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Hi, Kathy and all:

Maybe my view is skewed, since we have twin 14 y/o girls in a pretty  
enlightened school district, at least as far as gender issues are  
concerned.  In elementary school, one of the few male teachers taught  
science.  In order to avoid any gender bias, he strictly called on  
students boy-girl-boy-girl etc.  In middle school, one daughter has  
participated for the last three years in science olympiad.  Her group  
was about evenly divided by gender.  I suspect that the "science  
kids" will probably remain pretty much equal by gender in this schools.

As female students are increasingly represented among the high- 
achieving students in colleges throughout the country, I suspect that  
the bias issues will dissipate.  However the structural issues remain  
as strong as ever.  As long as a person has to choose between career  
and parenting, good people will be lost to important careers, and  
those good people will mostly be female.

Eric Siegel
New York Hall of Science
[log in to unmask]
(718) 699-0005 x 317



On Jul 16, 2006, at 9:47 AM, Kathy Krafft wrote:

> ISEN-ASTC-L is a service of the Association of Science-Technology  
> Centers
> Incorporated, a worldwide network of science museums and related  
> institutions.
> ********************************************************************** 
> *******
>
> Thanks to Pamela for the original link on gender issues, and the  
> rest of you for interesting responses.  This is something near and  
> dear to my heart for many years now as a rare female physics major  
> in college in the early 1970s who went on to get a PhD in  
> experimental physics from Cornell (and then volunteered to build  
> just one exhibit in 1991...)
>
> FYI on the book project for others who might be interested in  
> replying to her:  the author is a scientist by training, as she  
> graduated with a chemistry major from one of the countries very top  
> colleges for science, math and engineering majors (Harvey Mudd  
> college in Claremont in Southern California has only 750 students,  
> so not many people have heard of it-- they often beat out CalTech  
> and other colleges in prestigious competitions).
>
> Short story from maybe 6-8 years ago:  we do birthday parties here,  
> and a kindergarten boy told his mother to only invite the boys to  
> his party here as the girls wouldn't want to do science.  She had  
> him invite the entire class.  So here's a concerned, interested  
> parent.. and somehow her 6-year old son already knows that girls  
> don't do science??
>
> As a parent of three daughters (college age and beyond now) who  
> volunteered a lot in our schools over the years, especially with  
> math and science activities, I do have lots of anecdotal evidence  
> that "the rot" starts to kick in late in elementary school..  NY  
> state requires teachers to get Master's degrees for permanent  
> certification.  One teacher told me that the most valuable course  
> by far was one on gender issues-- watching videotapes to see how  
> boys and girls were treated differently in classrooms, etc.
>
> Very few girls go on in our high school to take CAD (Computer Aided  
> Drawing) for instance;  my oldest was the only girl to take digital  
> electronics out of two classes of boys in ~1999.  And this is in  
> enlightened, politically correct Ithaca, New York.  At least it was  
> ok for her to do so-- in my day it was not socially correct that I  
> did better than the boys in math and science.  I do see it  
> gradually improving over time here locally.
>
> Kathy Krafft
> Exhibit Projects Director
> Sciencenter
> Ithaca, NY
> 607-272-0600 ext 25
>
>
>
>
>
>>
>> --------------------------------------------------------------------- 
>> ---
>>
>> Subject:
>> An invitation for female scientists/educators
>> From:
>> David Smith <[log in to unmask]>
>> Date:
>> Sat, 15 Jul 2006 21:10:10 -0400
>>
>>
>> ISEN-ASTC-L is a service of the Association of Science-Technology  
>> Centers
>> Incorporated, a worldwide network of science museums and related  
>> institutions.
>> ********************************************************************* 
>> ********
>>
>> This site describes a book project for which the author is seeking
>> interviews with women in science or science education.
>> http://www.nasw.org/users/lhall/wtga.html  I have no connection to  
>> this
>> project, just thought it might interest some of you.
>> Dave
>>
>> David L. Smith, Ph.D.
>>
>>
>
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