DanArmak comments on Open Thread: November 2009 - Less Wrong

3 [deleted] 02 November 2009 01:18AM

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Comment author: DanArmak 06 November 2009 12:51:32AM 2 points [-]

indirectly, more female students means more female Ph.Ds means more female professors

That's what we hoped for in the physical/biological sciences. Then we discovered we had a glass ceiling problem. We have more than enough female grads now, more than half in some programs, but not enough become PhD students. Last I heard, people who were looking into solving this problem had come to a conclusion that it wouldn't just resolve itself with time and needed active intervention, in part by deliberately creating female role models. (They're trying but so far no very notable successes on the statistical level.)

This is true for my university (Hebrew U of Jerusalem) and other Israeli universities, and from what I'd heard in many other parts of the Western world as well. Is your philosophy dept. different?

Comment author: Alicorn 06 November 2009 12:54:38AM *  3 points [-]

When I talk about "my department", I mean the grad students - we don't interact very much with any but the most avid undergrads, except in the capacity of the TA/student relationship. So by saying that we need more girls, I mean we need more female Ph.D students.

Comment author: DanArmak 06 November 2009 01:15:51AM *  2 points [-]

Oh right, sorry :-) I assume the undergrad's POV too easily because I am one.

When existing grad students, who will eventually become professors, want more girls, that should be the best and most direct solution. I wish your department all success in this.

Comment author: Alicorn 06 November 2009 01:18:11AM 2 points [-]

There seems, thankfully, to be some new attention by the admissions people to the issue. I was the only girl admitted in my year, but this year we got two. (Also, two of the new admits were minority races, while I don't think that's the case with any but perhaps a couple of ABDs who were here already.)

Comment author: DanArmak 06 November 2009 01:24:31AM 1 point [-]

Out of how many total people admitted each year?

Comment author: Alicorn 06 November 2009 01:25:25AM *  1 point [-]

I was one of five; I think this year there were seven total.

Edit: Total for the whole department, we have 43 students, eight of whom are female (counting me).