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• Kuheli Dutt,
• Danielle L. Pfaff,
• Ariel F. Bernstein,
• Joseph S. Dillard
• Caryn J. Block

Nature Geoscience

Gender disparities in the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics, including the geosciences, are well documented and widely discussed1, 2. In the geosciences, despite receiving 40% of doctoral degrees, women hold less than 10% of full professorial positions3. A significant leak in the pipeline occurs during postdoctoral years4, so biases embedded in postdoctoral processes, such as biases in recommendation letters, may be deterrents to careers in geoscience for women. Here we present an analysis of an international data set of 1,224 recommendation letters, submitted by recommenders from 54 countries, for postdoctoral fellowships in the geosciences over the period 2007–2012. We examine the relationship between applicant gender and two outcomes of interest: letter length and letter tone. Our results reveal that female applicants are only half as likely to receive excellent letters versus good letters compared to male applicants. We also find no evidence that male and female recommenders differ in their likelihood to write stronger letters for male applicants over female applicants. Our analysis also reveals significant regional differences in letter length, with letters from the Americas being significantly longer than any other region, whereas letter tone appears to be distributed equivalently across all world regions. These results suggest that women are significantly less likely to receive excellent recommendation letters than their male counterparts at a critical juncture in their career.

The gender gap in computing is getting worse and has severe implications for the U.S. economy. New research by Accenture and Girls Who Code shows that the share of women in computing jobs is in decline and suggests that universal access to computing in schools will not address the gender gap. Only by tailoring courses to girls’ specific needs can we boost their commitment to computing. This report recommends a fresh approach that could increase the number of women in computing to 3.9 million by 2025. That would lift their share from 24% to 39% of the computing workforce and generate $299 billion in additional cumulative earnings. The greatest impact will come if we act now, starting with girls in junior high school and sustaining their interest throughout their education.

This Strategic engagement to gender equality 2016-2019 marks a new phase in EC efforts to promote equality between women and men while continuing to focus on priority areas for action of particular relevance. It identifies more than thirty key actions to be implemented in five priority areas, with timelines and indicators for monitoring. In addition, it emphasises the need to integrate a gender equality perspective into all EU policies as well as into EU funding programmes. This will be my strategy to ensure that gender equality is promoted across the EU through concrete actions and effective steps.

Five existing thematic priority areas:

‣ increasing female labour-market participation and the equal economic independence of women and men;

‣ reducing the gender pay, earnings and pension gaps and thus fighting poverty among women;

‣ promoting equality between women and men in decision-making;

‣ combating gender-based violence and protecting and supporting victims; and

‣ promoting gender equality and women’s rights across the world.

Authors: Cheryan, Sapna; Ziegler, Sianna A.; Montoya, Amanda K.; Jiang, Lily

Women obtain more than half of U.S. undergraduate degrees in biology, chemistry, and mathematics, yet they earn less than 20% of computer science, engineering, and physics undergraduate degrees (National Science Foundation, 2014a). Gender differences in interest in computer science, engineering, and physics appear even before college. Why are women represented in some science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields more than others? We conduct a critical review of the most commonly cited factors explaining gender disparities in STEM participation and investigate whether these factors explain differential gender participation across STEM fields. Math performance and discrimination influence who enters STEM, but there is little evidence to date that these factors explain why women’s underrepresentation is relatively worse in some STEM fields. We introduce a model with three overarching factors to explain the larger gender gaps in participation in computer science, engineering, and physics than in biology, chemistry, and mathematics: (a) masculine cultures that signal a lower sense of belonging to women than men, (b) a lack of sufficient early experience with computer science, engineering, and physics, and (c) gender gaps in self-efficacy. Efforts to increase women’s participation in computer science, engineering, and physics may benefit from changing masculine cultures and providing students with early experiences that signal equally to both girls and boys that they belong and can succeed in these fields. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved)