Date: Sun, 24 Feb 2002 22:58:24 -0500 (EST)
To: aaswliststsci.edu
Subject: AASWOMEN for February 22, 2002
Cc: aaswomenstsci.edu
Sender: owner-aaswliststsci.edu


	AAS Committee on the Status of Women
    Weekly issue of 02/22/2001, ed. by Meg Urry and Patricia Knezek

This week's issues:
1. Warner prize update
2. Limited access to CHE articles (unfortunately)
3. Comment on last week's CHE article on how having
   children affects women's careers
4. New CHE article on "Strategies for Raising the Number 
   of Women Scientists in Academe" 
5. CHE article on equity pay raises given to University of
   Wisconsin women faculty

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
1. Warner prize update

From Neal Evans njebubba.as.utexas.edu:

As noted in an earlier AASWOMEN, the rules for the 
Warner prize have been changed to allow candidates 
older than 35 OR less than 8 years since the PhD. 
For my sins, I am now on the Warner/Pierce prize 
committee and the composition of the committee looks 
pretty friendly toward taking advantage of this rule 
change to honor some deserving women. I hope the 
readers of this newsletter will see that some are 
nominated, with a bonus if they take advantage of 
this rule. The rule is changed for a trial period, 
so if it has no effect, it could be deemed unnecessary 
to continue it.
Nominations are due October 1.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
2. Limited access to CHE articles (unfortunately)

Last week's issue included a reference to a Chronicle 
of Higher Education article from 2/12/02, entitled 
"Women Who Have Children Early in Careers Hurt Their 
Chances to Achieve Tenure." 

Several AASWOMEN readers have noted that CHE is hard 
to access unless you are a subscriber. Unfortunately, 
we cannot redistribute copyrighted articles on AASWOMEN 
since obtaining the necessary permissions takes too long.

In general, if you know someone with a CHE subscription
they can send you the text of particular articles via email. 
We'll also try to summarize the highlights of any particular
article (see below). For complete access to The Chronicle's 
Web site, a special subscription offer can be found at:
  http://chronicle.com/4free

For last week's case, I have a PDF version of the original 
Berkeley study on which the CHE article was based, entitled
"Do Babies Matter: The Effect of Family Formation on 
the Life Long Careers of Women," which we'll try to post on
the CSWA web site.

Meg Urry

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
3. Comment on last week's CHE article on how having
   children affects women's careers

Kristy Dyer (kdyeraoc.nrao.edu) writes:

Regarding the Chronical article: It could be that fathers are 
more likely to get tenure than men without children because 
they are seen as being a "head of household", a "provider" who 
therefore needs/deserves the stability and income -- or having 
children (for men) can be seen as settling in, making a long-term 
commitment to the instituion/location: "He's less likely to leave 
because he's got kids in the local schools."

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
4. New CHE article on "Strategies for Raising the Number 
   of Women Scientists in Academe" 

Another interesting article from the Chronicle of Higher Education
(http://chronicle.com) Wednesday, February 20, 2002, entitled
"Panelists Offer Strategies for Raising the Number of Women
Scientists in Academe," by Lila Guterman. See:
   http://chronicle.com/daily/2002/02/2002022002n.htm

The article reports on a panel discussion at the annual AAAS
meeting last week. "Placing women in leadership roles and 
making rational hiring decisions are vital to helping female 
engineers and scientists receive equitable treatment in the 
academic job market," said the 6 women and 1 man on the panel. 

Denice D. Denton, dean of the college of engineering at the 
University of Washington, described her successes at increasing the
number of women hired at UW. Essentially, she taught departments
how to search for candidates rather than wait for candidates to
appear. She also debunked the notion that the problem is the 
lack of women in the candidate pool. Finally, she emphasized
that her approach to hiring increased the quality of the people
hired, both men and women. Her record: UW hired 22 new engineering 
faculty in 2001, including 7 women. "In contrast, from 1995 to
2000, the University of California at Berkeley hired 1 woman
and 48 men."

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
5. CHE article on equity pay raises given to University of
   Wisconsin women faculty

Yes, another article from The Chronicle of Higher Education 
(we should all subscribe!), from Tuesday, February 19, 2002:
"U. of Wisconsin Gives 'Equity' Pay Raises to 42 Female Faculty
Members," by Jennifer K. Ruark.
    http://chronicle.com/daily/2002/02/2002021901n.htm

This article describes how the University of Wisconsin at
Madison "will give pay raises totaling about $200,000 to 42 
female faculty members in a continuing effort to redress 
gender inequity at the university."
 
This follows a 1992 study that found disparities between the
salaries of men and women, at which time pay raises "totaling 
$830,000 [were given] to 372 female faculty members." Repeated 
surveys in 1995 and 1998 did not find any differences in the 
aggregate, but in 2001 salaries were again in need of adjustment,
hence the reported action.
 
----------------------------------------------------------------------------