New year, new challenges for Women in Physics

Gender issues are set to take centre stage in 2016, already this January we have seen strides taken to address sexual harassment within the Astronomy community. It is my hope that what has happened (mainly in the US at present) will send waves through other communities – and persuade them to revisit their policies and procedures when dealing with it. I urge you all to look up the procedure for dealing with sexual harassment complaints in your own department, and hope dearly that you never need them but you may be able to help someone who does.

So, onward from that somber note, 2016 will see the pilot members of Science in Australia Gender Equity (SAGE) forum put together their applications for the equivalent of the Athena Swan Awards. With the awards due to be handed out in 2018, this will set the new standard for policies of gender equity across science institutions in Australia. Elsewhere, WiSENet have merges with Women in Science AUSTRALIA – hopefully making for a louder voice in advocating women in STEM subjects.

Looking forward, in December we have the joint 13th Asian Pacific Physics Conference and 22nd Australian Institute of Physics Congress happening in Brisbane from the 4th-8th December. We are hoping to have a similar program of Women in Physics sessions, and are looking for suggestions of invited speakers for these. It’s a really exciting opportunity to discuss our issues with our colleagues from Asia.

Other articles of interest Meg Urry’s comment in Nature on Science and gender – why we all must work harder for gender equity. 

The University of Arizona has put together an information sheet about how to avoid gender bias in reference writing. Find that at this link.

An interesting paper in Physical review special topics – physics education research, on 'Factors that affect the physical science career interest of female students.'

And this just made me smile.

My 5-year old's best friend has a science lab in her house. Not pictured: wash station, balance, microscope pic.twitter.com/5BbeIA37hR

— Andrew D. Steen (@drdrewsteen) January 20, 2016

Women get a much needed boost in research funding gender equity plan

Sarah Maddison, Swinburne University of Technology

Women make up 44% of Australian academics, but just 24% of professors. One of the contributing factors for this disparity is that there are fewer women applying for research grants than men, even though women are just as successful at winning grants as men.

Given that research grant success is a key promotion criterion at most institutes, this hampers the ability of women to reach senior positions. So if we can encourage more women to apply for grants, then this could help increase the number of women professors.

This week saw the Australian Research Council (ARC) announce its Gender Equality Action Plan. This includes a range of actions aimed to ensure equal opportunity for men and women to participate in its National Competitive Grants Programme.

The ARC has already included maternity and paternity leave for all grants, and part-time options for early and mid career researchers with children or other carer responsibilities. It has also extended the eligibility criteria of some grants to account for time out of research for maternity leave and carer responsibilities.

Previously, the ARC would rate research output relative to the number of years since PhD completion, which would disadvantage women who had taken time out to start a family. Now research performance is based on the opportunity the researcher has had to do research.

The ARC has also introduced two prestigious Australian Laureate Fellowships specifically targeted for outstanding women.

The ARC Gender Equality Action Plan collects all these initiatives into a single document, along with new initiatives such as improving the gender balance of ARC selection committee members, raising awareness of parental leave entitlements and part-time options, and monitoring the impact of recent changes to eligibility and leave provisions.

ARC Centres of Excellence will also be required to develop and implement an equity plan.

It will also consider unconscious bias training for grant assessors and the ARC College of Experts, who are the people who ultimately decide who gets funded and who does not.

Why change is needed

These initiatives are long overdue and whole-heartedly supported by the academic community.

While there is still debate over whether parenthood decreases productivity among academics, various studies show that the rate of research output drops for women returning from maternity leave and their research output is affected until their children are teenagers.

This effect is also far greater for mothers than fathers. A recent study of 10,000 economists found the research productivity of mothers dropped by 17% compared to 5% for fathers.

Targets and quotas make some people uncomfortable. But such actions are probably needed to create the disruptive change required to re-balance gender inequities. While differences in the grant success rates for men and women are relatively small, there are enormous differences in the numbers of men and women applying for ARC funding across almost all disciplines.

In the STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) areas, between three and seven times more men than women are applying for grants. In the HASS (health, arts and social science) areas, this drops to one to three times more men than women applying. There are more women than men applying for ARC grants in only two fields of research: education; and language, communication and culture.

This is why the two targeted Laureate Fellowships (one in STEM and one in HASS) are accompanied by additional funds to support ambassadorial activities by the recipient to promote women in research and to mentor early career researchers.

Now that research output is judged relative to opportunity, career breaks and non-research tasks (like heavy teaching and administrative loads) can be taken into consideration.

Going forward

The ARC has no control over the employment conditions or workplace culture in universities, but it does control the research funding. Because ARC grants are generally paid to organisations rather than to researchers, they can put conditions on the funding. The ARC requires research institutes to comply with the Workplace Gender Equality Act 2012 when signing funding agreements.

The ARC also expects institutes to have a gender equity policy in place. If the ARC wanted to push the issue, it could require institutes to hold a Workplace Gender Equality Agency Employer of Choice for Gender Equality award, for example. Or it could require institutes to participate in programs like the Science Australia Gender Equity (SAGE) initiative.

The Australian Academy of Science and the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering recently launched this pilot of the Athena SWAN Charter, which aims to improve gender equity and increase participation of women in STEMM (the second “M” is for medicine). The SAGE pilot is strongly supported by the ARC.

The Athena SWAN initiative began in the United Kingdom with the aim of encouraging and supporting women in STEMM careers. Since 2011, UK medical research institutes have been required to have an Athena SWAN award to receive research funds.

Will the ARC head in that same direction? There is no doubt that funding drives behaviour. And if the ARC Gender Equality Action Plan can drive good behaviours, then it will be a great success.

Sarah Maddison, Dean of Science, Professor of Astrophysics, Swinburne University of Technology

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Where do we go from here?

It has now been six months since the Women in Physics group was rejuvenated at the AIP congress in December.  Since then we've had renewed motivation from the AIP council to support our aim, seen a blog established to support the community, have seen our committee members co-opted to a number of other positions in the AIP and now have picked our 2015 Women in physics lecturer.

It's probably time that we started to think strategically about what our aims are up to December 2016, and how we are going to move towards them.  So with that in mind, I’m (Helen – Chair of the Women in Physics group) putting together a strategy, outlining our issues and suggesting an (realistic) action to undertake.  So I thought I’d put this to you all – please add your thoughts in the comments!  What I’ll do is collate them and put a finalised strategy and action to the committee.      

Women in Physics group draft strategy 2014-2016

What are the BIG issues?

1.    Vast drop in young women taking high-school physics in Australia.

2.    Women aren’t reaching top positions in physics and physics-based industries.

3.    Women in developing countries in need of support for their science.

What do we do already?

The group already assists in the well-established AIP women in physics lecture tour, definitely a positive step towards addressing issue 1 through a positive role model. 

Established session at AIP congress every two years.  This has been very successful, along with the establishment of a ‘Women in Physics’ breakfast.  Excellent networking for issue 2.

Establishment of Women in Physics blog http://womeninphysicsoz.blogspot.com.au/ , rather than a newsletter.  The idea is that it will be more ‘evolving’ and allow more people to be involved and comment.

What are the difficulties in doing more?

We’re quite a diverse bunch.  Think that the reason that the astronomers seem a lot more focused (and successful in these activities) is that they are united about a science focus.  With a rapidly declining number of just physics departments it is getting harder to identify who is a physicist.  We are all pretty cross disciplinary these days. 

No one is collating the numbers.  Gender balance statistics used to be collected, but now aren’t. 

Geography, a problem for all Australian societies – membership is spread over an area the size of Europe.  That said, collating numbers should enable us to identify where people are so that we run

Possible things to help us do more?

Partnerships – Women in Engineering,  RACI,  Women in Astronomy?

Involvement with Science Academy’s SAGE project?

Seeking sponsorship – have seen some very impressive  work by the UNSW engineers in seeking sponsorship for their events http://wieunsw.weebly.com/

How to move forward?

At present, partnership must be key.  I propose to approach the Women in Chemistry group of RACI, and suggested a joint event in Sydney (they have run networking events in Melbourne, so would increase their reach too).  Propose event of ‘science leadership’ – plus networking after.   

Congratualtions Cathy

We'd like to congratulate Cathy Foley who, along with her colleague Keith Leslie, was awarded the prestigious Clunies Ross award for innovation and commercialisation.  This has been for the development of the LANDTEM system, which has discovered $4 billion of ore deposits across Australia - and $10 billion across the world. 

Cathy is a former Women in Physics lecturer and Chair of the Women in Physics group.  She's a fantastic role model and incredible supporter of women in physics.  Do check out her TEDx talk on what women can do for science - it's a great outline of the issues and how unconscious bias can hold us all back and what we can do to move ourselves forward. 

Inspiration at all levels

Today the Science Academy elected its new fellows, and we were delighted to see two women physicists afforded the honour.  You can learn more about Professor Maria Forsyth and Professor Christine Charles in the videos the Academy have produced about them and their work.

  
Elsewhere, some of you may have see reference to the #girlswithtoys hashtag, a response to an offhand comment by a senior US Astronomer that astronomy was just 'boys with toys'. Cue thousands of women scientists saying 'hang on a moment, we're here too!'  The outcry got quite a bit of media exposure - and resulted in some lovely images - we've picked a few below.  Perhaps you have more to add? 

Nope! Not even at Nat'l Labs: Science isn't just for 'boys with toys' http://t.co/D9Nq1dK20x @mashable #GirlsWithToys pic.twitter.com/WlU81upz5c

— LosAlamosNationalLab (@LosAlamosNatLab) May 18, 2015

Maria Goeppert Mayer, 1963 #NobelPrize in Physics for discoveries concerning nuclear shell structure #GirlsWithToys pic.twitter.com/e8U3iP63j3

— The Nobel Prize (@NobelPrize) May 18, 2015

Katharine Blodgett, 1st woman to earn a physics PhD @Cambridge_Uni, with a Langmuir-Blodgett trough: #girlswithtoys pic.twitter.com/sP8rovBUib

— Dr Paul Coxon (@paulcoxon) May 17, 2015

I'm afraid Margaret Hamilton just won #GirlsWithToys “@stevemilan: Still blown away by this photo. pic.twitter.com/9KsiKCAKRh”

— Elizabeth Tasker (@girlandkat) May 17, 2015

Professional Scientist Remuneration Survey

Many of you might be interested in completing the Professional Scientist Remuneration Survey, currently being carried out by Science and Technology Australia.  

Why?  Well, from their website:

'The survey has been conducted annually since 2005. Its purpose is to provide a snapshot of prevailing market salaries paid to professional scientists. It is important this type of information is current and readily available to scientists as they negotiate the terms and conditions of their individual employment contracts or explore new employment opportunities. The survey is an important tool in establishing market rates paid to professional scientists and helps provide valuable information to those working as professional scientists and those contemplating a career in science.

No identification is required to complete the survey questionnaire and all information supplied is held in the strictest confidence. A summary of results will be made available on the Professionals Australia and STA websites later in the year.'

Announcing the 2015 Women in Physics Lecturer

We're very happy to announce that Jodie Bradby, Associate Professor at ANU, has been selected (from a record-breaking field of nominations) to be our 2015 Women in Physics lecturer - congratulations Jodie!

While Jodie's Australian-wide tour is being finalised, we were able to ask some 'get to know you' questions about Jodie and her work.  

What inspired you to become a physicist?

At my high school in country Victoria all the kids who were classified as ‘clever’ were strongly encouraged into the science and maths subjects. So I took chemistry, biology, physics and maths. This turned out to be a good fit as I found science both interesting and fun- in particular the pracs were really fun. And it way easier for me than writing long essays where there was no right answer (how on earth to deal with that?). The deal was sealed when I was in Year 10 or 11 I went on one of those camps for science kids at Monash University. I had a ball, met lots of other kids who were also interested in science so then it was just a question of what type of science? Physics ended up winning the day for the somewhat trivial reasons that I found chemistry uninspiring in school and there were too many big words to spell in biology! Plus Physics was the most mathematical of the sciences and I also enjoyed that aspect of the work. So here I am!

Who would you say your Physics hero is?

I have been asked this question in a job interview before and it is a really great question. When I was growing up I greatly admired many scientists who were not physicists - the environmentalist David Suzuki and the giant of natural history David Attenborough for instance. Actually I don’t think I knew any Physicists as apart from Einstein and Newton – it was well before Brian Cox’s time! Then I read some of Richard Feynman books and he was my hero for a while. But now, given I am lucky enough work as a physicist (pinches self!), I am constantly surrounded by amazing scientist and my real heroes are much closer and more personal. For instance, I admire the way Prof Marvin Cohen at UC Berkeley works so effectively with his students and only takes 2-3 students on at a time because he doesn’t feel he can have a close relationship with a large group while still producing remarkable results. I admire the way Dr Guoyin Shen, the head of the High Pressure Sector at Argonne National Lab takes the time to chat with the groups visiting his beamline and gently offers his scientific insights and experience. I admire the work of Dr Katie Mack at Melbourne University for her strong outreach work on her own terms and closest to home I really do admire my mentor Prof Jim Williams at ANU who has simply trusted in me from the beginning and who has taught me so much in terms of both science and life.

What do you think has been the most exciting discovery (in Physics?) of the last 10 years?

I guess you would have to say the discovery of Dark Matter and Dark Energy is the most exciting discovery in physics for some time. Really, how can you go past the discovery of ~95% of the universe? Even if you argue that this has zero impact on our daily lives, and indeed by definition you cannot interact with Dark Matter and Energy so this is very true, such big discoveries really do help inspire the public and are the stuff of big scientific dreams.

But if I can be allowed a second place, I would like to take an example from my own field of condensed matter physics (sometimes called ‘materials science’ – it is basically the science of ‘stuff’!). Currently thousands of materials scientists all over the world are tackling one of the major challenges of our generation – how to generate and store enough clean energy to run our planet. In the past 10 years the advances in solar and battery technologies have been remarkable. However, it is hard to point to one specific scientific discovery from one specific scientific group or person that has made the difference. The truth is that the idea of a single ‘big’ discovery by a single scientist is not how much of modern science works. The real advances come from large groups of scientists all contributing a small solution to the problem. So perhaps this is not as exciting as Dark Matter and Dark Energy – but you can argue it is a lot more important for the future of the human race. 

One of your areas of expertise is in nanoindentation, can you tell us a little about that?

Certainly! Nanoindentation is essentially a method to measuring how things deform when you poke them, and, as prefix ‘nano’ suggests, we can do this at really small scales. How small? Well a nanometre is mind-bogglingly small. So small it basically impossible for the human brain to visualise – we are talking about the scale of atoms - a single gold atom is about one third of a nanometre. Anyway back to the nanoindenter. This instrument uses a specially shaped diamond to ‘poke’ materials at the nanoscale. Depending on the force applied to the diamond tip, and how deep the diamond tip gets pushed into the sample, we can gain lots of useful information like the mechanical properties of material being poked at the nanoscale. And why do we care about that? Well one of the fascinating quirks of nature is that as the scale of objects shrinks down to the nanoscale, their physical properties actually change. This is the basis of nanoscience and nanotechnology. So something that is ‘soft’ at a normal human length scale might actually be quite ‘hard’ at the nanoscale.

One topic that you’re covering in your lecture is super-hard materials, how do these materials impact on our daily lives?

Many many scientists and engineers are working on making better, stronger and harder materials. We rely on such advanced materials everyday – we just don't always see how amazing they are and far technology has come. Superhard materials such as diamond, sapphire, cubic boron-nitride and other materials are used as thin-films, coating, cutting tools and in a vast number of applications that require hard, wear-resistant materials – from a coating on an artificial heart, to the inside of a fusion reactor to the face of a watch or phone. (Although having dropped a phone recently I reckon there is still lots of work to do!)

Any advice for aspiring young scientists?

My advice is to always hang in there. One of the interesting and challenging aspects to establishing a career in science is that there is not one clear path to success. This can appear super scary to a young person thinking about starting out in the field but it is actually a huge advantage. Just think about it. If there are lots of paths available you should be able to find the one that best suits you.

So hang in there if you fail a few subjects - we have all been there! Hang in there if you aren’t dux of your school - you don't have to be the smartest kid in the state to do science. Hang in there if your experiments are going wrong or if you feel there are no jobs to apply for when you graduate. Remember that a career in science is diverse and can range from the laboratory to the classroom to industry and government. And importantly hang in there because of ‘science’ and the good it can do society. Science really needs people with diverse backgrounds and skill sets. Science needs people who are ‘people-people’ as well as strong logical thinkers. Science needs people who can see the opportunities that a discovery could uncover and people who can run complex instruments while teaching a group of students at the same time. We need all types in science – so if you hang in there chances are you will find your niche that will enable you to contribute your love of science to create a better world. And what can be better than that!