriers to the retention and promotion of women faculty within higher education nationwide? Further, how might

these barriers be most effectively addressed within academia? In this section, I

briefly highlight the most significant barriers to the advancement of women in

under-represented fields in the areas of climate, professional assessment and reward, work-family balance, and the absence of senior women. Following the discussion of these challenges, I review the most promising areas where solutions may be

45

7Please note that since the Gender Equity Task Force at UT Austin is still collecting and analyzing data, the applicability of the recommendations in this section for UT Austin have yet to

be determined. 8 Also see Jean Waltman and Carol Hollenshead, ‘‘Creating a Positive Departmental Climate:

Principles for Best Practices,’’ Prepared for NSF ADVANCE at the University of Michigan,

available at http://www.umich.edu/%7Eadvproj/BestPracticesReport¥FINAL¥Aug07.pdf 9See V. Valian, Why So Slow? The Advancement of Women (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press,

1998). 10 JR Cole & B Singer, ‘‘A Theory of Limited Differences: Explaining the Productivity Puzzle

in Science,’’ in H. Zuckerman, JR Cole and J Bruer, eds., The Outer Circle: Women in the Scientific Community (NY: Norton, 1991).

sought to the problem of women’s under-representation in academia. My recommendations in this area focus on accountability, assessment, continuity, and leadership.7

Climate

Institutional climate has a large impact on whether women and minority faculty

thrive and are retained in fields where they are under-represented. Even when universities are successful in recruiting women and minority faculty, they tend to leave

at greater rates due to climate concerns. Sometimes women and minority faculty

have less access to the informal professional networks that are important to their

professional success. They may feel as though their achievements and credentials

are regarded as suspect by students and colleagues alike. There may be few people

in their department with whom they can communicate about the particular challenges they face in establishing authority in the classroom, in responding to the

needs and expectations of women and minority students, or in finding social connections with people from similar social backgrounds outside of the university. Women

faculty (as well as many male faculty with substantial caregiving responsibilities)

may sense that there is a lack of sympathy or support for their family responsibilities. Finally, if there are no senior women or minority faculty within their department (or administrators at their institution), then junior faculty are more likely to

feel professionally isolated, and to doubt whether their institution will ever promote

and retain someone like them.

To address some of these climate concerns, several things are helpful.8 Universities should create strong mentorship programs that address concerns about intellectual community and social networks as well as professional development. They

should also establish clear policies that promote a family friendly work environment

for faculty. Where campus wide organizations for women and minority faculties

exist, they should be supported and strengthened. Where they do not exist, they

should be created. Support for interdisciplinary centers in racial, ethnic, or women’s

studies may also play a role in promoting intellectual community and social connection among women and minority faculty in a variety of fields. Finally, there should

be forums, lectures, and workshops that promote frank and open discussions of climate issues on campus.

Professional Assessment and Rewards

The professional assessment and reward structures of universities often allow for

unconscious or implicit bias to play a role in providing disparate opportunities and

rewards for equally qualified male and female faculty. Like everyone in our society,

academics employ information assessment shortcuts, or cognitive schemas, that filter information according to pre-existing understandings about how the world

works. Such schemas include deeply rooted race and gender stereotypes.9 These

schemas, or unconscious biases, play a greater role in influencing assessments if

they remain implicit and unaddressed, if assessments are made in a largely subjective fashion, and if the group conducting the assessment is not itself socially diverse.

Typical university procedures for faculty recruitment, assessments for salary recommendations, and promotions evaluation all rely on assessment processes that are

largely subjective and that may be conducted by a largely homogeneous group of

evaluators. Further, the impact of these disparate assessments accumulate over

time, so that over the course of their careers, women academics in under-represented fields may perpetually receive slightly smaller rewards and slightly fewer

opportunities, until a decade or two down the line when they make receive lower

salaries, are less likely to have advanced to the rank of full professor, and have less

lab space than their equally accomplished male counterparts.10

Universities can do several things to alleviate the impact of unconscious bias on

professional assessments or rewards. They can mandate that assessments be conducted in an objective fashion, with clear criteria for professional achievement and

46

11 Claudia Goldin & C. Rouse (2000), ‘‘Orchestrating Impartiality: The Impact of ‘Blind’ Auditions on Female Musicians,’’ American Economic Review 90:715–741. 12 Joan Williams, Unbending Gender (NY: Oxford University Press, 2000). 13For more information on their research and on the Family Friendly Edge Project at UC–

Berkeley, go to http://ucfamilyedge.berkeley.edu/

productivity.11 Where possible, professional assessments should be conducted blindly, without awareness of the race, ethnicity or gender of the person being evaluated.

Yet, if a blind assessment is not possible (and there are often implicit indicators of

race or gender in someone’s professional record), then the assessors should be encouraged to be self-aware about the role that race and gender biases may play in

their assessments. Self-awareness can decrease the influence that biases have on assessment. Finally, assessments should be conducted by diverse assessment teams.

Universities should put in place procedures that insure the racial and gender diversity of faculty search committees, salary review committees, and promotion and tenure committees.

Work-Family Balance

The creation of family support policies at universities benefits the entire faculty

and not just women. After the second world war, public and private social benefits

programs were based on the presumption of a family structure that included a male

breadwinner and a female caregiver. With the huge influx of women into the labor

market, as well as changes in patterns of marriage, divorce, and childbearing, we

no longer live in a society in which the breadwinner/caregiver model is applicable.

But our employment policies and presumptions have yet to adjust to fact that most

family caregivers are also paid employees, and that many caregivers have no other

adult in the household to rely upon in sharing the duties of care and economic provision.12 Within academia, our expectations about tenure, career trajectories and productivity, and the conduct of research and professional service to one’s department

and discipline, still presume that the full-time faculty are unencumbered by family

responsibilities or caregiving expectations for children, partners, or elderly parents.

Those presumptions are clearly unrealistic, and they are particularly harmful to

women faculty who are more likely to be limited by the professional careers of their

spouses, and more likely to have primary caregiver responsibility for family members. Further, to a greater degree than ever before, younger academic men are likely

to have substantial caregiving responsibilities for their children, and to have

spouses who work full-time. So both in the interest of gender equity, and in the interest of attracting men and women of talent into academic careers, universities

must do more to support the family responsibilities of their faculty.

At the University of California at Berkeley, Drs. Mary Ann Mason and Marc

Goulden have been national leaders in assessing the impact that work-family conflict has on the under-representation of women in academia, and in recommending

policies and piloting programs intended to address these issues.13 Most research

universities now provide some childcare, unpaid childbearing leave, and stop-theclock policies that extend the tenure clock for faculty with substantial caregiving responsibilities, as well as some assistance for dual career issues. In addition, Mason

and Golden recommend that universities implement programs that create part-time

tenured or tenure track options for faculty with substantial caregiving responsibilities, provide paid childbearing leave, provide emergency back-up childcare, assist

spouses and partners of faculty with employment relocation services, provide reentry post-doctoral fellowships for faculty who have taken time off to focus on family

care needs, and create policies that insure family friendly calendars and scheduling

for faculty.

Absence of Senior Women

In recent years, many universities have increased their efforts to recruit women

faculty at the assistant professor level. These efforts are important and should be

continued. Yet institutions often become frustrated by the difficulties they face in

retaining and promoting the junior women they have recruited. Not only does this

difficulty represent a failed investment by the university in their efforts to cultivate

faculty talent, it may also reinforce negative stereotypes about women faculty, by

suggesting that junior women are less likely to stay in academia or to succeed in

getting promoted to the tenured faculty. It is little surprise, then, that some senior

male faculty wonder whether efforts to recruit junior women are worthwhile. What

this perspective neglects, however, is the important role that senior faculty women

play in creating institutional cultures in which junior faculty women are likely to

succeed. The presence of women in the senior ranks has a large impact on the cliVerDate 11-MAY-2000 15:09 Feb 06, 2008 Jkt 038258 PO 00000 Frm 00050 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 C:\WORKD\R&SE07\101707\38258 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
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mate of a department and an institution, on the ability of institutions to provide

mentoring that is supportive of diversity, on the role of implicit gender bias in faculty assessment and reward structures, on the service demands imposed on more

junior faculty women, on the visibility of positive role models for junior faculty

women and women students, and on the creation of a family friendly institutional

culture within departments and colleges. For all of these reasons—and because the

delay or departure of women faculty before they reach the senior ranks represents

a loss of accumulated experience, insight, and potential innovations—more effort

should be made to reward and retain women at or near the senior level.

In order to reward and retain women at or near the senior faculty level, universities should consider implementing some of the following policies and programs.

They should fund efforts that result in more senior faculty women being hired. They

should provide support for elder-care responsibilities, which are more likely to fall

to women at the mid-career stage. They should provide research assistance and

leaves for associate level faculty who undertake substantive service or administrative positions, such as associate dean, center director, or faculty senate chair. In

fields where there are fewer women, the desire for diverse representation in administrative and service roles often leads to greater service demands on women at an

earlier career stage. Efforts should be made to decrease the impact that such demands have on the research productivity of mid-career women faculty. Since women

faculty are less likely to seek outside offers as a means of raising their salaries, efforts should be made to provide equity related and productivity based salary adjustments without having to rely on outside offers. Finally, attention should be given

to the way in which endowed professorships and chairs are awarded to internal faculty. To counteract the possible impact of implicit gender bias and the greater professional isolation of senior women faculty, the awarding of endowed positions to internal faculty should be overseen by a diverse panel of senior faculty from across

the campus.

Accountability, Assessment, Continuity and Leadership

For each of the areas discussed above, attention has been given to efforts that universities can undertake to reduce the impact of institutional barriers to the advancement of women in under-represented fields. This section concludes with additional

suggestions of ways that universities nationally can promote the recruitment and

retention of women in under-represented fields.

Universities should implement procedures that promote accountability in their efforts to recruit and retain women faculty. Accountability means requiring colleges

and departments to report on their recruitment, promotion and retention efforts regarding the identification of a diverse pool or applicants, the proportion of applicants by sex and race, the composition of search committees, and the composition

of governance committees that make hiring, promotion, and salary recommendation

decisions. Accountability also means requiring deans and department chairs in

fields where there is substantial under-representation to set goals for improving the

representation of women faculty, and then providing or withholding resources in relation to their progress in achieving those goals. If, for instance, a department

proves to be stubbornly unwilling to recruit any women faculty over a number of

years, then they should be restricted in their ability to hire new faculty. Finally,

accountability should include the ability and willingness of a dean or a provost to

intervene when policies and procedures implemented to promote the recruitment

and retention of women are not followed. For instance, if participants in a faculty

search fail to make a good faith effort to identify and solicit applications from qualified women candidates, then a dean or provost should be willing to stop the faculty

search until the failure to follow these procedures is corrected. Without accountability, goals and policies may be rendered meaningless.

Universities should also assess their efforts to increase recruitment and retention

of women in order to identify which efforts are most successful and which efforts

are not. Assessments of programs and policies should be done following standard social science protocols that promote objective evaluations. Program evaluations

should be published, so that they may be scrutinized within the university community and by academics elsewhere. Where assessments provide strong evidence of the

success of a program or policy, increased support should be given to that policy, and

the policy should be replicated by other departments and colleges within the university. Where programs or policies do not succeed, an analysis should be done to identify the reasons for their failure, in order to improve the university’s efforts in this

area.

Continuity is also important to the success of these efforts. All too often, in the

wake of a particular report or in response to an outspoken faculty leader, universities make short-term efforts to address gender equity concerns through one time

48

14 ADVANCE is an National Science Foundation program for ‘‘Increasing the Participation

and Advancement of Women in Academic Science and Engineering Careers.’’ 15 Richard Zare, ‘‘Sex, Lies and Title IX: Federal Law Banning Sex Discrimination in School

May do as Much for Academics as it has for Athletics,’’ Chemical & Engineering News Vol. 84

(May 15, 2006): 46–49. 16GAO report 04–639: ‘‘Gender Issues: Women’s Participation in the Sciences Has Increased,

but Agencies Need To Do More To Ensure Compliance with Title IX,’’ www.gao.gov/new.items/

d04639.pdf

efforts to correct disparities in salaries or promotion rates, or with short-term initiatives intended to increase the number of junior women who are hired. But even in

the case of successful programs, like the Target of Opportunity fund that was used

to recruit women in under-represented fields at UT–Austin, when the program ends,

so does progress in the recruitment and retention of women faculty. These efforts

take sustained, continuous commitment to make a substantial difference. Not until

the culture of an institution has thoroughly changed and there is a proportionate

number of women in the senior faculty and administration of our universities should

we consider letting up in our efforts to recruit more women in academic science and

engineering.

Finally, to succeed these efforts take leadership from the highest levels of the university. The universities that have made substantial gains in recruiting women faculty in under-represented fields are the ones that have a president or a provost who

is forthright, articulate, and visibly committed to the value of having a diverse and

equitable faculty. Whenever searches are conducted for a new dean, provost, and

president, strong candidates should have a record that verifies their commitment to

faculty diversity and equity. Administrative leaders can help to set the tone for the

entire institution. They can help to explain the value of equity and diversity to their

senior faculty and department chairs. And they can hold deans and chairs accountable for their successes and failures in this area.

IV. Role of Federal Funding Agencies

The ADVANCE14 initiative has made a substantial difference in the representation of women in science and engineering at several leading universities such as the

University of Michigan. The ADVANCE program ought to be expanded in several

respects: the initiative should be broadened to include women in all under-represented fields, particularly including the social sciences; the initiative ought to be

aimed to increasing the proportion of minority faculty (along with women) in the

STEM disciplines; and it ought to be broadened beyond individual universities. Regarding the last point, the PAID Awards clearly seek to have a broadening effect

in encouraging the universities with successful ADVANCE programs to serve as

models for universities elsewhere.

Including women from the social sciences in the ADVANCE grants is important

for a number of reasons. Social scientists can provide the research needed to understand why women and minorities are under-represented in academia. They can also

play a crucial role in designing programs aimed at rectifying those difficulties. Since

social science participation is important to the success of ADVANCE grants, and

since women social scientists are more likely to undertake research that examines

the effects of gender bias, it would be helpful to include social scientists in the ADVANCE program. Further, on their own merits, it is important to have a diverse

social science faculty since social scientists help to understand how society operates,

and their research helps to address social problems such as the under-representation of groups in the economy, politics and education. Which social problems we

choose to study will depend, in part, on who the social scientists are who conduct

the research. Finally, the involvement of social scientists is important to changing

the institutional culture of universities overall. Social science exists at something of

a midway point between science and engineering on the one hand, and the fine arts

and humanities on the other. Social scientists can play a crucial role in explaining

the nature of this problem and formulating solutions regarding under-representation to both the positivists in the sciences and engineering, and to the humanists

in the arts and humanities.

Another way to increase the impact of these efforts is through Title IX enforcement.15 The Society of Women Engineers is among the groups now advocating for

increased reliance on Title IX enforcement as a means of advancing women in academic science and engineering. In 2004, the GAO asked granting agencies to insure

that grant recipients were in compliance with Title IX.16 What this might mean in

practice and whether such compliance reviews are being conducted is not entirely

clear. Last year, Senators Boxer and Wyden called for an amendment to the National Science Foundation Reauthorization Act that would require the NSF to conVerDate 11-MAY-2000 15:09 Feb 06, 2008 Jkt 038258 PO 00000 Frm 00052 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 C:\WORKD\R&SE07\101707\38258 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
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duct compliance reviews as well. The original intent of Title IX was to insure equal

education opportunity for both sexes. Yet relatively little has been done (outside of

the arena of athletics) to make that mandate meaningful when it comes to addressing opportunities for academic achievement and advancement for women in traditionally male dominated fields. We now understand more clearly than ever before

that the academic achievement of young women in math, engineering, and science

depends on the presence of positive female role models as well as women peers in

the class room. To support equal academic opportunities for these young women, we

ought to use the leverage of federal education funding to mandate Title IX compliance within the faculty of our research universities. Creating equality of opportunity

for women within the faculty will have a big effect in allowing a young woman to

imagine herself as one of the great scientists or inventors of her generation.

BIOGRAPHY FOR GRETCHEN RITTER

Dr. Gretchen Ritter is Professor of Government and Director of the Center for

Women’s and Gender Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. She is also currently serving as Co-Chair of the Gender Equity Task Force that was appointed by

Provost Steven Leslie. She received her B.S. in government at Cornell University

and her Ph.D. in political science from MIT. Professor Ritter specializes in studies

of American politics, constitutional development, and gender politics from a historical and theoretical perspective. She has published two books as well as numerous

articles and essays. Her current research examines the impact of work-family issues

on gender equity in the United States. Professor Ritter has been a Faculty Fellow

at Princeton University, a Liberal Arts Fellow at Harvard Law School, and has received a National Endowment for the Humanities fellowship.

DISCUSSION

Chairman BAIRD. Thank you, Dr. Ritter. I very much appreciate

the comments and will now proceed to questioning. The standard

procedure is that each Member gets five minutes for questioning.

We rotate back and forth across the sides.

A question from me is I hear a lot of praise of the ADVANCE

program. My assumption would be, probably, that institutions that

have applied for the ADVANCE program are already pretty savvy

to this. And so you have got—meaning that at least somebody in

leadership at that institution says we need to address this; hence,

they apply for the grant. So my question would be what can we do

to expand that, learn from what has worked in ADVANCE and

then expand that to other institutions?

Dr. Hrabowski, you are prompt with a hand up, so——

Dr. HRABOWSKI. I am, because, first of all, and I think Donna

would agree with me on this, unlike in companies, presidents can’t

make people do many things at universities. It is called consensus

building and shared governance and committees that take more

time than you might expect sometimes.

What am I saying? So you can talk about bringing people——

Chairman BAIRD. They call it, Doctor, the faculty senate for a

good reason.

Dr. HRABOWSKI. Touche ́. I will tell you this: it seems to me the

people who are applying have some people on that campus who realize there are issues. But one of the reasons they are applying is

there are challenges.

Now, this is one thing that I have to say, and I can say this as

an African American. I have met so many scientists who are not

aware of the issues or who don’t necessarily believe there are these

issues, and they are good people. But we are all products of our environment. Whether it is about increasing the number of minorities

50

on the faculty, or increasing the number of women, people need

education at every level. It seems to me, as we develop these ADVANCE campuses, we need incentives to continue applying what

we’ve learned and incentives to replicate.

To use what we are learning, we have a group of faculty from

the University of Michigan on our campus, a group of people who

came and worked with our faculty. It was great. And so I think we

can—we need incentive, though, to do that kind of work. I also

think that as we think about all of the NSF funding that goes out

into the campuses, we need ways of substantively tying these

issues together. I really believe so. People will listen to money. I

mean when you talk about the money that you have.

I do want to recommend that you look at page four of my testimony. There is one point to be made here. This is a picture of all

of the women who came our Faculty Horizons Program. Half of

these women are women of color. I wanted to make this point

about this. What it did for my campus was to say to the departments people exist who have Ph.D.s who are Black and Hispanic

women. We need to look at those women, talk about developing

them, helping them with post-docs, thinking about them for faculty

positions so that while we want to continue increasing the number

of women of color, the fact is there are more out there than we

might think, and companies do a much better job than universities.

NSF can help us in bringing these women to our campuses, getting to know each other, and building that momentum.

Chairman BAIRD. Very well said. Dr. Shalala.

Dr. SHALALA. I just want to tell a quick story, parleying on what

my colleague said here.

My proudest moment at the University of Wisconsin Madison

was when an African American woman said to me that we had

hired so many African American women she didn’t have to like

them all.

Chairman BAIRD. That is a great story. You know, we had tried

to embody this earlier. I acknowledged the staff. I should note that

when I mention staff, the senior staff are both doctorates in

science, and they are both sitting right next to us, both women.

This committee, particularly under Vern Ehlers’s leadership on the

Republican side, but Bart Gordon on the Democratic side, has

made a commitment to this.

You mentioned the incentives, Dr. Hrabowski, but one of the

things that I note is when you apply for tenure, it is basically your

personal research productivity. You get about zero credit for having

mentored—and I have been through this process—for having

mentored young students. And so the incentives for our faculty to

bring young students along the line and move them into the track

towards graduate school is near nil. I don’t know if you have identified any institutions that include some credit for mentoring or

graduate students acceptance or admission along the way, but it

would be an interesting thought—or if you have included it in your

own practices. If you have a faculty member who mentors young

students, do they get credit, because my experience has been that

many times women faculty are particularly more interested in

bringing along the next generation, but at their own detriment

when it comes to tenure application.

51

Any thoughts on that? Dr. Olsen.

Dr. OLSEN. Actually, I have couple things. First of all, you know

that we actually provide Presidential Awards for Mentoring, and

his institution has won, I think, two. The Competes Bill also has

some interesting comments on mentoring that the National Science

Foundation is taking to heart. In the NSF geosciences Directorate,

we have a requirement for the grant proposal that when they have

graduate students in that, that they talk about the mentoring within that grant.

So we are really moving towards that because we know that

mentoring does work.

Chairman BAIRD. Dr. Ritter, you look like you may have a

though on that.

Dr. RITTER. Yeah, I think you are finding women and minority

faculty doing more than their fair share of the mentoring is a real

concern. I think what often happens, what has been noticed at our

institution and happens elsewhere as well, is a lot of women get

stuck at the midlevel and never make it to the senior level, essentially, because they are taking up more of a service burden because

there are too few of them.

Chairman BAIRD. Dr. Hrabowski.

Dr. HRABOWSKI. The institutional culture has everything to do

with this. It seems to me two things, number one, the NSF IGERT

grants are great in terms of training and having incentives for people to get involved in working with students in this, but we are

convinced that by having an individualized faculty-development

plan for women and for faculty in general to know exactly what is

expected and to make sure that the person isn’t overwhelmed is

very important because women are often asked to do far more than

people even realize because they are good at doing it. And we need

a culture, though, that makes sure that someone is working with

that young woman to make sure she is not overdoing in some areas

that will not help her move towards tenure.

Chairman BAIRD. I am going to move Dr. Ehlers.

Mr. EHLERS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. First of all, two quick

comments on the testimony. Dr. Shalala talked about sports and

the NCAA. The obvious solution is to designate the sciences as

sport.

Dr. HRABOWSKI. By the way, chess is a sport in Russia.

Mr. EHLERS. That is right. Chess already is a sport.

But there are two advantage to that. First the NCAA rules would

apply, but secondly, you would also share in the football revenues.

The other comment is, Dr. Hrabowski, you made a comment

about the politics, faculty politics. It reminds me of when I first got

into politics. One of my colleagues commended me and said I am

just amazed. You know, you come from academia, and you just

really understand the politics around this place. I said, well, frankly, this is real politics. It is a lot easier than academic politics.

Dr. HRABOWSKI. Where the pie is much smaller.

Mr. EHLERS. Anyway, back to business. Pardon me.

First of all, insight from any of you on this: there are some professions that have done pretty well at achieving close to 50/50,

medicine, law—that is not much a science, but nevertheless, it was

traditionally male—and there are various other professions. Have

52

you any of you looked at that and analyzed how that happened

as—particularly in medicine which is science related, compared to

the problems you are encountering? Is there something unique

about the universities that limits this?

Dr. CAMPBELL. This is exactly something that I have been curious about. How is that fire departments and police departments

are more integrated than physics departments? How is it that the

navy is more integrated than physics departments? And part of the

answer, frankly, comes from the ability to have true, top-down decision made. And that is something that in many fields in academics,

a top-down decision to try to do something like that is going to be

met with resistance from everyone involved, and exactly the opposite effect is going to be achieved.

I don’t think that the kinds of solutions that we are seeing in

those other kinds of fields are practical here, and so many of the

kinds of things that we have to do really are changing the climate,

as we have talked about, and that has to occur at the stages where

the everyday interactions and the everyday decisions are being

made.

Mr. EHLERS. Thank you. Dr. Ritter, you wanted to answer that?

Dr. RITTER. Yes, I would just have a couple of things. One is that

one issue in academia, I think, is the coincidence of tenure track

with family formation creates particular stresses. I think one of the

reasons why medicine has done better is that it is easier to be a

successful professional and not have an 80-hour-a-week job. You

can’t do that as an assistant professor at a top research university.

Law, actually, I think it really depends on which field of law we

are talking about. There are very, very few women partners still

at major firms.

Mr. EHLERS. Dr. Shalala?

Dr. SHALALA. Thank you very much. Actually, we have done pretty well in medical schools in terms of students and in law schools

in terms of students. It still gets narrower when you go to the top

in terms of the tenure faculty appointment in medical schools. The

reason the numbers look better is because women go into the clinical tracks, and there we can have flexibility in terms of how many

hours you work. So we still see the same things in medical school

in terms of chairman positions, tenure-track positions, moving to

full professors, where the numbers aren’t very good.

There is no question the pool is huge, and I think that is our fundamental point. Elementary and secondary education has done a

terrific job in terms of encouraging young people, women in particular to go into science. We have these huge pools at the undergraduate level. At the graduate level it gets narrower. In the great

research universities, it gets even narrower.

That is true in medicine, but in medicine, they have another kind

of track called the clinical track, and that is where you will see

larger percentages of women.

Mr. EHLERS. This relates to a follow-up question, and that is do

you have any data or do you have any idea how many women will

choose, in a particular situation, to go into some other profession

rather than university teaching because of these factors?

Dr. HRABOWSKI. Let me start with women in general and women

of color. As we have produced Ph.D.s on our campus and then sent

53

them other places, I have listened to the voices of those new Ph.D.s

in science, women and women of color, and what I find is the quality of mentoring has been very uneven. When the advisor is very

supportive, you will have a greater probability that that young

woman will think about post-doctoral experiences and the possibility of going into university. Unfortunately, when the advisor has

not understood the role that he could have played—and it is often

he, quite frankly—or has just not understood the challenges she

has faced, the person wants to leave the academy because companies are much more welcoming.

What others will tell you is, to the extent that it has been a terrible experience—and you talked about this earlier. If they have

not had a great experience—and I talk about it in my testimony

with a woman who just said it has just been a lonely road, and I

don’t want this anymore. So the quality of the experience while in

grad school, the quality of mentoring will determine the extent to

which the person may even consider the possibility of continuing on

to a post-doc.

Mr. EHLERS. Dr. Olsen, you——

Dr. OLSEN. I just wanted to point out again, that right now, 52

percent of the majors in science in the undergraduate level are

women, and one of the things that the National Science Foundation

has been really fostering as well is the fact that a Ph.D. really

opens up the way that you think. And people go to law school, not

because they are going to practice law, but because it opens up opportunities, and I think people here, with the number of doctorates

sitting up there, knows that earning that degree in science or engineering really can open up a lot of careers, and some are more supportive for women and industries tend to really—have gotten onto

the childcare and these issues. I think the academy is learning that

this is a critical component. But we are really trying to get more

people, males, females, under-representeds, to actually major in

science and engineering all of the way to the Ph.D. levels and then

hopefully have a plethora of career opportunities for them, waiting

for them.

Chairman EHLERS. Thank you.

Mr. BAIRD. Thank you, Dr. Ehlers.

You know, reflecting on my own graduate experience which was

somewhat mixed in terms of the enjoyment level, it may be a manifestation of the superior intelligence of women that so many drop

out of the graduate program.

Dr. McNerney.

Mr. MCNERNEY. Well, I have to say your testimony, all of you,

has been energetic. It has been interesting, informative, and hopefully, we can make some progress here.

Dr. Shalala, in your testimony, you report a dreadful number, 15

percent of full professorships are women. Some of that might be

due to legacy effects. Is there any more encouraging news in the

last five or ten years on that subject, or is there any statistics in

that?

Dr. SHALALA. There are statistics. It is not increasing much. We

look specifically at the major research universities, so that is where

the difficulty has been. We looked at the top research universities,

where federal money is going, NIH money, NSF money, because we

54

though it was important that if the United States is investing its

scientific moneys in the great research universities in this country,

then we can expect them to expect that the personnel will be the

most talented, so we focused there.

You know, the numbers are getting better, not fast enough given

the pool. The interesting thing about the study—and I actually

didn’t want to chair this panel, not my subject of expertise. I sort

of got talked into it by the National Academies into doing it. But

what I learned was that the pools are there for the first time.

We used to say, you know, we got to develop the pools. That was

our excuse. The pools aren’t there. And what I mean by that is the

52 percent. There are women studying science, and that is why I

give praise—somehow the elementary and secondary education has

excited young women about science enough so they are majoring in

it in our major colleges and minor colleges and universities, frankly. But to get them to the Ph.D. level, even when they get there,

they don’t seem to get the jobs at the major institutions. That is

why we know that there are cultural issues. There are sensitivity

issues. There are opportunity issues. There is a network that needs

to be worked. That is why we are so optimistic, because it is not

the pool issue anymore. It is our behavior.

Mr. MCNERNEY. Well, one of the things we have talked about

this in this committee is the deterrent for people to go into science

and research in general because the compensation is poor. The

number of years it takes to get to a good position, and then once

you are there, again, the compensation is that not that great compared to what you could be doing in industry, so I think we are in

trouble in general on this issue, and one of the things I like to

soapbox about is how we really can’t afford to leave anyone behind.

Our nation needs to pick up every single person of any color or any

background or any religion, because we need them for our future

challenges. And anything we can do to encourage that is something

that is our responsibility and our duty, so we look forward to your

good ideas.

Dr. Hrabowski.

Dr. HRABOWSKI. I really do want you to remember too, though—

and I have to say this—that while we have a few more African

Americans, for example, and Hispanics making it at the Ph.D.

level, women or men, the fact is that you still only have about five

percent of the Ph.D.s going to African American in the country, so

there are still very few women of color, Black and Hispanic, from

certain groups, who are at the Ph.D. level, and I think it is so important to keep thinking about both of these issues.

When I was a grad student in mathematics at Illinois, there was

only one woman in the whole department of mathematics. She understood how alone I was, and she connected to me, and that is

why I know from personal experience, quite frankly, that white

women and kids of color, there is a connection there because of the

loneliness that they feel, and it is important to think about how we

keep building both of those pools.

Mr. MCNERNEY. Well, what specific steps would be most effective

in terms of academic roles in terms of getting women and people

of color to move into these spaces?

55

Dr. HRABOWSKI. Just to suggest that for the women that we

get—it is so interesting to me. We need incentives to help institutions work with the researchers, mainly the guys, to pull women

in as post-docs and to pull them in to think about faculty positions

and to give them the kind of support that males just get naturally,

in the bathroom, on the golf course, on the basketball court. I mean

it may sound trite, but it is so true. I see it all the time. The

woman just wasn’t in the room when certain discussions were

being held. And mentoring is a very important part of that. We still

have many people who think mentoring is warm and fuzzy stuff,

not realizing that we, males, in general, get much more mentoring

than we realize.

Mr. MCNERNEY. Well, we certainly recognize the importance of

mentoring all of the way from kindergarten on up, so that is something that we could think about in our role. Thank you very much.

I yield back.

Dr. HRABOWSKI. Economic incentives, financial incentives. It

makes the people listen to the money talk.

Mr. NEUBERGER. Well, as you can tell, at this end of the table,

from here, that direction, are all doctors, and I dumb down the

room by bringing a business guy into the room, and so I thank the

Chairman for having this hearing.

Dr. Ritter, it is always good to have a fellow Texan here, and our

Red Raiders are going to—speaking of football—going to come

down and visit you all in just a few weeks, and I hope you will be

kind to us.

I would like a little bit of bragging, before we talk some questions here. But I went to Texas Tech University and had the honor

and privilege of representing Texas Tech University, where I believe we have about 12 schools there, and five of our deans are

women. And so I think there is some progress being made, and obviously from listening to the panel today, I hear that we need to

make some more progress.

I want to go along a couple of question. The title of this hearing,

and we have gotten off on some interesting topics, but Women in

Academic Science and Engineering, and when you look at some of

the charts, in some areas, women are increasing in number, and

in fact a majority in coming into some of the sciences, life sciences,

and some of those. I think 52 percent, we use that number.

And so a couple of questions, will it take us time—I mean I come

from a tradition—and probably what would happen today—I have

two grandsons. I had two sons, and so we gave them Lincoln Logs

and erector sets and microscopes and stuff like that, and if I had

a granddaughter, I would want to be dress her up and dolls, and

so we kind of set a precedent early on in kind of classifying what

roles that young women have, and that is probably a maybe a mistake on granddaddy’s part.

But the other piece of that is a lot of the women that are going

into the sciences and going into law and medicine, that produces

high income for them outside of the academic world. And so is the

fact that a lot of women are not staying in the academic world related to the fact that they don’t see a lot of role models in the academic world, or is this entrepreneurial economic opportunity out

there that corporate America has provided where women seem to

56

be, in some fields, moving up through the ranks a little faster? Are

they being funneled out in that way, instead of staying in academia?

Dr. Shalala.

Dr. SHALALA. You know, we didn’t find that at all. We found that

they were being turned off and discouraged moving up. There is

just no way the economic incentives of the private sector is pulling

off that many women, that there really are barriers here and discouragement and a lack of encouragement and a lack of

mentorship, a lack of strategies, narrow search processes.

What my colleague here was talking about is, you know, if you

really want to find a minority woman in science, you can’t just pick

some narrow field that you are going to recruit in. You have got

to broaden your recruiting opportunities, and I am sure that Dr.

Campbell found that in physics as well, that you have to try different strategies.

But you know, it is just—we are not convinced it is a pool problem. We are convinced that there are barriers and bias from both

women and men that we have to overcome. Economic incentives

help. Economic incentives, you know, as a businessman, changes

behavior. And if we are going to plow billions of dollars into science

in this country, our only issue is, not that you have got to hire

women to do it, but you have got to hire the best people. And if

that is the standard, we believe that women will get a fair shot.

And we just have to make sure that we don’t have those barriers

there.

All of us have stories from our own careers, of crazy things that

people have said to us, and we are lucky we are here today.

Mr. NEUBERGER. Dr. Olsen.

Dr. OLSEN. Yeah, I love data, okay, and there is this wonderful

chart from Nelson and Rodgers, and it is in biology, where they

show that both males and females in 2002 were equal numbers in

terms of getting their Ph.D.s. But then when you saw the first faculty position, it was something like 70 percent males and 30 percent women. And yet, they are there, and they are asking did you

want the faculty position or did you want to go elsewhere? And it

turned out that the women were just not getting interviewed. And

the women that did make it to the interview stage were then very

successful in terms of getting the job, getting back to your report,

in terms of the implicit thing.

But salary still is an issue, and this is true in academic, but

throughout, women tend to make less salaries for the same positions as males. And what is interesting—and I will do a story—but

when I was at my university, it was a research-intensive university. I had my own NIH grant, and I was co-PI on the grant, the

PI on the NIH grant was out, and I realized that the post-docs on

the grant that I was co-PI on were making more money than I was,

and it was a shocker, and of course. It was—my personality—I got

a raise! But the thing is that we don’t know a lot of this stuff, and

so it is really, again, the culture, the mentoring, in terms of what

the salary is.

Dr. SHALALA. The professional journals have had to take off—

send out the journal articles blind to make sure that you could

overcome the bias. Members of my panel told me they used their

57

initials early in their careers when they sent out their journal articles to make sure they got a fair review of those articles.

Dr. CAMPBELL. I would like to come back to your question about

is it the economic incentives? And all of my anecdotal evidence in

talking to people who have decided to go out, the answer is no.

That is not what the incentive is.

I would also like to come back to the question of mentoring. Mentoring is very important. This is one of the lessons that we have

learned from ADVANCE. And in my department, we have now instituted formal mentoring for all junior faculty. In addition, we do

take into account junior faculty’s mentoring of students in their

tenure-review process, so mentoring is something that is taken

very seriously.

I also want to come back to your question about how long is it

going to take? Again, this was something that was sponsored by

NSF and the Department of Energy. The American Physical Society hosted a meeting of all of the chairs of physics departments,

and I served on the panel for that, exactly addressing this kind of

issue. And out of that meeting was a stated goal that we want to

double the number of women in physics departments in 15 years.

And the 15 years allows us to say there are two components to this

problem: there is the here and the right now, and this is something

that is being addressed with ADVANCE. And there is what are we

going to do for training students who are coming up? What are we

going to do to for undergraduates and graduate students and postdocs? Attention has to be placed there as well.

And finally, I can’t not make a football comment. Michigan also

has a football team, and it is my personal goal, I want a physics

department which is going to make our football players proud to

say I am from Michigan.

Mr. NEUBERGER. Dr. Hrabowski.

Dr. HRABOWSKI. Two points, you know, you may not know it, but

a part of the mentoring for women is teaching them how to negotiate. It is very interesting that guys go in being much more aggressive, and older guys like us can be so responsive to the aggressiveness and just assume that the woman doesn’t need it because

she didn’t ask for it. So the negotiating process is very important

in all of this work.

And the other point is, in terms of things that can be done, I

think that—and it was something that Dr. Campbell just said—the

idea of using the societies, the different disciplinary society, and

having leveraging with NSF with physics and chemistry and biology and the different subgroups to have sessions that focus on this,

because if people haven’t been around the discussions and a part

of it, they tend to see it as something that is not as serious an

issue. And it needs to be known that the country sees it as a very

serious issue.

Chairman BAIRD. We are going to probably have time for just

two more sets of questions, and then—this time, Pavlov was right.

We do have votes coming up now.

Having been in academia and having been through a period

when diversity training and sensitivity training was big at my university, followed by a drop in enrollment—totally unrelated, just

the demographic bubble went down that year—and then it became

58

necessary to lay off a bunch of faculty, and it was taken for granted

that the most recently hired faculty would be the first to go, which

meant persons of color and women, and as a untenured white, male

faculty member, I said we ought to stop that, which meant, frankly,

that the women behind me would have been able to jump me. But

it was the right thing to do, but you should have seen the outcry.

This was within two year of this sensitivity-training workshop, and

then suddenly, it is like wait a minute. It only goes so far here,

bringing people on board.

The reason I preface with that without a hammer—it seems, you

know, academia likes to think of itself as superior to every other

institution in the world, but we have cited examples of police, military, business, et cetera, that I think is actually much more progressive than the academic world. And my question would be what

kind of hammer can we use or should we use, and relate it to Dr.

Shalala’s observation about NCAA or Title IX. What would enforcement of Title IX—Dr. Ritter noted this—what would that enforcement look like? So what can we do to put some pressure on, from

not just a positive model, which I think are very meritorious like

the ADVANCE program, but real-world, pressure, consequences if

you don’t do it from federal funding or other operations.

Dr. RITTER. In terms of enforcement, I think there are a couple

of things. One is I think that presidents and provosts need to be

willing to hold their deans accountable, and deans need to be willing to hold their chairs accountable for things like whether or not

they have diverse pools or their willingness to invite diverse candidates to campus, for their ability to meet goal that have been set

and agreed upon. Unless you are willing to say you can’t hire next

year because you haven’t made a good-faith effort to diversify your

pool, then it is not going to have.

Chairman BAIRD. You have got to have that kind of top-down

consequences.

Dr. RITTER. You have to have that kind of accountability. And in

terms of Title IX enforcement, I do think we need to be thoughtful

abut what effective compliance would look like there. I know there

is a lot of debate about this right now, and I don’t know that the

right model is going to be something like the athletic model, but

we can only improve on what we are doing now, because currently,

virtually nothing is being done.

Dr. SHALALA. We talked in our panel, and we have some language in here about developing an NCAA type of organization,

something between the universities and the government that

would, as opposed to using a government agency as such, that

would thoughtfully develop the goals and be realistic about it in

terms of marching towards a much fairer system, and that, certainly, is worth looking into.

Unlike the NCAA, though, the Federal Government really does

have the clout of money, requiring that—I mean NSF is a model

for calling in department chairs. These are pretty straightforward

things to do, but we should not be focusing just on NSF. The big

dollars are in the National Institutes of Health, and if the NIH,

through their institutions, aren’t fully participating, then we don’t

have a chance of getting this done in the major research universities.

59

Chairman BAIRD. Well put. Dr. Campbell, you were going to say

something?

Dr. CAMPBELL. Yes, our department did have a Title IX audit.

NASA came in and audited our department for Title IX compliance,

and the effect of that was almost nothing, that we were totally

in——

Chairman BAIRD. Shucks, I thought you were going to say it

rocked us.

Dr. CAMPBELL. So perhaps there are places where they clearly

are in violation of the law, clearly are in violation of Title IX, but

I think it is, as you said in your introduction, a much subtler problem, and has to do with the climate, and it does not have to do with

a flagrant violation of the law.

Dr. HRABOWSKI. We have got to get people to believe that this

is not just the right thing to do, but it is the best thing for science.

And it seems to me that hammers don’t work the same way in universities. This is my sixteenth year as President. Believe me; I

know what I am talking about. But money does talk, and the idea

of leveraging the federal funding, NASA, NIH, NSF, in such a way

that you can encourage institutions that are making a difference in

this area through grants and training, for example, that will be

connected to the research infrastructure in such a way that places

will want to be in this. I mean places want to be a part of NSF

with the ADVANCE grant. ‘‘Every time I go to speak at a university, the first question they ask is how can you talk to us about

what you’re doing with NSF?’’ Presidents ask me, ‘‘Talk to my faculty, engineers, and tell us how great it is and what it does.’’ I

think if we can use the mechanisms we have and leverage opportunities to bring different national agencies together, institutions listen to the National Science infrastructure because they have the

money, and there are ways of doing it without it coming across like

a hammer, but rather in a way of highlighting the best in training

and diversity and in science infrastructure.

Dr. SHALALA. I absolutely agree with that. I really think that to

get this right we have to understand the culture that we come from

and those incentives will make a difference. But it is also professional organization and accrediting organizations, and in addition

to the major funders, the professional organizations have come a

long way, but they have a long way to go yet.

Dr. OLSEN. But it is not just good for science, it is good for America. It is good for our economy and well being, and that is the point

that needs to be infused throughout.

Chairman BAIRD. I think that might be an appropriate final comment for this hearing. I really have been enlightened and inspired

by this hearing. I am grateful for the witnesses. We, unfortunately,

have to go vote, but rather than holding you here for another set

of questions, because the votes can take longer than we would like,

I would just express my gratitude on the part of the Committee for

all of your work on this, and we look forward to pursuing this vigorously in the future, and this hearing now stands adjourned.

[Whereupon, at 3:22 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]

(61)

Appendix:

ANSWERS TO POST-HEARING QUESTIONS

62

ANSWERS TO POST-HEARING QUESTIONS

Responses by Donna E. Shalala, Professor of Political Science; President, University

of Miami

Questions submitted by Representative Vernon J. Ehlers

Q1. Many of you emphasized that as higher education administrators, you do not

mandate change but encourage it in little ways at all levels. What would be the

worst thing(s) Congress could do legislatively? What would be the best thing(s)

Congress could do to help improve the environment for female faculty in S&P

A1. The worst thing Congress could do legislatively would be to mandate a one-size

fits all solution for all university campuses: For example, mandating that the professoriate be 50 percent women. While such a goal would be desirable, using a federal mandate to obtain it is not. The effect of a de facto quota would likely be to

increase tensions among faculty and thus actually worsen the campus climate for

women. The Beyond Bias and Barriers report recommends several actions at the federal

level. One of the primary recommendations is for Congress to mandate that federal

grant-making agencies implement a Title IX review of recipient organizations. Such

a review would be based on data collected by individual institutions and organized

and maintained by an inter-institutional NCAA-like oversight organization. Congress could partially fund such an inter-institutional effort, and those institutions

that participate could be provided technical assistance with data collection procedures and compliance with anti-discrimination laws. In conjunction with regular

Congressional oversight hearings of federal enforcement and granting agencies, such

an approach could be very effective in encouraging adequate enforcement of antidiscrimination laws.

Another option is for Congress to increase funding for federal agency programs,

such as the NSF ADVANCE program, whose goal is to test a variety of data collection and anti-discrimination compliance programs in situ on campuses across the

Nation. Such a strategy has been shown to not only stimulate research at our nation’s universities and colleges but also to improve the recruitment and retention

of women in science and engineering programs and careers. To support campus efforts, Congress could request that federal agencies support regular national meetings of scientists and engineers to disseminate the strategies found to be successful

through such research efforts.

Questions submitted by Representative Ralph M. Hall

Q1. When asked about how medicine has overcome biases barriers present in science

and engineering, you mentioned a clinical track in the University of Miami’s

medical program that many women choose. Can you explain this clinical track

and explain how it differs from the other tracks available in the school of medicine? Why does this track attract more women than other tracks?

A1. The University of Miami’s Miller School of Medicine’s clinical-educator

track: The clinical-educator track at the Miller School of Medicine is intended for

faculty members whose primary professional activities are teaching and clinical

services, as opposed to research. The intent of having different tracks is to allow

promotion criteria to match the professional focus of a faculty member. Faculty

members who focus their time and talent on clinical and education duties would not

be promoted if the only criteria were based on achievements in research. In the clinical-educator track, promotion is based on tangible contributions in clinical-education. For the assistant and associate professor level, impact should be in the local,

regional and State environment; national contributions are required to achieve full

professor status.

Current implementation of a track system remains challenging nationwide. The

definition of tangible contribution in education is elusive. In research, contributions

are literally counted, in terms of numbers of publications, the prestige of the journal

in which faculty members publish and sustained level of grant funding. We lack

similar quantifiable means of measuring education impact. Thus, even in current

clinical-educator tracks, promotion standards remain slanted toward publication and

grant funding.

Over time, the goal is to align promotion and tenure criteria to reward educators’

academic impact. This would mean a promotion review that recognizes factors such

as curriculum development, innovation in clinical care or education, and impact on

policy and funding of medical education.

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Why does this track attract more women than other tracks? Nationwide,

women in academic medicine are more likely than men to choose roles in clinical

care and education rather than research. At UM, more than half of women faculty

members define their roles as mainly in teaching and clinical services. Factors contributing to this trend in professional choice may include the time pressures of familial responsibilities and child-bearing, a lack of female role models and mentors

in academic medicine, and perceived barriers for women to succeed in research.

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ANSWERS TO POST-HEARING QUESTIONS

Responses by Kathie L. Olsen, Deputy Director, National Science Foundation

Questions submitted by Chairman Brian Baird

Q1. Another witness from the panel, Myron Campbell, recommended that the National Science Foundation (NSF) create a postdoctoral fellowships program

analogous to its Graduate Research Fellowships program to enable faculty to

draw from a larger pool of applicants. One of the findings from the ADVANCE

program has been that open, broad based searches result in a larger, more diverse pool of applicants. Dr. Campbell argued that while universities can implement this process on their own with respect to recruiting new assistant professors, most don’t have the resources to do the same for post-docs, who are most

often recruited through small, informal networks to the exclusion of everyone

else. Has NSF considered creating a postdoctoral research fellowships program?

Please elaborate on any plans to create such a program or explanation for not

pursuing this option.

A1. The National Science Foundation (NSF) currently has several postdoctoral research fellowship programs managed within the research Directorates and Offices

(see attached list of programs). For example, the Directorates for Biological Sciences

(BIO) and for Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences (SBE) currently jointly

sponsor a program of Minority Postdoctoral Research Fellowships and Supporting

Activities that provides postdoctoral fellowships, research starter grants, and travel

grants. This program was evaluated in 2004 by SRI International (EEC 9815246),

which concluded that the program was meeting its broad goal of preparing scientists

from under-represented ethnic groups at advanced levels for academic positions and

leadership in industry and government. In addition, many postdoctorals are supported by NSF through research awards made to university faculty members and

to research centers.

We also note that several ADVANCE projects are working on the development of

systemic approaches to facilitate the identification of a more diverse pool of talented

potential postdoctoral fellows for universities to track and develop as future faculty.

For example, in late 2006, Rice University created a National Female Ph.D. and

Postdoctoral Database (http://www.advance.tice.edu/database/), drawing from applicants to its ADVANCE-funded workshop on ‘‘Negotiating the Ideal Faculty Position.’’ At this time there are over 700 scholars in the database, and hundreds of visitors to the site have made use of it as part of recruitment outreach. Taking a different approach, the University of Illinois Chicago ADVANCE program recruited nationally in order to bring in a cohort of ADVANCE-supported postdoctorals to increase the number of well qualified female candidates for faculty positions.

Q2. Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 prohibits discrimination on the

basis of sex in education programs and activities receiving any federal financial

assistance. A 2004 GAO Report (GAO–04–639) found that only Department of

Education had conducted the required periodic compliance reviews, and that the

granting agencies had not effectively coordinated the implementation of compliance reviews. Please describe how NSF has responded to the GAO recommendations in the three years since the report, including any plans to implement periodic compliance reviews as well as efforts to coordinate implementation with

other granting agencies.

A2. As for the second question, NSF takes seriously its responsibility to ensure that

the educational and research institutions that it funds comply fully with Title IX.

Every grant awarded by NSF includes a clause whereby the grantee contractually

agrees to comply fully with Title IX.

In addition, in accordance with the recommendations in the GAO report, we have

been working diligently to develop a post award Title IX compliance program. To

that end, since the issuance of the GAO report, we have been exchanging ideas and

information with other agencies that are establishing or refining their post-award

compliance review programs, such as NASA and the Department of Energy, to ensure that the reviews are meaningful and effective.

In 2005, NSF conducted an on-site post-award Title IX compliance review at Columbia University. After the review was completed, we assessed our newly-developed approach to conducting compliance reviews, and engaged in additional dialogue

with other Federal grant-making agencies. NSF determined that a more coordinated

Federal approach to such reviews might be appropriate to ensure consistency, and

to avoid the prospect of agencies engaging in duplicative efforts.

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Subsequently, NSF had a series of conversations with the Office of Science and

Technology Policy suggesting that the National Science and Technology Council

(‘‘NSTC’’) take on the development of a coordinated Federal research agency approach to Title IX post-award compliance reviews—the NSTC Research Business

Models Subcommittee of the Committee on Science has been tasked with this coordination.

Question submitted by Representative Vernon J. Ehlers

Q1. Many of you emphasized that as higher educational administrators, you do not

mandate change but encourage it in little ways at all levels. What would be the

worst thing(s) Congress could do legislatively? What would be the best thing(s)

Congress could do to help improve the environment for female faculty in S&E?

A1. It appears that this question is addressed to the three current higher educational administrators that were on the panel; Drs. Donna Shalala, Freeman

Hrabowski, and Myron Campbell.

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ANSWERS TO POST-HEARING QUESTIONS

Responses by Freeman A. Hrabowski, III, President, University of Maryland, Baltimore County

Questions submitted by Representative Vernon J. Ehlers

Q1. Many of you emphasized that as higher educational administrators, you do not

mandate change but encourage it in little ways at all levels. What would be the

worst thing(s) Congress could do legislatively? What would be the best thing(s)

Congress could do to help improve the environment for female faculty in S&E?

A1. Congressional legislative action on behalf of women in science and engineering

has profound implications, not only for those it seeks to benefit, but also for those

charged with its enforcement. Consequently, the worst thing Congress could do is

produce expedient legislation not informed by the substantial body of research that

addresses the unique challenges women in these fields are facing in America’s colleges and universities. Responsible legislative action should reflect current studies

in the field in order to create effective, multi-faceted, approaches to achieving gender parity in science and engineering (S&E).

Women’s full potential in academic S&E across our nation will be realized only

through a long-term, bipartisan Congressional commitment to transforming institutions of higher learning. The accumulated disadvantages women experience in these

fields reflect a powerful history of institutional bias and discrimination in academe.

In short, such a legacy can be remedied only by sustained Congressional mandates

for compliance, expanded roles for key federal funding agencies, and authorization

of additional targeted resources for critical initiatives. Accordingly, Congress should

consider taking the following actions to improve the environment for women in

S&E:

1) Continue Funding the NSF ADVANCE Grant Program: Through its effective administration of institutional transformation grants, the NSF ADVANCE Program

has demonstrated a record of excellence in establishing innovative models and comprehensive programs that have substantially increased the participation of women

faculty in S&E. The NSF ADVANCE Program’s funding of transformation initiatives across a broad spectrum of institutions (liberal arts colleges, community colleges, Historically Black Colleges and Universities, women’s colleges, and research

universities) has been fundamental to its success. Consequently, to ensure the national impact of these efforts, Congress should continue funding the NSF ADVANCE

Program as a way to engage many more colleges and universities in this vital enterprise.

2) Expand Funding to Sustain and Replicate Success of NSF ADVANCE Campuses:

In oral testimony before the House Subcommittee on Research and Science Education, I stressed the importance of expanding NSF ADVANCE funding in order to

sustain and replicate the success of exemplary ADVANCE campuses. NSF provides

no funding for sustainability and offers only modest support for narrow replication

efforts through the Partnerships for Adaptation, Implementation, and Dissemination

(PAID). The lack of federal funding in these areas jeopardizes the future impact of

the NSF ADVANCE Program because many successful campuses do not have sufficient funding of their own to sustain and replicate their efforts. As the initial rounds

of NSF support end for ADVANCE campuses, we are quickly learning that a shortsighted approach to continued funding is stalling our efforts to help meet the continuing demand for a highly educated S&E workforce. I urge Congress to expand

the mandate of the NSF ADVANCE Program to provide funding for sustaining and

replicating exemplary campus initiatives. The recent reassignment of the NSF ADVANCE Grant Program to the Directorate for Education and Human Resources

under new leadership offers an unprecedented opportunity for collaboration with undergraduate and graduate science education initiatives.

3) Establish Dedicated Federal Funding of Scholarship Programs and Training

Grants for Under-represented Minority Undergraduate and Graduate Students in

STEM: Although encouraged by the modest increase in NSF’s overall funding, I am

concerned that NSF resources for science education have decreased in recent years.

Efforts to remedy the crisis in science education funding for innovative programs

have been caught in a series of fiscal Continuing Resolutions in Congress. In addition, current limitations for federal scholarship funding and training grants have

significantly impeded full participation by under-represented minorities in S&E. I

strongly urge Congress to look at successful training models such as the Meyerhoff

Scholarship Program at UMBC.

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4) Support Full Anti-Discrimination Compliance and Enforcement: Meeting the Nation’s demand for a well-trained and inclusive S&E workforce requires greater diligence in anti-discrimination compliance and enforcement efforts. Federal agencies

(especially NSF, NIH, and NSA) should leverage their funding to provide incentives

for research universities to recruit, support, and advance women and minority faculty in STEM. This incentive-based approach should be coupled with a mandate

that federal agencies extend the enforcement of anti-discrimination laws at universities through regular compliance reviews as a condition of continued funding. Expanding the application of Title IX of the Civil Rights Act beyond athletics to include academic areas as well, especially in S&E, would result in even more substantial advances for gender equity.

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ANSWERS TO POST-HEARING QUESTIONS

Submitted to Myron Campbell, Chair, Physics Department, University of Michigan

These questions were submitted to the witness, but were not responded to by the

time of publication.

Questions submitted by Representative Vernon J. Ehlers

Q1. Many of you emphasized that as higher educational administrators, you do not

mandate change but encourage it in little ways at all levels. What would be the

worst thing(s) Congress could do legislatively? What would be the best thing(s)

Congress could do to help improve the environment for female faculty in S&E?

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ANSWERS TO POST-HEARING QUESTIONS

Responses by Gretchen Ritter, Professor of Government; Director, Center for Women’s

and Gender Studies, University of Texas at Austin

Questions submitted by Representative Vernon J. Ehlers

Q1. Many of you emphasized that as higher educational administrators, you do not

mandate change but encourage it in little ways at all levels. What would be the

worst thing(s) Congress could do legislatively? What would be the best thing(s)

Congress could do to help improve the environment for female faculty in S&E?

A1. The worse thing that Congress could do is to say that this is just a problem

for the universities. Taking a completely hands-off approach is not likely to result

in significant efforts to improve the situation of women faculty in under-represented

fields on many campuses.

One of the best things Congress could do legislatively is to ask for greater accountability from universities. Research universities depend upon federal research

funding. Colleges and universities at all levels receive other forms of federal educational assistance. In order to continue to receive this assistance, Congress should

ask universities to be accountable in providing equal opportunity and a supportive

work environment for female faculty in under-represented fields. Applying Title IX

standards in academia (as we do in sports) would create positive incentives for universities to recruit and retain talented women in science and engineering.

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