(The "maternal wall" is sexism. If it impacted men, academia would not be shaped liked this. This is not to detract from the article, which is awesome.)
An alternative argument for why women leave STEM
591–600 of 748 posts
Re: An alternative argument for why women leave STEM
#592One thing that she touched on that I've thought a lot about recently is the age at which we have kids. My father passed away a couple of weeks ago, and I compare him to his brother. My uncle had his first kid 10 years younger than my dad, and he ended up with the fourth one being older than me. He's got 10 grandchildren, the oldest of which is an adult now. My dad's grandchildren will never know him in any real way.…
I think about this a lot as well. My wife and I decided to have our first child at 30, which is fairly early compared to our peers. Economically it would have been better to wait, we’ve each had career opportunities we couldn’t take advantage of because of having children, and if somehow we could have waited until 40 I think we would have had an easier time economically. But, physically and emotionally, I wish we cou…
Hopefully People just live longer and healthier? That can solve this problem a bit
Re: An alternative argument for why women leave STEM
#593I think it's still a form of sexism to assume women are the ones who need to care for a child. That's something that very few diversity-in-STEM folks are really thinking about. Many years ago an ex-girlfriend, who works in STEM academia (and is otherwise a liberal, progressive feminist), expressed concerns similar to the author about having kids. When I brought up that it wasn't written in stone that she would need t…
Your point (and there is truth to it) might work in industry, but in academia there is an expectation (as is mentioned in the OP) that you move around a lot.
Even if the husband takes care of the child, doing your masters in LA, your PhD in London, and a postdoc in Sidney, why on earth would anyone want to drag a child along with them?
Re: An alternative argument for why women leave STEM
#594Earlier quoted context omitted.
> With all due respect, I don’t understand this call to action. Faculty position is basically a zero sum game. If more women end up as faculty, fewer men will. So, unless it costs more to train women than men, I doubt any “investment” would be saved The assumption is that aptitude for these positions is roughly the same between genders, so if there's a significant imbalance, society doesn't get the best people on the…
> The assumption is that aptitude for these positions is roughly the same between genders, so if there's a significant imbalance, society doesn't get the best people on the given set of seats. Aptitude can be exactly equal and aiming at equality can still be a poor choice if men and women are different. Among medical school graduates women are more likely never to practice, to work part time, to retire early and less…
The article argues about roles in academia and how women drop out during/after PhD programs.
If your goal is to maximize the number of hours worked in the medical profession, you should optimize for that _much_ earlier in the pipeline because all those post-PhD women who then move into part time work already took away precious college resources from those hard working men who are more likely to work past retirement age (if they don't die of a heart attack long before reaching that still-working-at-80 panacea).
(may contain traces of sarcasm)
Re: An alternative argument for why women leave STEM
#595Earlier quoted context omitted.
It may have also been the case, that before industrialization, metal smelting, and anything-faster-than-walking the world was inherently safe. Daycare only become necessary once transportation, tools that could cut, and exposed toxins became abundant. Imagine a world were all parents let their children roam the streets from dawn til dinner, child-right-of-way, and any harm befalling a child was universally met with p…
> It may have also been the case, that before industrialization, metal smelting, and anything-faster-than-walking the world was inherently safe. I would disagree: historically, kids had to cope with other threats - illnesses, toxic or otherwise deadly animals, general accidents that are "tiny nothings" today could cripple or even kill you back then because there were no antibiotics... Back 200 years ago, this only wo…
I know a family that's under 30, just had their second, just bought a house, and is a single earner as a middle/high school teacher. It is possible, it just requires some sacrifice.
Re: An alternative argument for why women leave STEM
#596Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you are going to claim something as harmful as that, I want you to present clear evidence and peer reviewed studies to support your claims. What you were suggesting is that men are better than women at STEM. Simplg saying men have more testosterone doesn't cut it as evidence. (Besides, competitiveness doesn't make you a better researcher or employee, and can even be harmful in a team). I also need data for the num…
Start here [1]. This is delving dangerously close to flame war territory, so I probably won't respond further. But I'd like to point out that because of attitudes like this >If you are going to continue with this subtle sexist talk (implying men are better than women at STEM) You're probably unlikely to find too much on the subject - it's dangerous to academic careers to even propose research which could potentially…
> Start here [1]
I see nothing there but speculation about evolutionary history. It would be a shame if the potential STEM contributions of half of the human race were left fallow because of a half-assed evolutionary just-so story.
Re: An alternative argument for why women leave STEM
#597Earlier quoted context omitted.
Good point. A bit of nuance: Young children are information sponges. Think about how easy a 2-3 year old picks up language. It is not that hard to believe that 2-3 year olds also pick up behavioral patterns from their surroundings. For life. Do we want Mothers to shape their young children's behavioral patterns, or low paid child care workers with no skin in the game? 8 year olds? Send them to school with a key aroun…
That's not necessarily an argument against daycare, it is an argument for high quality daycare. Studies show that boys with working mothers are less sexist and have more positive relationships with woman in general. Picking up behavior patterns goes both ways.
Yeah here in Iceland we have state run kindergarten’s open to kids from 18 months. They are staffed by degree educated people specialising in child development as well as assistants. They’re nothing but delightful in my experience. They are definitely underpaid though and I would absolutely like them to be paid more.
I’ve also heard horror stories of private daycares from my friends who have lived in the US though. Particularly those studying so without particularly high incomes.
Re: An alternative argument for why women leave STEM
#598I think the author buried the lede here. My biggest takeaway from the article is that you'd have to be an absolute sucker to work in academia given how poorly you'll be treated. Each person that puts up with this only makes the problem worse, giving at least tacit approval to the status quo. If folks were to start opting out of academia in larger numbers for jobs in private industry, schools would be forced to improv…
I have no question why a reasonable person, woman or not, might stay away from academia. I wonder why there are few women in engineering, where the conditions and the pay are so much better. I've seen a number of women in IT industry, from junior developers to CTOs, and most of them were brilliant and sharp. But they are still a minority in the field. This puzzles me.
Like you almost all women I've seen in tech are brilliant. The best explanation I have for the imbalance is lack of interest on average. Having a son, we could see the difference even from around age 1. Boys really are drawn to things that move while girls seem to react more to social interactions. We really tried not to influence e.g. with the choice of toys. I find it no surprise that 20 years later the same boys fill up IT and engineering while the girls are working in HR and corporate communication. There's always outliers, and I we need to take care of them especially because their contributions can be very valuable (on both sides), but I think trying to evening out the gender gap in all jobs is like chasing an invisible dragon.
Re: An alternative argument for why women leave STEM
#599Thanks, Karen Morenz, for providing a unified, panoramic view of the ways that the standard academic career progression short-changes many female scientists, even if each step along the way seems to make sense. It's worth taking a look at three other professions with long, high-intensity pathways from apprentice to master --all of which have been wrestling with the same challenges. They are management consulting, law…
I think careers in IT/software can have exactly the same issues of work/life balance, though it's very dependent on which industry and company you work in.
For an extreme example, just look at the AAA games industry.
Having said that, I think you could say the same about most industries unfortunately. I don't know if it's just because that's what competition forces us into, but I would guess that is a big part of it.
Re: An alternative argument for why women leave STEM
#600Earlier quoted context omitted.
> and make room for Mothers to take care of their own children. Whoa, 50's regression much? Why not make room for fathers to take care of their own children? > in the care of poorly paid strangers Or you could leave your children in the care of educated professionals in child development, who will ensure your children gets age- and stage-appropriate stimulation, as well as socialization with other children in a safe…
> you could leave your children in the care of educated professionals in child development... That sounds wonderful, but it's economically impossible, except for the rich. The cost would be near or exceed what most people clear working a job.
It wouldn’t be if society recognised the importance of the next generation and pooled together collectively.