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EYH Impact Report (Final) July 2010

In America we know that women do not enter STEM fields at the same rate as their male counterparts and we don’t really know why this is the case.  We have ideas, but even our ideas cannot be agreed upon.  Some say socialization is the problem, some same job discrimination is a factor, some say females brains are programmed too differently to make good scientists. I emphatically challenge this last statement, but I’ll save that for another blog post.

While in Cuba I met with many different Cuban women, some scientists and some not. I was particularly lucky to meet with Aramis Rivera, a very successful women scientist who recently won the TWOWS award for women in science.  TWOWS stands for the Third World Organization of Women Scientists and two female scientists from Cuba recently won this prestigious award along with other international scientists.  Aramis works in the pharmaceutical sciences at the University of Havana and I met with her for about an hour at her house in Havana.

With the help of her husband,  (who was translating) I asked a wide variety of questions about her background including questions about what type of discrimination she may have faced as a female STEM professional, especially since she is such a successful scientist.  When I asked the question, Aramis gave me a funny look,  and so I asked her husband to make sure he had translated my question properly.   I had.  He told me that my question was strange and that Aramis didn’t really understand what I was asking.  Here’s why…

As it turns out,  in Cuba, female STEM professionals are wildly successful.  Aramis indicated that she had never experienced any discrimination based on her gender, nor did she know of any other Cuban female scientists who had encountered  job discrimination.  It simply does  not seem to exist in Cuba. She explained that women are well integrated in all STEM fields and have the full support of their male colleagues!  I was fascinated by her response and I asked her to talk about any potential discrimination her teachers might have showed her during her elementary school years.  She replied that she had experienced no discrimination whatsoever during her  early school years and her teachers always encouraged her to study math and science.

I thought that perhaps Aramis was a lucky Cuban so I pressed other female STEM professionals on the subject, and they all had similar stories.  They received the exact same educational opportunities as the boys they knew and they never had experienced any gender discrimination as youngsters. As adults in the workplace their male colleagues were very, very supportive and encouraging.

American female STEM professionals (and women from many other countries) have completely different experiences from that of Aramis and her colleagues.  So my question is , what is Cuba doing that the United States isn’t?   Post your comments.   You can learn more about Aramis and her by clicking on the link below.

http://english.cas.cn/accessory/twows4th/twowsaward/201006/t20100627_55766.html

]]> http://staging.expandingyourhorizons.org/2010/08/17/some-interviews-and-just-a-bit-of-sunshine/feed/ 0 http://staging.expandingyourhorizons.org/2010/07/26/stacey-gets-interviewed-on-comcast-cable-newsmakers/ http://staging.expandingyourhorizons.org/2010/07/26/stacey-gets-interviewed-on-comcast-cable-newsmakers/#comments Mon, 26 Jul 2010 21:39:18 +0000 stacey http://staging.expandingyourhorizons.org/?p=2980 Watch a recent interview with Stacey Roberts-Ohr, EYH/N Executive Director.

The House of Representatives has passed what I like to think of as Larry’s Law. The official title of this legislation is “Fulfilling the potential of women in academic science and engineering,” but nothing did more to empower its advocates than the controversy over a speech by Lawrence H. Summers when he was president of Harvard.
Related

This proposed law, if passed by the Senate, would require the White House science adviser to oversee regular “workshops to enhance gender equity.” At the workshops, to be attended by researchers who receive federal money and by the heads of science and engineering departments at universities, participants would be given before-and-after “attitudinal surveys” and would take part in “interactive discussions or other activities that increase the awareness of the existence of gender bias.”

I’m all in favor of women fulfilling their potential in science, but I feel compelled, at the risk of being shipped off to one of these workshops, to ask a couple of questions

Read more at http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/08/science/08tier.html?pagewanted=1&emc=eta1

Confessions of a newbie blogger by Stacey Roberts-Ohr, Executive Director, Expanding Your Horizons Network and guest blogger

Confession part one… this is my first experience as a guest blogger or as any blogger for that matter.

Confession two…I’m a childfree by choice chick.   My husband and I never really wanted kids. Since we don’t have them,  I have never experienced the joys and tribulations of motherhood.  I don’t know if this makes me any less qualified to contribute charming witty banter to a mommy blog. You be the judge.

What possibly can a happy, childfree by choice, 44 year old woman possibly contribute to a mommy blog? Well, I actually got some good advice, on how to raise a confident and happy teen daughter who one day might want to change the world- I’ve been asked to share this advice with you today as the Director of a non- profit that works with teenage girls to motivate them to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering and math.

I work at The Expanding Your Horizons Network,  motivating young women to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM).  Fact… girls tend to lose interest in science and math during middle school.  During these turbulent years, girls often subconsciously feel that “pretty” is better than being smart. Smart girls don’t have boyfriends and they don’t get asked to school dances or to parties.  Yes, that’s the message many girls internalize, even if it’s not the true.

Enter The Expanding Your Horizons Network. Through our one-day hands-on math and science conferences, we present a safe and fun environment where girls can become innovative and creative thinkers, ready to solve 21^st century challenges.  Middle school girls gather at a local university and meet with professional women engineers, computer scientists, and even female astronauts. They listen to their stories, learn about their career paths, and glean some cool details about their personal lives, (fact: some astronauts and physicists sport stylish tattoos, skydive and some are even moms themselves)  Then the girls dive in and participate in an interactive hands-on activity. They might build lego robots and then participate in a robot demolition derby, or  they will extract and then bottle their own DNA, whatever the activity, these women are amazing role models and the girls have a blast.

Sometimes, I wish I was one of the smart scientists I interact with in my job. I wish I was designing buildings that are impenetrable to terrorists, or inventing a new medical device to help improve the lives of the disabled, I wish I could develop a new mathematical formula that would do something cool, And, if I had a teenage daughter, I would want her to pursue a STEM focused career and I would do everything in my power to help her understand that these careers pay well and are within their reach.

If I did have the darling teenager, that you have, (let’s call her Clementine– my secret, cool girl’s name) here are a couple of smart, subtle things I would do to influence her choice of career.

• First, I would send her to the nearest EYH conference. They cost as little as $10 and they are located worldwide.  Visit the EYH website at www.expandingyourhorizons.org.to find one near you.
• Secondly, I would introduce Clementine to STEM role models every chance I got.  I would help her interact and meet female STEM professionals both in social and professional environments. I would encourage Clementine to spend a few days shadowing a successful female scientist at her place of employment.  I would also encourage Clementine to participate in her school science fair and sign up to attend a rad” summer sleepover science program where the kids would call her “Clem.”

Okay, it’s true that Clementine only lives in my head, but if I did have a daughter like her, I would do everything in my power to convince her that it’s Okay to be smart, and that math and science careers are a cool career option.

Do you have someone like Clementine living in your house?  What have you done to encourage her interest in STEM?   I would really like to know. Send me an email at Stacey@expandingyourhorizons.org.

Check out more about the Expanding Your Horizons Network at www.expandingyourhorizons .org.  And, learn more about our recent honor.  We recently won the 2010 Public Service Award of the year from the National Science Board.

So much fun that Bajaj has now attended the annual math and science conference three times.

Mission accomplished. That’s just the response the coordinators of the conference — Expanding Your Horizons Network, an Oakland-based nonprofit — hoped to inspire. Established in 1976, the organization has worked to encourage young women to pursue careers in what are known as STEM fields: science, technology, engineering and mathematics.  For their efforts, the group was honored recently in Washington, D.C., with a public service award by the governing board of the National Science Foundation, the federal agency charged by Congress in 1950 “to promote the progress of science.”

Steven Beering, chairman of the National Science Board, said the award, given May 4, was in recognition of the Oakland network’s long-standing commitment to the early development of interest in mathematics and science among young girls.

The math and science conferences are the main tool Expanding Your Horizons uses to reach out to learn about what they do in a typical day.

Expanding Your Horizons board President Rachel Sheinbein studied chemical engineering as an undergraduate and received her MBA as well as a master’s in civil and environmental engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Sheinbein said she was lucky that her parents encouraged her interest in math and sciences when she was young and took her to participate in enrichment programs.

Many girls miss out on such encouragement. A study released earlier this year by the AAUW, formerly known as the American Association of University Women, called “Why So Few?” noted that while the number of women in STEM fields is increasing, they are still outnumbered by men.

With math scores for girls rapidly increasing, the report puts much of the blame for the underrepresentation of women in science and engineering on such external factors as negative stereotypes about girls’ abilities in math. Who can forget the Barbie doll released in 1992 that was programmed to say “math class is tough”?

Since its inception, more than 800,000 girls have attended a conference, Sheinbein said, adding that the organization is not content to rest on its laurels.

“We’d like to be in every state,” she said.

whysofew-1.pdf