Tag Archives: science technology engineering mathematics

A SciArt Gallery @ Science Rendezvous call for artists and a SciFi and Fantasy screenplay contest and

I’ve got two ‘creativity’ opportunities, one for people working on an art/sci (sciart) project and another for people with scripts,

SciArt Gallery @ Science Rendezvous

This notice arrived in a January 31, 2018 email from the ArtSci Salon people in Toronto (Ontario, Canada),

Science Rendezvous is a free Canada‐wide outreach festival that spurs interest in scientific research among the general public and last year at U of T, we attracted over 30,000 guests! This year we are hosting our first science-inspired art gallery called the SciArt Gallery! We are actively recruiting artists for the gallery to display their science-inspired works! Painting, design, music, dance, theatre, textiles, ceramics: We welcome all artists to apply!

To apply and for more information, please visit: http://bit.ly/SciArtGallery2018

The open call deadline is Friday, February 23rd, 2018 at 11:59pm!

To learn more about Science Rendezvous and this year’s festival on Saturday, May 12th, please visit www.ScienceRendezvousUofT.ca.

So you know what you might be getting into, the About Science Rendezvous webpage has this to say about what the organization does and about its origins,

We work with Canada’s top research institutes to present a coast-to-coast open house and festival that is FREE for everyone. With over 300 events across 30 cities and 1000’s of mind-blowing activities, Science Rendezvous is Canada’s largest celebration of the amazing feats of science and engineering happening right here at home.

In 2017, more than 210,000 attendees participated in our unique brand of hands-on science, a new landmark for such events in Canada. Science Rendezvous is the only organization that generates this level of public engagement with science, and direct face-to-face involvement with those at the very frontiers of innovation.

This SATURDAY, MAY 12th 2018 [emphasis mine] over 6,000 of Canada’s greatest innovators, researchers, engineers, and scientists from 125 partner organizations will open their doors and close city streets to present exciting demonstrations, hands-on activities, and explosive experiments. From the physics of rock and roll to the chemistry of ice-cream, Science Rendezvous has something for everyone!

History

Science Rendezvous began as a joint program between the University of Toronto, Ryerson University, York University and the University of Ontario Institute of Technology (UOIT) in 2008. These founding partners saw the need to work together in order to launch an event of great enough scale and exciting content to engage the public in the vast wonders of science and engineering. Since that time, Science Rendezvous has grown to include 40 of Canada’s top research institutions and over 85 community partnerships across 30 cities in 10 provinces and 2 territories. Today, it is a marquee event and signature partner of Science Odyssey [Note: This is a government of Canada annual national “celebration of science, technology, engineering and mathematics, featuring fun and inspiring experiences in museums, research centres, laboratories and classrooms from coast to coast” which will run from May 11 – 20, 2018 this year], and is the single largest science festival in Canada.

Science Rendezvous is a science outreach pioneer in Canada. Offering direct engagement with 6,000 of Canada’s top researchers and scientists at 300 simultaneous events and 1000’s of hands-on experiments for the public to try themselves.

The Science Rendezvous head office acts as an umbrella organization that coordinates the efforts of all participating institutions, reinvents public engagement with science through festival programming, and offers direction for event organizers all while promoting both the festival and Canadian science on a national level.

To be clear, the call for sciart projects is from the physics department at the University of Toronto (U of T) and the deadline is February 23, 2018. I went to the U of T Science Rendezvous SciArt Gallery artist application page and found more details about the call,

The theme for SR 2018 is “Full S.T.E.A.M. Ahead!” – We’re placing an emphasis on the Art in S.T.E.M. [science, technology, engineering, and mathematics] this year and hosting our first and hopefully annual SciArt Gallery! We want to create a gallery full of science-inspired art and showcase the talent of our local Toronto artists! We hope that artists will be able to share their enthusiasm and teach visitors about how science inspired you to create and the science behind the art!

Artists will be permitted to sell their wares and will be provided with tents, chairs, volunteers, t-shirts, and lunch if accepted to the gallery. SR2018 is currently accepting applications for its SciArt Gallery taking place on Saturday, May 12, 2018 from 11am to 5pm.

There will be a $20 table deposit fee that will be refunded upon your attendance at SR. SR hopes to showcase science-inspired works of art and host workshops to allow artists to inspire kids and adults about their art medium.

*** Applications will close on Friday, February 23rd, 2018 at 11:59pm! ***

If you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact us at uoftsr.sciartgallery@gmail.com

For more information and to keep up-to-date about the SciArt Gallery, please visit our:

Website: http://www.sciencerendezvousuoft.ca/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/UofTSR/

The name and photo associated with your Google account will be recorded when you upload files and submit this form.

I don’t know if you noticed but the application page specifies Toronto artists while the email did not. You may want to contact the organizers for more details. At a guess, they don’t want to fund any trips or accommodation for out-of-town artists but if you’re willing to self-fund they’ll consider your application.

One final thing worth mentioning, there may be opportunities in your home community. So, it may be worthwhile to check out the Science Rendezvous website.

SciFi and fantasy screenplay contest

I got this January 31, 2018 withoutabox.com announcement via email,

… the 4th Annual ScreenCraft Sci-Fi & Fantasy Screenplay Contest, an out of this world screenplay competition set to discover talented writers. The 2018 contest judges are Steven Douglas-Craig, Development at Sony Pictures, the studio behind Passengers, Ghostbusters, Men In Black, Resident Evil, and Spider-Man; Jonathan Wu, Development Executive at 20th Century Fox, the studio behind Avatar, X-Men, Another Earth, Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes, and Prometheus ; and Michael Doven, CEO of United Pictures, producer of such celebrated movies as Mission: Impossible, Vanilla Sky, Minority Report, and The Last Samurai.

The Grand Prize winner will receive a $1,000 USD cash award and personal introductions to producers, managers, agents and studio executives. Additionally, the top finalists will be circulated to ScreenCraft’s vetted network of over 60 producers, studio executives, managers and agents. Whether you’re writing a contained science fiction drama or an epic fantasy saga, ScreenCraft wants to read your sci-fi or fantasy feature film screenplay. Great science fiction explores the human condition against the backdrop of a heightened imagined world, impacted by technology and human creativity and imagination.

Past ScreenCraft winners have optioned their projects and signed with top representatives at top Hollywood companies including WME, CAA, 3Arts Entertainment, Anonymous Content, Paradigm Talent Agency, ICM, Bellevue Productions Zero Gravity Management, Kaplan/Perrone and many more.

UPCOMING DEADLINE
February 9, 2018 – Earlybird Deadline [March 30,2018 final deadline]

View submission details

MISSION AND OBJECTIVE
ScreenCraft’s screenwriting contests are dedicated to discovering talented screenwriters and connecting them with producers, agents and managers.

MORE ABOUT THE FESTIVAL
ScreenCraft runs a suite of screenwriting competitions that have a long history of getting writers represented and working. The secret is that ScreenCraft actually determines the winners with judges who work in the particular genre or space – real industry executives (not just readers). The winners get actual meetings with actual executives, so that a relationship forms beyond just a great script.

I checked for more details and found this (from the withoutabox.com 4th Annual ScreenCraft Sci-Fi & Fantasy Screenplay Contest Submission webpage),

RULES:
Submissions are accepted via electronic submission only, between January 10, 2018 and March 30, 2018.
Entry fee for each feature film screenplay is $49 until the early deadline on February 9, 2018, then $69 until the final deadline on March 30, 2018.
Optional feedback from a professional reader may be requested at the time of entry. Requests for feedback after an entry is submitted will not be accepted.
Screenplays must be a minimum of 75 pages and a maximum of 150 pages.
There is no limit to the number of projects you may submit.
Entries must be received on or before the deadline dates by 11:59PM Pacific Time, and submission fee payment must be made in full at time of the submission. All entry fees are non-refundable.
All submitted material must be original, and all rights must be wholly owned by the writer(s).
Material must be submitted by the writer. Material written by writing teams must be submitted by one of the writers, with consent of the other(s). All writers must be credited on title page.
If a writing team is chosen as a winner, prizes will be given to the person who submits the project. Each team is responsible for dividing or sharing the prize money.
Substitutions of either corrected pages or new drafts of the entered material will be allowed for a limited time with a $5 reentry fee through Coverfly. Please proofread your script carefully before submitting.
It is recommended that original material be registered with the WGA or The Library of Congress before submitting to any competition, however we do not require registration.
Contact info may be included on the cover page of the screenplay, however it is not required.
All ownership and rights to the scripts submitted to this contest remains with the original rights holders.

ELIGIBILITY:
All writers at least 18 years of age are eligible. However, a writer who has earned more than $50,000 (or equivalent currency) from professional writing services for film or TV in the preceding year is not. (Contest winnings not included.)
All persons from anywhere in the world are eligible; however the material submitted must be in English (occasional dialogue in other languages is acceptable, if subtitle translation is provided).
All material submitted to other competitions or contests are eligible for this contest.
There are no requirements as to when the material was written.
Screenplay and intellectual property must be wholly owned and submitted by the writer(s).
Material should be submitted in standard screenplay format, font, spacing and margin.
We have no preferences regarding title page content. Title and name of writer would suffice.
Entries for this competition are managed on the submission platform Coverfly.
Adaptations are ineligible unless the underlying rights are owned by the writer or the work is in the public domain.
Feature screenplays longer than 150 pages will not be eligible.
All material must be submitted electronically as a PDF or it will not be eligible.

You can find out more about ScreenCraft here.

To everyone: good luck!

Trans-Atlantic Platform (T-AP) is a unique collaboration of humanities and social science researchers from Europe and the Americas

Launched in 2013, the Trans-Atlantic Platform is co-chaired by Dr.Ted Hewitt, president of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) , and Dr. Renée van Kessel-Hagesteijn, Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research—Social Sciences (NWO—Social Sciences).

An EU (European Union) publication, International Innovation features an interview about T-AP with Ted Hewitt in a June 30, 2016 posting,

The Trans-Atlantic Platform is a unique collaboration of humanities and social science funders from Europe and the Americas. International Innovation’s Rebecca Torr speaks with Ted Hewitt, President of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council and Co-Chair of T-AP to understand more about the Platform and its pilot funding programme, Digging into Data.

Many commentators have called for better integration between natural and social scientists, to ensure that the societal benefits of STEM research are fully realised. Does the integration of diverse scientific disciplines form part of T-AP’s remit, and if so, how are you working to achieve this?

T-AP was designed primarily to promote and facilitate research across SSH. However, given the Platform’s thematic priorities and the funding opportunities being contemplated, we anticipate that a good number of non-SSH [emphasis mine] researchers will be involved.

As an example, on March 1, T-AP launched its first pilot funding opportunity: the T-AP Digging into Data Challenge. One of the sponsors is the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), Canada’s federal funding agency for research in the natural sciences and engineering. Their involvement ensures that the perspective of the natural sciences is included in the challenge. The Digging into Data Challenge is open to any project that addresses research questions in the SSH by using large-scale digital data analysis techniques, and is then able to show how these techniques can lead to new insights. And the challenge specifically aims to advance multidisciplinary collaborative projects.

When you tackle a research question or undertake research to address a social challenge, you need collaboration between various SSH disciplines or between SSH and STEM disciplines. So, while proposals must address SSH research questions, the individual teams often involve STEM researchers, such as computer scientists.

In previous rounds of the Digging into Data Challenge, this has led to invaluable research. One project looked at how the media shaped public opinion around the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic. Another used CT scans to examine hundreds of mummies, ultimately discovering that atherosclerosis, a form of heart disease, was prevalent 4,000 years ago. In both cases, these multidisciplinary historical research projects have helped inform our thinking of the present.

Of course, Digging into Data isn’t the only research area in which T-AP will be involved. Since its inception, T-AP partners have identified three priority areas beyond digital scholarship: diversity, inequality and difference; resilient and innovative societies; and transformative research on the environment. Each of these areas touches on a variety of SSH fields, while the transformative research on the environment area has strong connections with STEM fields. In September 2015, T-AP organised a workshop around this third priority area; environmental science researchers were among the workshop participants.

I wish Hewitt hadn’t described researchers from disciplines other than the humanities and social sciences as “non-SSH.” The designation divides the world in two: us and non-take your pick: non-Catholic/Muslim/American/STEM/SSH/etc.

Getting back to the interview, it is surprisingly Canuck-centric in places,

How does T-AP fit in with Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC)’s priorities?

One of the objectives in SSHRC’s new strategic plan is to develop partnerships that enable us to expand the reach of our funding. As T-AP provides SSHRC with links to 16 agencies across Europe and the Americas, it is an efficient mechanism for us to broaden the scope of our support and promotion of post-secondary-based research and training in SSH.

It also provides an opportunity to explore cutting edge areas of research, such as big data (as we did with the first call we put out, Digging into Data). The research enterprise is becoming increasingly international, by which I mean that researchers are working on issues with international dimensions or collaborating in international teams. In this globalised environment, SSHRC must partner with international funders to support research excellence. By developing international funding opportunities, T-AP helps researchers create teams better positioned to tackle the most exciting and promising research topics.

Finally, it is a highly effective way of broadly promoting the value of SSH research throughout Canada and around the globe. There are significant costs and complexities involved in international research, and uncoordinated funding from multiple national funders can actually create barriers to collaboration. A platform like T-AP helps funders coordinate and streamline processes.

The interview gets a little more international scope when it turns to the data project,

What is the significance of your pilot funding programme in digital scholarship and what types of projects will it support?

The T-AP Digging into Data Challenge is significant for several reasons. First, the geographic reach of Digging is truly significant. With 16 participants from 11 countries, this round of Digging has significantly broader participation from previous rounds. This is also the first time Digging into Data includes funders from South America.

The T-AP Digging into Data Challenge is open to any research project that addresses questions in SSH. In terms of what those projects will end up being is anybody’s guess – projects from past competitions have involved fields ranging from musicology to anthropology to political science.

The Challenge’s main focus is, of course, the use of big data in research.

You may want to read the interview in its entirety here.

I have checked out the Trans-Atlantic Platform website but cannot determine how someone or some institution might consult that site for information on how to get involved in their projects or get funding. However, there is a T-AP Digging into Data website where there is evidence of the first international call for funding submissions. Sadly, the deadline for the 2016 call has passed if the website is to be believed (sometimes people are late when changing deadline dates).

A study in contrasts: innovation and education strategies in US and British Columbia (Canada)

It’s always interesting to contrast two approaches to the same issue, in this case, innovation and education strategies designed to improve the economies of the United States and of British Columbia, a province in Canada.

One of the major differences regarding education in the US and in Canada is that the Canadian federal government, unlike the US federal government, has no jurisdiction over the matter. Education is strictly a provincial responsibility.

I recently wrote a commentary (a Jan. 19, 2016 posting) about the BC government’s Jan. 18, 2016 announcement of its innovation strategy in a special emphasis on the education aspect. Premier Christy Clark focused largely on the notion of embedding courses on computer coding in schools from K-12 (kindergarten through grade 12) as Jonathon Narvey noted in his Jan. 19, 2016 event recap for Betakit,

While many in the tech sector will be focused on the short-term benefits of a quick injection of large capital [a $100M BC Tech Fund as part of a new strategy was announced in Dec. 2015 but details about the new #BCTECH Strategy were not shared until Jan. 18, 2016], the long-term benefits for the local tech sector are being seeded in local schools. More than 600,000 BC students will be getting basic skills in the K-12 curriculum, with coding academies, more work experience electives and partnerships between high school and post-secondary institutions.

Here’s what I had to say in my commentary (from the Jan. 19, 2016 posting),

… the government wants to embed  computer coding into the education system for K-12 (kindergarten to grade 12). One determined reporter (Canadian Press if memory serves) attempted to find out how much this would cost. No answer was forthcoming although there were many words expended. Whether this failure was due to ignorance (disturbing!) or a reluctance to share (also disturbing!) was impossible to tell. Another reporter (Georgia Straight) asked about equipment (coding can be taught with pen and paper but hardware is better). … Getting back to the reporter’s question, no answer was forthcoming although the speaker was loquacious.

Another reporter asked if the government had found any jurisdictions doing anything similar regarding computer coding. It seems they did consider other jurisdictions although it was claimed that BC is the first to strike out in this direction. Oddly, no one mentioned Estonia, known in some circles as E-stonia, where the entire school system was online by the late 1990s in an initiative known as the ‘Tiger Leap Foundation’ which also supported computer coding classes in secondary school (there’s more in Tim Mansel’s May 16, 2013 article about Estonia’s then latest initiative to embed computer coding into grade school.) …

Aside from the BC government’s failure to provide details, I am uncomfortable with what I see as an overemphasis on computer coding that suggests a narrow focus on what constitutes a science and technology strategy for education. I find the US approach closer to what I favour although I may be biased since they are building their strategy around nanotechnology education.

The US approach had been announced in dribs and drabs until recently when a Jan. 26, 2016 news item on Nanotechnology Now indicated a broad-based plan for nanotechnology education (and computer coding),

Over the past 15 years, the Federal Government has invested over $22 billion in R&D under the auspices of the National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI) to understand and control matter at the nanoscale and develop applications that benefit society. As these nanotechnology-enabled applications become a part of everyday life, it is important for students to have a basic understanding of material behavior at the nanoscale, and some states have even incorporated nanotechnology concepts into their K-12 science standards. Furthermore, application of the novel properties that exist at the nanoscale, from gecko-inspired climbing gloves and invisibility cloaks, to water-repellent coatings on clothes or cellphones, can spark students’ excitement about science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM).

An earlier Jan. 25, 2016 White House blog posting by Lisa Friedersdorf and Lloyd Whitman introduced the notion that nanotechnology is viewed as foundational and a springboard for encouraging interest in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) careers while outlining several formal and information education efforts,

The Administration’s updated Strategy for American Innovation, released in October 2015, identifies nanotechnology as one of the emerging “general-purpose technologies”—a technology that, like the steam engine, electricity, and the Internet, will have a pervasive impact on our economy and our society, with the ability to create entirely new industries, create jobs, and increase productivity. To reap these benefits, we must train our Nation’s students for these high-tech jobs of the future. Fortunately, the multidisciplinary nature of nanotechnology and the unique and fascinating phenomena that occur at the nanoscale mean that nanotechnology is a perfect topic to inspire students to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM).

The Nanotechnology: Super Small Science series [mentioned in my Jan. 21, 2016 posting] is just the latest example of the National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI)’s efforts to educate and inspire our Nation’s students. Other examples include:

The announcement about computer coding and courses being integrated in the US education curricula K-12 was made in US President Barack Obama’s 2016 State of the Union speech and covered in a Jan. 30, 2016 article by Jessica Hullinger for Fast Company,

In his final State Of The Union address earlier this month, President Obama called for providing hands-on computer science classes for all students to make them “job ready on day one.” Today, he is unveiling how he plans to do that with his upcoming budget.

The President’s Computer Science for All Initiative seeks to provide $4 billion in funding for states and an additional $100 million directly to school districts in a push to provide access to computer science training in K-12 public schools. The money would go toward things like training teachers, providing instructional materials, and getting kids involved in computer science early in elementary and middle school.

There are more details in the Hullinger’s article and in a Jan. 30, 2016 White House blog posting by Megan Smith,

Computer Science for All is the President’s bold new initiative to empower all American students from kindergarten through high school to learn computer science and be equipped with the computational thinking skills they need to be creators in the digital economy, not just consumers, and to be active citizens in our technology-driven world. Our economy is rapidly shifting, and both educators and business leaders are increasingly recognizing that computer science (CS) is a “new basic” skill necessary for economic opportunity and social mobility.

CS for All builds on efforts already being led by parents, teachers, school districts, states, and private sector leaders from across the country.

Nothing says one approach has to be better than the other as there’s usually more than one way to accomplish a set of goals. As well, it’s unfair to expect a provincial government to emulate the federal government of a larger country with more money to spend. I just wish the BC government (a) had shared details such as the budget allotment for their initiative and (b) would hint at a more imaginative, long range view of STEM education.

Going back to Estonia one last time, in addition to the country’s recent introduction of computer coding classes in grade school, it has also embarked on a nanotechnology/nanoscience educational and entrepreneurial programme as noted in my Sept. 30, 2014 posting,

The University of Tartu (Estonia) announced in a Sept. 29, 2014 press release an educational and entrepreneurial programme about nanotechnology/nanoscience for teachers and students,

To bring nanoscience closer to pupils, educational researchers of the University of Tartu decided to implement the European Union LLP Comenius project “Quantum Spin-Off – connecting schools with high-tech research and entrepreneurship”. The objective of the project is to build a kind of a bridge: at one end, pupils can familiarise themselves with modern science, and at the other, experience its application opportunities at high-tech enterprises. “We also wish to inspire these young people to choose a specialisation related to science and technology in the future,” added Lukk [Maarika Lukk, Coordinator of the project].

The pupils can choose between seven topics of nanotechnology: the creation of artificial muscles, microbiological fuel elements, manipulation of nanoparticles, nanoparticles and ionic liquids as oil additives, materials used in regenerative medicine, deposition and 3D-characterisation of atomically designed structures and a topic covered in English, “Artificial robotic fish with EAP elements”.

Learning is based on study modules in the field of nanotechnology. In addition, each team of pupils will read a scientific publication, selected for them by an expert of that particular field. In that way, pupils will develop an understanding of the field and of scientific texts. On the basis of the scientific publication, the pupils prepare their own research project and a business plan suitable for applying the results of the project.

In each field, experts of the University of Tartu will help to understand the topics. Participants will visit a nanotechnology research laboratory and enterprises using nanotechnologies.

The project lasts for two years and it is also implemented in Belgium, Switzerland and Greece.

As they say, time will tell.

Gender gaps in science and how statistics prove and disprove the finding

A Feb. 17, 2015 Northwestern University news release by Hilary Hurd Anyaso (also on EurekAlert) features research suggesting that parity in the numbers of men and women students pursuing science degrees is being achieved,

Scholars from diverse fields have long proposed that interlocking factors such as cognitive abilities, discrimination and interests may cause more women than men to leave the science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) pipeline after entering college.

Now a new Northwestern University analysis has poked holes in the much referenced “leaky pipeline” metaphor.

The research shows that the bachelor’s-to-Ph.D. pipeline in science and engineering fields no longer leaks more women than men as it did in the past

Curt Rice, a professor at Norway’s University of Tromsø, has challenged the findings in a Feb. 18, 2015 post on his eponymous website (more about that later).

The news release goes on to describe how the research was conducted and the conclusions researchers drew from the data,

The researchers used data from two large nationally representative research samples to reconstruct a 30-year portrait of how bachelor’s-to-Ph.D. persistence rates for men and women have changed in the United States since the 1970s. For this study, the term STEM persistence rate refers to the proportion of students who earned a Ph.D. in a particular STEM field (e.g. engineering) among students who had earlier received bachelor’s degrees in that same field.

They were particularly surprised that the gender persistence gap completely closed in pSTEM fields (physical science, technology, engineering and mathematics) — the fields in which women are most underrepresented.

Among students earning pSTEM bachelor’s degrees in the 1970s, men were 1.6 to 1.7 times as likely as women to later earn a pSTEM Ph.D. However, this gap completely closed by the 1990s.

Men still outnumber women by approximately three to one among pSTEM Ph.D. earners. But those differences in representation are not explained by differences in persistence from the bachelor’s to Ph.D. degree, said David Miller, an advanced doctoral student in psychology at Northwestern and lead author of the study.

“Our analysis shows that women are overcoming any potential gender biases that may exist in graduate school or undergraduate mentoring about pursing graduate school,” Miller said. “In fact, the percentage of women among pSTEM degree earners is now higher at the Ph.D. level than at the bachelor’s, 27 percent versus 25 percent.”

Jonathan Wai, a Duke University Talent Identification Program research scientist and co-author of the study, said a narrowing of gender gaps makes sense given increased efforts to promote gender diversity in science and engineering.

“But a complete closing of the gap was unexpected, especially given recent evidence of gender bias in science mentoring,” Wai said.

Consequently, the widely used leaky pipeline metaphor is a dated description of gender differences in postsecondary STEM education, Wai added.

Other research shows that gaps in persistence rates are also small to nonexistent past the Ph.D., Miller said.

“For instance, in physical science and engineering fields, male and female Ph.D. holders are equally likely to earn assistant professorships and academic tenure,” Miller said.

The leaky pipeline metaphor is inaccurate for nearly all postsecondary pathways in STEM, Miller said, with two important exceptions.

“The Ph.D.-to-assistant-professor pipeline leaks more women than men in life science and economics,” he said. “Differences in those fields are large and important.”

The implications of the research, Miller said, are important in guiding research, resources and strategies to explain and change gender imbalances in science.

“The leaking pipeline metaphor could potentially direct thought and resources away from other strategies that could more potently increase women’s representation in STEM,” he said.

For instance, plugging leaks in the pipeline from the beginning of college to the bachelor’s degree would fail to substantially increase women’s representation among U.S. undergraduates in the pSTEM fields, Miller said.

Of concern, women’s representation among pSTEM bachelor’s degrees has been decreasing during the past decade, Miller noted. “Our analyses indicate that women’s representation at the Ph.D. level is starting to follow suit by declining for the first time in over 40 years,” he said.

“This recent decline at the Ph.D. level could likely mean that women’s progress at the assistant professor level might also slow down or reverse in future years, so these trends will need to be watched closely,” Wai said.

While the researchers are encouraged that gender gaps in doctoral persistence have closed, they stressed that accurately assessing and changing gender biases in science should remain an important goal for educators and policy makers.

Before moving on to Rice’s comments, here’s a link to and citation for the paper,

The bachelor’s to Ph.D. STEM pipeline no longer leaks more women than men: a 30-year analysis by David I. Miller and Jonathan Wai. Front. Psychol., 17 February 2015, doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00037

This paper is open access (at least for now).

Maybe the situation isn’t improving after all

Curt Rice’s response titled, The incontinent pipeline: it’s not just women leaving higher education, suggests this latest research has unmasked a problem (Note: Links have been removed),

Freshly published research gives a more nuanced picture. The traditional recitation of percentages at various points along the pipeline provides a snapshot. The new research is more like a time-lapse film.

Unfortunately, the new study doesn’t actually show a pipeline being tightened up to leak less. Instead, it shows a pipeline that is leaking even more! The convergence in persistence rates for men and women is not a result of an increase in the rate of women taking a PhD; it’s the result of a decline in the rate of men doing so. It’s as though the holes have gotten bigger — they used to be so small that only women slipped through, but now men slide out, too.

Rice believes  that this improvement is ‘relative improvement’ i.e. the improvement exists in relation to declining numbers of men, a statistic that Rice gives more weight to than the Northwestern researchers appear to have done. ‘Absolute improvement’ would mean that numbers of women studying in the field had improved while men’s numbers had held steady or improved for them too.

To be fair, the authors of the paper seem to have taken at least some of this decline in men’s numbers into account (from the research paper),,

Reasons for the convergences in persistence rates remain unclear. Sometimes the convergence was driven by declines in men’s rates (e.g., in mathematics/computer science), increases in women’s rates (e.g., in physical science), or both (e.g., in engineering). help account for the changes in persistence rates. …

Overenthusiasm in the news release

Unfortunately, the headline and bullet list of highlights suggest a more ebullient research conclusion than seems warranted by the actual research results.

Think again about gender gap in science
Bachelor’s-to-Ph.D. pipeline in science, engineering no longer ‘leaks’ more women than men, new 30-year analysis finds

Research shows dated ‘leaky pipeline’ assumptions about gender imbalances in science

  • Men outnumber women as Ph.D. earners in science but no longer in doctoral persistence
  • Dramatic increase of women in science at Ph.D., assistant professorship levels since 1970s, but recent decline since 2010 may be of concern for future supply of female scientists
  • Assessing inaccurate assumptions key to correcting gender biases in science

Here’s the researchers’ conclusion,

Overall, these results and supporting literature point to the need to understand gender differences at the bachelor’s level and below to understand women’s representation in STEM at the Ph.D. level and above. Women’s representation in computer science, engineering, and physical science (pSTEM) fields has been decreasing at the bachelor’s level during the past decade. Our analyses indicate that women’s representation at the Ph.D. level is starting to follow suit by declining for the first time in over 40 years (Figure 2). This recent decline may also cause women’s gains at the assistant professor level and beyond to also slow down or reverse in the next few years. Fortunately, however, pathways for entering STEM are considerably diverse at the bachelor’s level and below. For instance, our prior research indicates that undergraduates who join STEM from a non-STEM field can substantially help the U.S. meet needs for more well-trained STEM graduates (Miller et al., under review). Addressing gender differences at the bachelor’s level could have potent effects at the Ph.D. level, especially now that women and men are equally likely to later earn STEM Ph.D.’s after the bachelor’s.

The conclusion seems to contradict the researchers’ statements in the news release,

“But a complete closing of the gap was unexpected, especially given recent evidence of gender bias in science mentoring,” Wai said.

Consequently, the widely used leaky pipeline metaphor is a dated description of gender differences in postsecondary STEM education, Wai added.

Other research shows that gaps in persistence rates are also small to nonexistent past the Ph.D., Miller said.

Incomplete pipeline

Getting back to Rice, he notes the pipeline in the Northwestern paper is incomplete (Note: Links have been removed),

In addition to the dubious celebration of the decline of persistence rates of men, the new research article also looks at an incomplete pipeline. In particular, it leaves aside the important issue of which PhD institutions students get into. For young researchers moving towards academic careers, we know that a few high-prestige universities are responsible for training future faculty members at nearly all other research universities. Are women and men getting into those high prestige universities in the same numbers? Or do women go to lower prestige institutions?

Following on that thought about lower prestige institutions and their impact on your career, there’s a Feb. 23, 2015 article by Joel Warner and Aaron Clauset in Slate investigating the situation, which applies to both men and women,

The United States prides itself on offering broad access to higher education, and thanks to merit-based admissions, ample financial aid, and emphasis on diverse student bodies, our country can claim some success in realizing this ideal.

The situation for aspiring professors is far grimmer. Aaron Clauset, a co-author of this article, is the lead author of a new study published in Science Advances that scrutinized more than 16,000 faculty members in the fields of business, computer science, and history at 242 schools. He and his colleagues found, as the paper puts it, a “steeply hierarchical structure that reflects profound social inequality.” The data revealed that just a quarter of all universities account for 71 to 86 percent of all tenure-track faculty in the U.S. and Canada in these three fields. Just 18 elite universities produce half of all computer science professors, 16 schools produce half of all business professors, and eight schools account for half of all history professors.

Then, Warner and Clauset said this about gender bias,

Here’s further evidence that the current system isn’t merely sorting the best of the best from the merely good. Female graduates of elite institutions tend to slip 15 percent further down the academic hierarchy than do men from the same institutions, evidence of gender bias to go along with the bias toward the top schools.

I suggest reading the Slate article, Rice’s post, and, if you have time, the Northwestern University research paper.

Coda: All about Curt Rice

Finally, this is for anyone who’s unfamiliar with Curt Rice (from the About page on his website; Note: Links have been removed),

In addition to my work as a professor at the University of Tromsø, I have three other roles that are closely related to the content on this website. I was elected by the permanent faculty to sit on the university board, I lead Norway’s Committee on Gender Balance and Diversity in Research, and I am the head of the Board for Current Research Information System in Norway (CRIStin). In all of these roles, I work to pursue my conviction that research and education are essential to improving society, and that making universities better therefore has the potential to make societies better.

I’m currently writing a book on gender balance. Why do men and women have different career paths? Why should we care? How can we start to make things better? Why is improving gender balance not only the right thing to do, but also the smart thing to do? For a taste of my approach, grab a copy of my free ebook on gender equality.

Beyond this book project, I use my speaking and writing engagements to reach audiences on the topics that excite me the most: gender balance, open access, leadership issues and more. These interests have grown during the past decade while I’ve had the privilege to occupy what were then two brand new leadership positions at the University of Tromsø.

From 2009–2013, I served as the elected Vice Rector for Research & Development (prorektor for forskning og utvikling). Before that, from 2002–2008, I was the founding director of my university’s first Norwegian Center of Excellence, the Center for Advanced Study in Theoretical Linguistics (CASTL). Given the luxury of being able to define those positions, I was able to pursue my passion for improving academic life by working to enhance conditions for education and research.

I’m part of the European Science Foundation’s genderSTE COST action (Gender, Science, Technology and Environment); I helped create the BALANSE program at the Research Council of Norway, which is designed to increase the numbers of women at the highest levels of research organizations. I am on the Advisory Board of the European Commission project EGERA (Effective Gender Equality in Research and Academia); I was on the Science Leaders Panel of the genSET project, in which we advised the European Commission about gender in science; I am a member of the Steering Committee for the Gender Summits.

I also led a national task force on research-based education that issued many suggestions for Norwegian institutions.

Women and Girls at the Intersection of Innovation and Opportunity webcast May 21, 2014

The webcast, Women and Girls at the Intersection of Innovation and Opportunity, takies place at 2 pm EDT (11 am PDT). I find the information about access to the webcast confusing in this EIC network May 21, 2014 announcement,

Live Webcast on EICnetwork.tv’s Science Engineering & Technology Channel from TV  [emphasis mine]
Worldwide Studios Near Washington D.C.
Wednesday, May 21, 2014, 2 PM ET

The Manufacturing Institute and EICnetwork.tv are kicking off the summer with a special webcast focusing on Women and Girls in STEM + the Arts. The webcast will be hosted on Wednesday, May 21st, live from the EICnetwork.tv studio in Chantilly, VA at 2pm ET, with a studio audience of students from the greater DC/VA area. It will be made available for later viewing immediately following the live event. [emphasis mine]

Featured panelists include Harris IT Services Director of Human Resources, Patricia Munchel; Harris IT Services Line of Business Lead & Program Manager for Health and Human Services/Clinical Research Support, Elena Byrley; Director of Communications at The Manufacturing Institute (a division of the National Association of Manufacturing), AJ Jorgenson; Brittney Exline, the youngest African-American female computer engineer in the US, and female leadership from Lockheed Martin’s space division.

This is an incredible opportunity to support excellent Internet TV program content reaching a wide audience of students, educators, policy leaders, academia, news media, mentors, entertainment writers, and executives who support initiatives in STEM + the Arts.

Perhaps the writer meant that if you don’t catch the live webcast, you can view it later?

I have found out more about EIC (Entertainment Industries Council) and its various projects, from the About page (Note: Links have been removed),

The Entertainment Industries Council, Inc. (EIC) is a non-profit organization founded in 1983 by leaders in the entertainment industry to provide information, awareness and understanding of major health and social issues among the entertainment industries and to audiences at large.

EIC represents the entertainment industry’s best examples of accurately depicting health and social issues onscreen in feature films, TV and music videos, in music and within the pages of comic books. A look at our Board of Directors and Trustees will reveal the entertainment industry’s commitment to incorporating science-based information into storylines to make them as believable–and beneficial to the viewer–as possible, and to heighten entertainment value.

EIC not only represents the best creative works that come out of Hollywood, New York and beyond; we take an active role in helping entertainment creators maximize the realistic attributes of health and social issues in their productions. EIC provides educational services and resources, including First Draft™ briefings and consultations, publications that spotlight specific health issues, Generation Next™ film school briefings and fellowships, and much, much more.

EIC also produces the PRISM Awards™, EDGE Awards™ and other recognition programs that serve to recognize and reinforce our industry’s hard work and great accomplishments in depicting health and social issues realistically, but also in an entertaining way. It is our belief that the majority of Americans–and people all over the world–are most receptive to information when it is provided in an easily digestible way. with today’s health and social issues, substance abuse and addiction, gun violence, mental illness, depression, suicide, bipolar disorder and HIV/AIDS, constantly rising cancer rates and so many more, making a difference through entertainment is a powerful tool to reach millions of people. EIC is the link between the science and the entertainment, and enables communication between scientists and the creative community, and facilitates communication from them to the public.

EIC educates, serves as a resource to, and recognizes the incredible writers, directors, producers, performers and others who are committed to making a difference through their art.

I also looked at the Board of Directors list and found a familiar sounding name, Michele Lee (from her EIC Board of Directors biography page),

A founding Board Director of the Entertainment Industries Council, Inc., this thriving star of Broadway, film and television has diversified since completing her nine year stint as Karen McKenzie on Knot”s Landing. Now an accomplished filmmaker, she was the first woman to ever write, produce, direct and star in a movie for television. A 1998 recipient of the Larry Stewart Leadership and Inspiration Award, she has long served as the “voice of EIC” – a passion which continues in her role on the PRISM Awards Honorary Committee.

Congratulations Ms. Lee on reinventing yourself.