May 10, 2005

Critical Mass

The University of Maryland-Baltimore County has had a growing reputation over the last decade as one of the most successful institutions in the country at recruiting and graduating black students in the sciences. Through a combination of scholarship programs and mentoring, the university year after year places students in top Ph.D. programs at a time that many institutions struggle to identify and educate black science talent.

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In the last few years, UMBC has started a push in an additional direction: focusing on female faculty members in the sciences, another area where many top universities have struggled to make headway. In the last five years, the university has more than doubled, from 17 to 36, the number of tenured and tenure-track women on its sciences, mathematics and engineering faculties. Women still make up a decided minority among the 155 total faculty in these fields at UMBC, but the growth has been such that there are science departments — such as chemical and biochemical engineering — where women are now in the majority, which be unthinkable at most institutions.

“There is real passion and commitment here, and I think we are going to make even more progress,” said Janet Rutledge, associate dean of the graduate school and a professor of computer science and electrical engineering.

Nationally, UMBC is starting to gain recognition for its efforts. When a group of college and university presidents met at the National Academy of Sciences last month to talk about the issues facing women in science faculties, the opening session featured the three women who lead Ivy League universities — and Freeman Hrabowski III, the president of UMBC.

So what is UMBC doing and why is it working?

Officials at the university cite no one single solution, but rather a combination of efforts that is making a difference. Among the key strategies:

• Examining the search process. Under a policy the university adopted, every department chair doing a search must show that there is a plan to attract a diverse pool. While traditional methods, such as advertising, are part of the plans, they generally must also include outreach efforts to people and organizations who would be likely to identify female talent. “It’s not enough to say, ‘whoever applies, that’s our pool,’ ” said J. Lynn Zimmerman, a professor of biology and vice provost for academic initiatives. “When we pay attention to this, we get better pools.”
• Mentoring starts before hiring has even taken place. Every woman who is interviewed for a science position has a meeting with some of the women who are already scientists at UMBC. The meeting isn’t part of the decision making process for the search, but it allows all candidates to know that they will be arriving at an institution with an active network of female scientists and potential mentors. Rutledge said that these meetings appear to have a major impact on women accepting UMBC offers because “they see the community that already exists here.” She said that women with good mentors (men or women) fare much better in the promotion process, so starting early is key.
• Educating women about their faculty careers. Once women are recruited, they have access to summer retreats and regular seminars on topics to help them get ahead: grant writing, the tenure process, finding mentors, balancing a research career with a family life, etc. The university is also creating an internship program that will place up-and-coming female scientists in various administrative offices to see if they would make good deans or presidents down the road.
• Enhancing good family leave policies. Officials said that family leave policies are only effective if people know about them, and if departments receive enough support so that they truly support women (and men) who use them. It’s important to think broadly, said Zimmerman. One example of this: UMBC has special grants for graduate students to keep lab work going to help scientists on family leaves, so the science can continue to develop while someone is away from the campus.
• Winning grants. University science has a heavy emphasis on outside support and professors take note when grants arrive. So UMBC has made diversifying the faculty something for which outside support is sought. The National Science Foundation awarded UMBC a $3.2 million grant that supports many of the existing programs and has allowed some of them to grow. The university also received money from the Clare Boothe Luce Program for a position for a female scientist.
• Involving the president. Hrabowski is the principal investigator on the NSF grant, and those involved with the project at UMBC say that he takes the role seriously, leading discussions on advancing the program, showing up at seminars on women in science, playing a personal role in recruiting, and asking lots of questions of everyone. Several women in science at UMBC said that the president’s role means that scholars who might be skeptical of the efforts understand that the equity efforts must be taken seriously. “I think it’s important for the president, whether male or female, to be speaking out on issues of inclusiveness,” Hrabowski said. “I’m convinced that a major part of this is just accepting that we all have to learn to do some things that we may not have been doing previously.”

Hrabowski said that UMBC’s experience educating black science students has been instructive for the efforts on women faculty, but he said that it was important “to look at these issues with specificity” and to acknowledge differences in the two efforts. He said that the university’s approach to both issues was shaped by the need to have mentors and a critical mass. “We are not accustomed to seeing large numbers of women or minorities who are successful in science,” he said.

The main difference he noted is that the pipeline for women — in elementary and secondary school — is much stronger, as many more girls are taking math and science courses and succeeding in them. That progress means that colleges should be in a position to narrow or eliminate gender gaps in their science faculties — if they take the issue seriously, Hrabowski said.

“We’ve got women in the pipeline, but then they leave,” he said. “Universities need to look at their cultures and identify things that will make them stay.”

Women who are making their careers at UMBC say that its reputation for inclusiveness is a key factor in their decisions to work there. Jane Turner, an associate professor of physics, first came as a visiting professor in 1998, but stayed because of what she calls the “can do” approach in the department to helping people win research support, and because of the environment for women.

“Working at a supportive institution is my top priority,” she said.

Mariajose Castellanos just earned her Ph.D. from Cornell University and will be starting as an assistant professor in January, teaching thermodynamics. She said she was impressed in the interview process that the university had the resources “to help me become a full professor.” UMBC also offered her partner a postdoctoral fellowship. He ended up taking a position at Johns Hopkins University instead.

But Castellanos said that the effort sent a message: “They were supportive of dual career couples, and they were active about it. They were going to deal with the issue.”

— Scott Jaschik

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