IB WIS End-of-Semester Ice Cream Social - Tue May 8th @ 5pm!

Please join us this Tuesday (tomorrow!) for the IB Women in Science end-of-semester event. Ice cream will be provided and beer will be offered for a small donation. Come have a sundae or a drink, meet those in neighboring departments, support our group, and find out about how you can be involved! If you are not a woman in science, chances are you know/work with/are married to one. The issues that face women in science face us all, directly or indirectly. IBWIS hosts monthly meetings during the Spring and Fall semesters, and would love to extend the invitation to students, post-docs, faculty, staff, and those in other departments. Come to the event tomorrow to learn more about our group and how you can be involved.

When: Tuesday, May 8, 5-7pm
Where: VLSB courtyard (or 2063 if it's raining)
Who:   Graduate students, post-docs, faculty, and staff are all welcome.


Bring your plate, cup, and utensils to reduce waste. This meeting is generously funded by the Graduate Assembly and the Department of Integrative Biology.  If you have any questions, or would like to be on our listserve, please contact any of the IB WIS organizers.

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April 10th Meeting Minutes - Dr. Bree Rosenblum

At our April meeting, Dr. Erica Bree Rosenblum, who joined ESPM this semester as an Assistant Professor, shared sage advice about interviewing, writing, balancing family life with academia, and being a successful faculty member with IBWIS members. Dr. Rosenblum's biography and minutes from the April meeting are now posted online!

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Upcoming Meeting with Dr. Erica Bree Rosenblum, April 10th, 1:00pm

When: TUESDAY April 10th, 1:00-2:30
Where: 2063 VLSB
Who:   Graduate students, post-docs, faculty, and staff are all welcome. 
What: This month we will hear from new Assistant Professor in ESPM, Dr. Erica Bree Rosenblum.  Dr. Rosenblum completed her PhD at UC Berkeley in the MVZ and taught as an Assistant Professor at the University of Idaho before returning to Berkeley.  She is the recipient of an NSF CAREER award and her research, which focuses on biodiversity, speciation and extinction in reptiles and amphibians of the western US, has been funded by both NSF and NIH grants.  Dr. Rosenblum also has two young children and an academic husband; she will speak to us about navigating different career and life stages and being successful as a woman in science.


If possible, please RSVP to thammond [at] berkeley [dot] edu


Bring your plate, cup, and utensils to reduce waste. This meeting is generously funded by the Graduate Assembly and the Department of Integrative Biology.

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Field Research Resources

For our March meeting on field research, we gathered a number of field season planning resources that our members might find helpful. We are publishing these resources in this document and below the fold.

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March 14th Meeting Minutes - Fieldwork

Women in Science Meeting 

March 14th, 2012

Topic: Fieldwork 

I. Introductions

-Student panelists 

-Maria Padilla:

• Campus Climate and Compliance Office
• Importance of talking and bringing up issues early after they arise; preventative action

II. How to set up field work/connections for field sites

-Apply for fellowships early

-Fulbright

-Moorea/other Berkeley stations

-GSIing Moorea course

-Write lots of emails

-Look at authors of papers you’re interested in

-Government sources

-Talk to museums to access field notes

-Talk to groups that work where you want to to get your foot in the door

-Go on a training trip/field course to get started and make connections

III. How to pick a field site

(Much more after the jump!)

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Graduate Women's Project Study Hall/Clothing Swap

The Graduate Women's Project at Berkeley is hosting a study hall and clothing swap event (with food!) this Saturday, March 17th, 10am-4pm at Anthony Hall.  Here's the announcement from the Graduate Women's Project coordinator:

The Graduate Women's Project is having a special Study Hall this weekend. As always, a light breakfast and lunch are provided. Anthony Hall will be open from 10AM to 4PM on Saturday, March 17. Come and enjoy a quiet, comfortable place to study.  

In addition to the usual work session, we will be having the annual spring cleaning, closet exchange event. Everyone is encouraged to bring clothes, shoes and accessories that they are interested in trading/exchanging with others at the Study Hall. I will set up a table in the morning (probably on the patio) where folks can lay out their stuff and we can continue to trade throughout the day -- perhaps engaging in some more active interactions over lunch. 

Ground rules: 1) You don't have to bring anything to take something you really like -- but reciprocity works best, in general! 2) Anything left over at the end of the day will donated to a local battered women's shelter. 3) Please bring items for donation only in a separate bag.

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Upcoming Meeting on Fieldwork: March 14, 1:00 pm

When: March 14th, 1:00-2:30
Where: 2063 VLSB
Who:   Graduate students, post-docs, faculty, and staff are all welcome. 
What: At this meeting we will discuss fieldwork logistics, safety, and boundaries.  Graduate students will talk about their experiences with field work - good and bad.  We will discuss the problem solving skills necessary for planning and conducting the best field season possible.  Graduate students who have completed extensive field work are especially welcomed to come and discuss their experiences. 


If possible, please RSVP to thammond [at] berkeley [dot] edu


Bring your plate, cup, and utensils to reduce waste. This meeting is generously funded by the Graduate Assembly and the Department of Integrative Biology.

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Meeting Minutes - Feb 8th - Outreach

General Summary 8 Feb 2012 Meeting:
At this meeting we discussed our involvement in outreach activities, heard from Judy Scotchmoor about the UCMP outreach and education program, and heard about the upcoming Expanding Your Horizons conference at UC Berkeley on March 3rd.  (http://www.expandingyourhorizons.org/conferences/EYHBERKELEY/)

(Much more after the break!)

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Miss Representation screening, March 17th @1pm

There will be a local screening of the documentary Miss Representation hosted by the I.M.P.A.C.T. Alliance on March 17th at 1pm in 2050 VLSB.

Written and directed by Jennifer Siebel Newsom, Miss Representation exposes how mainstream media contribute to the under-representation of women in positions of power and influence in America.  The film challenges the media's limited and often disparaging portrayals of women and girls, which make it difficult for women to achieve leadership positions and for the average woman to feel powerful herself.

Miss Representationincludes stories from teenage girls and provocative interviews with politicians, journalists, entertainers, activists and academics like Condoleezza Rice, Lisa Ling, Nancy Pelosi, Katie Couric, Rachel Maddow, Rosario Dawson, Jackson Katz, Jean Kilbourne, and Gloria Steinem.  The film offers startling facts and statistics that will leave audiences shaken and armed with a new perspective. 

You can see a trailer for the film here.

Tickets are available here.

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Motherhood and the Leaky Pipeline

Several new articles have come out this February on the leaky pipeline problem and the impacts of motherhood on women in science and engineering. 

Deborah Kaminski and Cheryl Geisler examined the effects of gender on faculty retention using a survival analysis in a Science publication (CHE summary here). They found that in STEM fields overall, gender did not affect faculty retention or promotion rates during the first 10 years of employment.  However, when they examined specific disciplines, they found that that in mathematics, women remain in academic positions for significantly less time than men. Although Kaminiski and Geisler believe that their conclusions indicate that STEM departments are headed toward gender parity, they also point out that due to the inertia caused by long faculty careers, it will take decades for the number of female faculty to reflect the number of women in the hiring pool and it may take as long as 100 years before women commonly represent 50% of the faculty in STEM departments.

In an article in American Scientist this month, Wendy Williams and Stephen Ceci provide an in depth review of the role of motherhood (or, in some cases, the desire for it) in causing the leaky pipeline. The article is complex and well-worth a read, but argues that of the most-often cited causes of the leaky pipeline (ability differences, career and lifestyle differences, sex discrimination), career preferences and lifestyle differences, especially the desire to have children, are the most important reasons that women leave the academic career trajectory at higher rates than men.

Citations

Kaminski D and Geisler C. 2012. Survival Analysis of Faculty Retention in Science and Engineering by Gender. Science. 335: 864.

Williams WM and Ceci SJ. 2012. When Scientists Choose Motherhood. American Scientist. http://www.americanscientist.org/issues/feature/2012/2/when-scientists-choose-motherhood/1. Accessed 2/22/2012.

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Expanding Your Horizons Conference - March 3rd

For the first time, UC Berkeley is hosting the Expanding Your Horizons (EYH) conference!  From the EYH website (link):

"Expanding Your Horizons (EYH) is a conference for girls in middle school from Berkeley and surrounding areas. This day-long event will include hands-on activities in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). At the conference, girls will get a chance to meet STEM role models and learn more about careers in those fields. Our ultimate goal is to motivate girls to become innovative and creative thinkers ready to meet 21st Century challenges."

The conference is on March 3rd, 2012 and starts at 8:30am.  If you're a student, professor or professional interested in volunteering at the conference or helping prepare beforehand, email: berkeleyEYH2012 [at] gmail [dot] com. 

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Exploring Alternative Careers in MCB 295: Life After Grad School!

Although many PhD students in the biological sciences enter graduate school with the clear goal of becoming a principle investigator at an R1 institution, by the time they graduate, their career goals have often changed. To facilitate an exploration of alternative careers, the Department of Molecular and Cell Biology (MCB) here at UC Berkeley runs a seminar course in the spring called "Life after Grad School." The course brings in speakers from many different institutions who represent different career paths available to newly minted PhDs. MCB has just posted the Spring 2012 speaker schedule and it includes representatives from industry, museums, forensics, and smaller colleges. 


The seminar meets Tuesdays at 6pm in 101 Barker.

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Upcoming Meeting - Feb 8, 1:00pm, 2063 VLSB - Outreach

When: February 8, 1:00-2:30 pm

Where: 2063 VLSB

What: At this meeting, we will discuss and learn about academic outreach opportunities, including the Expanding Your Horizons conference at Berkeley.  We will also consider how outreach benefits communities and how it fits into scientific careers.

Join us for a meal and a great discussion!  All faculty, staff, graduate students and post-docs are welcome (male and female!).

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Welcome!

Welcome to the new Integrative Biology Women in Science website!  We'll keep this site up to date with information on upcoming meetings, minutes from past meetings, and blogs on relevant topics.  Please check back frequently for regular updates!

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