Tuesday, July 2, 2013

What Can I Do? Give a Talk on a Women-in-Science Topic


Many graduate students and postdocs would like to do something to promote women in astronomy and help create a female-friendly workplace, but their time for such activities is limited. This is the second in a series of monthly posts with suggestions for those who want to help but don’t have the time to commit to being a full-fledged CSWA member. Today’s suggestion: give a lunch talk in your department/research group summarizing information on a Women-in-Science topic that interests you. You don’t have to start from scratch. Here are two suggestions for getting started:

(1) Check out the CSWA resources page for information on the two-body problem, work-life balance, sexual harassment, mentoring, unconscious bias, diversity, and taking a career break.

(2) Download Why So Few? from AAUW (it’s free). The report presents evidence that social and environmental factors contribute to the underrepresentation of women and girls in STEM. Focus on any chapter – they are all good! Two of my favorites: Stereotypes and Spatial Skills. They even have a ready-made powerpoint presentation.

1 comment :

kelle said...

I would especially like to encourage white men to consider giving talks on diversity issues. These talks are likely to have much higher impact with everyone in the audience and helps minimize any stigma that might be attached to a woman or minority speaker as whiner or troublemaker.