I'm a grad student finishing up a PhD in CS. (As any grad student knows, "finishing up" can take a while.) This topic- gender and mentoring in the sciences- is one that I've thought over a great deal in the last several years. It's even influenced my probable career choice.

I should mention that the shortage of female CS students appears to be limited to the US. Our international students from India and China show no gender skew. The results from India surprised me, because I've been told that the academy "feels" more sexist there; several female students have described having male instructors who didn't feel they should be pursuing a professional career at all.

My department, not surprisingly, is dominated by male professors, many foreign. (We have 20 professors: 17 male, 3 female. 10, including all the female profs, are American-born. Our new department chair is one of the female professors.) So, the suggestion that hiring more female professors will help the mentoring of women makes some sense.

On the one hand, this is a point I can appreciate. The 2 or 3 professors that I've found most helpful have been male and American-born. Perhaps that's because it was easier to develop a personal rapport with instructors who, despite generational differences, had a fair amount in common with me in terms of gender and upbringing. It turned out a couple of my best profs also had politics similar to my own, so maybe we were just like-mined individuals that got along well.

On the other hand, there are two problems I see with this argument:

1. Almost no one gets real professional mentoring (grant-writing, professional etiquette, dealing with journal editors, how to structure a job search, etc.). Those that do have either been incredibly lucky and had a great adviser or have received it through some special program. The only catch? The programs available (the good ones that are actually geared towards helping you become a professor) are for women and visible minorities. I've been walking by posters and receiving emails for years that advertise these "professional development", "networking", or "careers in academia" events or organizations. Many of them provide exactly the sort of mentoring that those of us interested in professorships would like, but white and Asian men need not apply. Which leads to...

2. There is a very real demoralizing effect on men. I've recently decided not to pursue that particular career. There were a number of issues: a grueling application/interview procedure, no real choice in where I'd live, fewer tenure-track positions, a salary that is less than what I could make in private industry, and a huge amount of time spent writing grants. All of these issues I've discussed with my professors and advisers. But there is one issue that never gets discussed except amongst us graduate students (and those friends that have made the transition to faculty): men in the hard sciences are at a disadvantage in hiring at present and for the foreseeable future.

Some might argue, "Suck it up." But the application process for academia is, as I said, brutal. And when it is clear that you will be at a disadvantage before you even start, hiring practices play a role in deciding whether to run that particular gauntlet.

I don't mean to imply that the men and women on the hiring committees are biased against men. But because there is so much pressure from administrators to hire women in the hard sciences (my university is no exception), it creates a situation in which the safe choice is a woman or visible minority. If such a choice is made, no administrator is going to second guess it- the administrators want to see these sorts of hires. It helps boost the diversity statistics that can influence an administration's reputation. Hiring a woman or visible minority upsets no one. But there is an impression that if a white or Asian man is hired, the administration (or perhaps even some within the department) may be upset. That impression alone is enough to put a very fat thumb on the scales.

I very much want to see more women in my field as I prefer working in a gender-mixed environment. I've met enough smart, capable female grad students in my fields to know that this doesn't require sacrificing intellectual quality or trying to make the environment "less nerdy/techie", as I've heard suggested in the past. (We're getting advanced degrees in the sciences because we're nerds. Male or female, finding a work environment that won't be geeking out about math, video games, sci fi, or the latest technology is an unrealistic expectation.) But we should acknowledge that influencing our hiring practices and putting Asian and white men at a disadvantage will reduce the number of highly qualified candidates for these jobs at the margins. That is, it will drive some very talented men into industry. Is this collateral damage, to both individuals and the discipline, worth it?

Excellent write up. What you discuss isn't only limited to the hard sciences; the same thing happens everywhere. I too was ABD for a period of time while finishing my dissertation in Geography. I took my quals but never did finish my dissertation after years of working on it when I could, while teaching full time. I ended up leaving with my MS at a very top school; but a school that didn't offer a terminal Masters program, so leaving w/out a PhD was almost an embarrassment.

There are so few tenure track positions out there, that I eventually came to realization that simply being in the top 3 or 4 grad students in a program really doesn't cut it, unless you have something else going for you. The real kicker for me was when my good friend and mentor, who was in all honesty likely the top PhD candidate in the country, could not get hired even when he had over $500k of grant money at his disposal and much more on the horizon.

Unfortunately, so many professors in academic programs finished their PhD's back at a time when the 'boomers were going through college, and the need for faculty was rising exponentially. They tend to give advice to both their undergrads and grad students that guide them towards an academic career, that really no longer exists outside of a handful of openings nationwide each year.

Econ:

But there is one issue that never gets discussed except amongst us graduate students (and those friends that have made the transition to faculty): men in the hard sciences are at a disadvantage in hiring at present and for the foreseeable future.

It may vary from field to field, but I would argue that this is not true in all the hard sciences...certainly not in physics. It's true that most PhD programs do not provide adequate career mentoring for students...and that is a disadvantage to both men and women. These programs help make up for that, and they focus on women b/c they are at a further disadvantage. In my field, much career networking happens in informal and social settings...it can be very intimidating for the sole woman. Learning how to forge professional connections is particularly helpful for women who are often very much the outsiders in their field. That said, I don't disagree that PhD programs should generally invest more into helping students succeed in the long term...I just wouldn't blame organizations that focus on women and minorities for this. And I would argue that the relative advantage that these programs provide does not make up for the disadvantage of being an outsider who constantly has to prove her worth.

Econ:

But we should acknowledge that influencing our hiring practices and putting Asian and white men at a disadvantage will reduce the number of highly qualified candidates for these jobs at the margins. That is, it will drive some very talented men into industry. Is this collateral damage, to both individuals and the discipline, worth it?

As I said above, I think that institutionalize bias against women is so strong that I disagree that affirmative action in hiring strongly disadvantages men...but if that is the case I would argue yes, it's worth it. If nothing else, look at the findings of this paper. Women professors help female students perform better in STEM courses without strongly disadvantaging their male students. Hiring more female faculty expands the overall pool of people with who understand math and science. More of these students will go into STEM fields expanding the talent pool and increasing competition...which is ultimately good for the field. You assume that the women who are earning these positions are less qualified than the men they are replacing...but therein lies the problem these rules are meant to counteract.

I might add one more thing, perhaps there is harm to white and Asian men...but continuing the status quo continues to hurt talented women and minorities. Is that "worth it"?

SlateSurfer:

In my field, much career networking happens in informal and social settings...it can be very intimidating for the sole woman.

And it isn't intimidating for men? Bear in mind we're not talking about the paragons of social skills here. Are men just supposed to "suck it up" while women are given a pass because it's "intimidating"?

Xando:

And it isn't intimidating for men? Bear in mind we're not talking about the paragons of social skills here. Are men just supposed to "suck it up" while women are given a pass because it's "intimidating"?

Well, what makes it intimidating is being the sole woman in a situation...often where the men she works with are drinking and telling off-color (somewhat raunchy) jokes. Perhaps CS is different, but that's my experience in astrophysics. To be honest I enjoy a beer and edgy jokes so it's not so hard for me, but many women are understandably intimidated or put off by this. Unfortunately, though, it is often in the post-conference social settings that one also discusses research and ideas which can result in new collaborations.

I don't mind that some of this happens in a social setting, but the fact that there are no (or few) women can make it much more difficult for women to break in. Many (but certainly not all) of the people in my field are a bit socially awkward amongst the general population, but they generally seem to feel pretty at home with other scientists.

I think the problem is; we all agree that when discussing a population as a whole, it's good to "level the playing field" but when it comes to individuals, a leveled playing field can put specific individuals at a disadvantage.

We can make many assumptions about institutional discrimination and then put in place quota systems and extra programs for one group. The problem is, within the group that's supposedly at the advantage, there will always be individuals who have no such advantages.

I can imagine it would be pretty unpleasant to be an introverted male student (we know there are a lot of them in many fields) where he has no advantage in terms of informal networking, as well as no advantage in terms of special programs to help him. He would be just as intimidated in social situations as the lone female colleague.

I felt like I was in a similar situation as an undergrad. My family was very poor, my dad left us when I was 10, my mother was in and out of mental hospitals after frequent suicide attempts, was raised by my older sister, and I was an above average student but not the best in anything. I was the first in my family to go to college and the whole system was overwhelming and confusing. I felt like assumptions were made about me, like I had some inherent advantage because I was a white male, but in reality I was pretty much lost my first two years. If it wasn't for the help of Uncle Sam (GI Bill), I probably would have dropped out my freshman year. Yeah, white males were probably at some kind of statistical advantage at my school but I sure wasn't.

Econ,

Excellent write up. As a relatively newly minted PhD in English, I went against all my faculty suggestions and took a contract-based non-TT position at a small engineering school (they wanted me to take a much less interesting TT position because it's all about TT, nothing else matters). The engineering school I'm at has a male population of 84%. They added a nursing program a few years ago to attract more females. But it is overwhelmingly a male school. This is represented in the faculty make-up. I'm in the general studies department and we have a fair number of female facutly (I am one of them) but outside of nursing and my department, there are not a lot of women faculty at all. The female students who are in engineering disciplines, especially Mechanical Engineering do talk about how this and how it is intimidating for them.

But another point you made was about faculty who are native English speakers. At every school I've been at from my MA on, students have complained about taking difficult courses (especially in math) from individuals who don't know English very well. Now this can be dismissed as racism or xenophobia, but I do think that there is something in these students' complaints.

In the US, most engineers don't go on to grad school. They don't need to. It is actually discouraged. As a result, as the old guard of faculty retire, there aren't enough native English speaking new faculty to replace them. But other cultures see nothing wrong with people earning advanced degrees in engineering so that's where the crop of young faculty come from. And they are excellent scholars and brilliant, the only black mark (so-to-speak) is that English is not their first language.

This also intimidates students. They feel stupid because they can't understand their faculty members. Some end up taking classes two or three times because of the language barrier. Native English speaking teachers have lines out of their doors as students try to get into their classes over other faculty. I'm not sure how to alleviate the problem, if there is even one at all. I still think that the students may be a little xenophobic, but since it has happened at three schools that I've been at, I would like to see what others think.

A disclaimer, since I will be flamed for this post, I'm sure. I WANT more female engineers. I WANT more female PhD engineering students. I WANT more female engineering faculty. Both my wife and I have PhDs in engineering. I've had male and female advisors.

That being said, there is no need to promote hiring of female engineering faculty as females are being hired for engineering faculty at rates significantly greater than men are being hired for engineering faculty when you account for the gender ratio in qualified applicants. This distracts us from the real problem - girls in the US start dropping out of math and science in junior high, not college. It is also noteworthy that this is more of a US phenomena as in other countries, espescially developing nations, there tends to be very little gender gap in STEM fields.

A faculty position, like any job, has certain prerequisites. I think we agree that a florist (of either gender) is not qualified to teach quantum electrodynamics or manage a research group developing new catalysts for making gasolien from natural gas.

So why do people use the student-body gender ratio to determine what the faculty gender ratio should be? Shouldn't the gender ratio to use to determine the aprpopriate faculty gender ratio be the gender ratio of PhD students in a particular field at the top schools in that field (the ones most likely to have students oriented towards academic careers)?

After a frustrating faculty search, I had the feeling that if I were female, that I would have had a significantly higher chance of getting interviews. So I went to NSF and looked at the PhD degree trends and gender breakdowns and tried to sort out hiring practices from the gender studies on tenure granting. Suprisingly (or maybe not so surprisingly), I was unable to find statistics from NSF on gender equality in hiring faculty for the sciences and engineering. I can't find my spreadsheet with the data on it right now, but the key results I found were interesting:

1. When calculating the percentage of women receiving PhDs in STEM fields, the ratio of men to women in most fields were similar except for psychology which was something like >80% female.
2. Removing psychology from the calculation of the gender ratio for STEM fields dramatically reduced the female-to-male ratio.
3. Limiting the fields to only engineering was about the same as the aggregate STEM fields less psychology
4. The aggregate (assistant, associate, and full professors) faculty gender ratio is largely skewed to a lower percentage of women due in large part to the high percentage (~95%) of men that joined the faculty over 30 years ago when the percentage of men receiving PhDs in science and engineering was ~95%.
5. The percentage of junior (assistant prof.) engineering faculty that are women is much higher than the percentage of women receiving PhDs in engineering.
6. Female engineers with PhDs were 37% overrepresented in junior faculty positions relative to the percentage of female PhD engineers.
7. There was no signifcant bias in promotion from junior to senior faculty with regards to gender which means that the 37% overerpresentation of females in junior faculty was due to increased hiring, not decreased promotions.

A key point here is to remember that every college and university has a chemistry department, but a much smaller percentage of universities have engineering programs, therefore the competition for engineering faculty is much more intense than for the sciences.