Lauren+M

blog about gender/science [].

nytimes: lack of women in science isn't due to biology []

nytimes: the power of suggestion []

nytimes: math scores same for boys & girls []

nytimes: computer science recruits girls []

rolinson: title ix for science []

whitten on physicstoday: starts from home life []

the independent: top 10 women scienctists uk []

nsf: raising female scienctists []

etzkowitz: barriers to women in science []

extended project proposal: The Proud. The Few. The...Female Scientists, Technicians, Engineers, and Mathematicians? In the past, women who pursued any kind of scholarly goals were censured and cast out from society as misfits who have stepped outside of society’s constraining ideals. However, the times have changed, and today more women than men are attending college. Despite this revolution in education, equality remains to be seen in fields traditionally considered to be male-dominated, specifically in science, technology, mathematics, and engineering (STEM). For some reason, a distinct line has been drawn between the humanities and social sciences and STEM which women are either unable or unwilling to cross. The lack of women studying STEM is most often attributed to biological differences between men and women, factors influencing girls in childhood and early home and school life, low self confidence in women studying STEM, bias perceived by women working in STEM, and lack of accommodations for differences between male and female employees. Out of these possible causes, the most prevalent and pressing factors which influence young women not to study STEM are factors in early home and school life and gender bias against female scholars in STEM. Each of these possible influencing factors must, for the sake of both young women and the world, be made public and remedied. Some scholars believe that the paucity of women in STEM sprouts from innate, biological differences which simply cannot be avoided. An article covering a National Science Foundation report on gender disparity in The New York Times proves otherwise with a quote from Catherine Hill, the project leader, who says “ None of the research convincingly links those differences [in male and female brains] to specific skills, so we don’t know what they mean in terms of mathematical abilities.” The article goes on to argue against innate differences by stating that girls are performing at much higher levels on standardized tests than thirty years ago. The report argues that major evolution and biological changes are not capable of occurring as quickly as thirty years, thus ruling out biological differences as a possible cause of gender disparity in STEM.