Transcript Networking: Lessons Learned from Hunter College’s Gender

Networking: Lessons Learned from Hunter College’s
Gender Equity Project
Networking challenges vary with
 Institution type, e.g., Research 1, Doctoral-granting, Liberal Arts,
Comprehensive
 Larger institutional context, e.g., urban/rural,
commuter/residential college, resource rich/resource poor
 Department characteristics, e.g., percentage of women,
characteristics of chairs, quality of channels of communication
 Discipline-related characteristics, e.g., percentage of women,
ways of working
 Personal and social characteristics of faculty member, e.g., sex,
race, self-esteem, shyness, level of productivity, status in the
field
THE GENDER EQUITY PROJECT
About Hunter College
 Carnegie Comprehensive in transition, with increasing emphasis on
research productivity
 High teaching loads and service obligations
 Urban, commuter, resource-poor
 Short tenure clock
 Few family friendly policies
 Hunter science departments have a larger percentage of women and
underrepresented minorities among faculty than most other schools
 Hunter’s GEP targets disciplines from the Natural and Physical
Sciences to the Social Sciences, from departments with one woman to
departments with nearly 50 percent women
THE GENDER EQUITY PROJECT
Special challenges for Hunter women faculty
Structural
 Few formal and informal faculty development opportunities
 Few family friendly polices
 Lack of a formal women’s organization/office on campus
dedicated to women faculty or gender equity until GEP
 System of elected chairs untrained, undercompensated,
undersupported. Chairs vary in the extent to which they see
themselves as advocates for junior faculty
 In a commuter school in a large urban area, students and
faculty isolated intellectually and socially and need communities
THE GENDER EQUITY PROJECT
Special challenges for Hunter women faculty
Individual
 Some associates have never had, or have largely lost, strong
identities as researchers and scholars
 Most associates are not on doctoral faculty and have no access
to doctoral students
 For those who have not published much, not published in a
given area, or have not published in a long time, there may be
a need for improved research skills
 Need for increased appreciation for what kind of time,
commitment, and activities are necessary for success in
academic careers
THE GENDER EQUITY PROJECT
About the GEP sponsorship program
Time and resources for research

$10,000 (in Year 1)
 release time
 research assistance
 Travel
A sponsor
 $5,000 (in Year 1)
 serves as an intellectual
sounding board
 provides feedback on papers
and career plans
Workshops
THE GENDER EQUITY PROJECT
Tangible benefits for associates
Our 15 Associates:
Very diverse in all ways:
 Two African American women, two Latina women, four Asian
women
 Assistant to Full Professor
 From Sociology to Chemistry; from torture in the Middle East to
lanthanide polyoxmetalates
 From those with few publications in refereed journals to more
than 30 publications; from no grants to history of external
funding
THE GENDER EQUITY PROJECT
Associates define their ideal sponsor variously,
including as one who
 Is of my race
 Will be “gentle with me”
 Will “hold my feet to the fire”
 Has an affinity for a particular approach to scientific problems is
in a specific research area
 Has a particular skill set
 Is physically close to Hunter College
THE GENDER EQUITY PROJECT
Networking through sponsors
In the GEP, associates network through their sponsors
 Two sponsors have played large roles in two associates getting
their first book contracts
 Two associates are now collaborating
with their sponsors on auspicious new
research projects
 Two associates have formed significant
relationships and found intellectual
community at the home institutions of
their sponsors
Networking (inseparable
from mentoring/
sponsoring/ community)
is one of the most
important and effective
aspects of our program.
 One associate was seriously contemplating leaving academia,
but her identity and confidence as an academic are being
restored, largely because of her sponsor
THE GENDER EQUITY PROJECT
Networking through GEP Co-Directors
VVV and VCR have different areas of
expertise, and that has proven useful
to associates. Associates come to us
for help with:
 Assistance in the tenure and
promotion processes
 Conflicts in their departments with
chairs, technical assistants, and fellow
faculty
 Corresponding with editors and
collaborators
 Setting priorities in their career
 Conflicts between personal and
professional life
THE GENDER EQUITY PROJECT
“I found it extremely helpful
to be able to speak to VVV
and VCR candidly about
the situations I have been
trying to deal with, and
they have been
outstanding resources for
me.”
“From conversations with
VCR and VVV, I feel I am
(slowly and somewhat
painfully) learning a lot
about being a professional
academic, a scientist in my
field.”
Networking through each other
For some of the women, the GEP community is the closest
and best professional community they have.
 Associates learn that they are not alone in their struggles to
balance work and family, find time to write, or revise a rejected
article, and exchange ideas
 Associates form alliances within and across departments
 Two associates who had never before collaborated are putting
together a symposium on gender, race, and science
 Associates meet informally with each other and support each
other personally and professionally
THE GENDER EQUITY PROJECT
Networking beyond the GEP
 Get known by important people
in your field
 Propose colloquia and panels
and invite prominent scientists
 Use professional conferences
wisely
 Get known by important people
in your institution
 Go to events in the institution
that will maximize your
visibility.
 GEP associates were in
force at a recent holiday
party
 One associate used the
occasion of a conference to
get her work known—and
 Treat the chair, dean, and
herself cited—by a
others as allies
prominent scientist
Be on the lookout for the unexpected—for
help from seemingly unlikely sources
THE GENDER EQUITY PROJECT
All major Sponsorship Program successes are
directly or indirectly related to networking:
 Importance of writing in a professional career — new personal
identity
 Mentorship from GEP as well as from sponsor
 Understanding reward structure
 Intellectual and social communities for associates: learning
from each other
THE GENDER EQUITY PROJECT
Significant challenges remain
Ethnic Minority Women
There is reason to think that there may be special challenges in
networking among minority women.
 Race schemas work against minority women in academe
 Minorities may be held to higher standards than others and
encounter resentment and hostility as tokens
 Being small statistical minorities also works against minority
women in academic science
 In turn, statistical minority status also shapes the expectations
and experiences of outgroup members
 Anticipation of being stereotyped may lead outgroup members
to behave in ways that become self-fulfilling prophecies
THE GENDER EQUITY PROJECT
Significant challenges remain
Ethnic Minority Women
 The literature suggests that strong network ties are useful to
people, but minority women are at periphery of social networks
and they do not have powerful people advocating for them
 Men have stronger network ties at work, and men make much
better use of weak ties than women do
 Cross race (and sex) relationships are difficult and often weak
 When minority scientists are successful and viewed as
competent, they are often overwhelmed with requests and
opportunities
THE GENDER EQUITY PROJECT
Significant challenges remain
Ethnic Minority Women
 There are heightened pressures for within-group solidarity
among underrepresented groups. This solidarity sometimes
invites scrutiny and disapproval from those in the majority.
 There is evidence that Hispanic and Asian people in
organizations are subject to negative stereotypes, but are less
likely than African Americans to report exclusion from informal
networks
THE GENDER EQUITY PROJECT
Significant challenges remain
Work Family Issues
These are the some of the hardest issues for academic women,
including women who have children, who want children, and
who are single mothers. In addition, there are problems
intertwining a career with one’s partner.
 When to have children: life circumstances and preferences often
determine this
 If one has children: key is to commit to priorities and stick to
them
 Stopping the tenure clock: implicit clock still ticks in some minds
 Spousal hires: challenges for negotiation
THE GENDER EQUITY PROJECT