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Current legislation : The National Committee on Pay Equity supports two bills in Congress aimed at curbing wage discrimination. The bills work on different aspects of wage discrimination, and both are needed to fully close the wage gap. ===== **The Paycheck Fairness Act** (H.R.12 and S.182) was introduced January 2009 by then-Senator Hillary Clinton and Rep. Rosa DeLauro to strengthen the Equal Pay Act of 1963. The bill expands damages under the Equal Pay Act and amends its very broad fourth affirmative defense. In addition, the Paycheck Fairness Act calls for a study of data collected by the EEOC and proposes voluntary guidelines to show employers how to evaluate jobs with the goal of eliminating unfair disparities. The bill was passed by the House of Representatives on January 9, 2009, ADD and action by the Senate is pending, under the lead sponsorship of Sen. Christopher Dodd =**http://harkin.senate.gov/contact.cfm Tom Harkin's website.. contact info and everything**=
 * The Fair Pay Act ** (S. 904, H.R. 2151) is sponsored by Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) and Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC). It seeks to end wage discrimination against those who work in female-dominated or minority-dominated jobs by establishing equal pay for equivalent work. For example, within individual companies, employers could not pay jobs that are held predominately by women less than jobs held predominately by men if those jobs are equivalent in value to the employer. The bill also protects workers on the basis of race or national origin. The Fair Pay Act makes exceptions for different wage rates based on seniority, merit, or quantity or quality of work. It also contains a small business exemption.

= = =lexi= =[|Making it cool for girls to study science]= this article is about trying to get girls more interested in sciences. it talks about how girls arent as interested in engineering because they like "helping" jobs while engineering doesnt seem to help people. this article talks about trying to change that and showing that it can focus on that kind of "helping"

[|tips for women in science] i thought this website was interesting because it is different ways to support women who do want to pursue jobs in the sciences. it talks about having confidence and being assertive for yourself but also going to support groups or having a mentor to help you through out college where you can get down about being a women in this field. =Why are there so few women in STEM?= Here are the issues identified by researchers as the primary cause for underrepresentation of women in STEM. (1)

//__**The classroom climate for girls in school classrooms and for women students and faculty in university departments has been classically described as “chilly” (Hall & Sandler 1982).**__// //Girls and women are treated differently than men in both subtle and overt ways. For example, everyday ways of conducting classroom discussions can exacerbate inequities when boys are given more attention and praise by the teacher.//

//__**A dearth of role models is another contributing factor to the underrepresentation of women in science.**__// //Women students look to faculty as role models for balancing career and family, and if career demands are seen as excessive, may leave their department in higher numbers than men (Ferreira 2003). Women scientists benefit from role models and mentors who are cognizant of the differential experiences of women and men in the sciences (Etzkowitz et al. 2000).//

//__**Poor preparation and lack of encouragement in STEM subjects in school also contributes to a lack of women in STEM fields.**__// //Women undergraduates enter their majors highly qualified and competent, yet experience a drop in confidence in the first year of their science and engineering studies (Brainard & Carlin 2001; Seymour 1995). The primary reasons that women give for leaving are a loss of interest in the field, discouragement at academic difficulties, and poor teaching (Seymour & Hewitt 1997). Girls may also be less prepared than boys in science and math during their high school years, lagging behind their male peers in some measures of science achievement and in confidence in their scientific abilities (AAUW 1992).//

PHOEBE:

Encouraging girls into science careers
A number of organisations have been set up to combat the stereotyping that may encourage girls away from careers in these areas. In the UK [|The WISE Campaign] (Women into Science, Engineering and Construction) and UKRC (The UK Resource Centre for Women in SET) are collaborating to ensure industry, academia and education are all aware of the importance of challenging the traditional approaches to careers advice and recruitment that mean some of the best brains in the country are lost to science. The UKRC and other women's networks provide female role models, resources and support for activities that promote science to girls and women. One of the largest membership groups in the UK is [|Women's Engineering Society], which has been supporting women in engineering and science since 1919.

//__**A lack of “critical mass” of women in a department may lead to dissatisfaction and greater attrition of women scientists (Dresselhaus et al. 1995; Ferreira 2003).**__// //The theory of critical mass asserts that as representation of women increases, so will their access to important resources and social networks. However, Etzkowitz et al. (2000) highlight the paradox of “critical mass” by arguing that the organization and culture of academic science must change in order to encourage more women to enter the profession. “Critical mass” is meaningful only if the organization is democratic and inclusive.//

//__**Bias and discrimination in hiring and advancement of women leads to slower advancement of women in science, particularly in academic science.**__// //Valian (1998) posits an important role for gender schemas, people’s mental constructions of categories and their beliefs about those categories. People create normative beliefs and stereotypes about gender that affect the way they perceive the behavior and attributes of women and men. For example, women scientists are perceived as less competent than their male peers. The high-profile MIT report (1999) showed that women faculty were increasingly marginalized as they progressed through their// //careers at that institution, subject to disparities in salary, lab space, awards, resources, and response to outside job offers, despite having equal professional accomplishments to their male colleagues.//

//__**Salary differences and low status continue to plague women across sectors of employment.**__// //In academic positions, although men far outnumber women in all types of institutions by a ratio of 2 to 1, this gap is most prevalent in research-oriented, doctorate-granting, and comprehensive institutions (Nelson 2004). Women are concentrated in medical schools and two-year institutions.// //Male scientists and engineers are more likely to be employed full-time, and in the field of their highest degree, while women are more likely to work part-time or involuntarily outside their fields (NSF 2004b).// //College-educated women in male-dominated fields earn 76% of what college-educated men earn one year after graduation (AAUW 2007).// //Engineering and computer science graduates continue to earn the highest salaries (NSF 2005) at both the bachelor’s and master’s levels. Since women earn 21% of both BS and MS degrees in engineering and 25% and 31% of computer science BS and MS degrees, respectively, these salary disparities have lifelong implications for women’s earnings (NSF 2007a).//

Salary gaps between men and women in engineering: http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/issuebrf/sib99352.htm

In 1970, about 43 percent of women aged 16 and older were in the labor force; by 2007, over 59 percent were in labor force. In 1970, only 17.9 percent of women aged 25 and older had gone to college; by 2000, almost half had gone to college; and by 2006 one-third of the women in the labor force held a college degree. In 2007, women accounted for 51 percent of all workers in the high-paying management, professional, and related occupations. They outnumbered men in such occupations as financial managers, human resource managers, education administrators, medical and health services managers, and accountants and auditors. In 1970, the median usual weekly earnings for women working full-time was only 62.1 percent of those for men; by 2007, the raw wage gap had shrunk from 37.9 percent to just 21.5 percent.
 * a report by CONSAD Research Corporation 211 North Whitfield Street Pittsburgh, PA 15206**


 * They conclude that the Northeast and parts of the West coast are among the best economic environments for women, considering the gender wage gap in the state and the state policies to encourage female labor force participation. The Southeast and parts of the Midwest have the lowest rankings. The District of Columbia has the best area economy and Arkansas has the worst state economy for women, based on rankings of the eight economic indicators.**


 * http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=125998232 this is an NPR segment on what is being done on the hill surrounding women and equal pay, there are also stats about the disparities**

This information spells out where the issue originates, why enter a field where you know you will be paid less and look down upon for your gender. There must be equal pay, and equal benefits for women to become engaged in STEM.

//__Issues of work-life balance are more significant for women.__//
 * //Long times to doctoral degrees and a growing expectation for postgraduate education (“postdocs”) delay opportunities to establish stable careers and families for scientists and engineers, as compared to those in other fields. Although the median age (31) for doctoral degree attainment in engineering, life and physical sciences is lower than in the social sciences (33), humanities (35) or education (44), multiple postdocs for STEM PhDs can contribute to postponement of families and careers (NSF 2006b).//**
 * //Women in academic STEM positions lag behind their male counterparts on a number of measures of career success (NSF 2004a). If they are married with children, they fare even worse, hitting the “maternal wall” (Williams 2001). Academic women who postpone children until later in their careers are more likely to achieve tenure than those with early children (Mason & Goulden 2004; NSF 2004b).//**


 * Gabby: Intersting information**
 * Step 1: Educate the nearest community **
 * · TITLE IX: what does it mean to the science community **
 * o It must be strongly enforced for our society to progress **
 * o It needs to start from the top, legislation is written to be followed, it is not a suggestion **
 * o [] **


 * § articles about the use of title 9 **


 * · A great video: [] about women who have made a large impact in STEM fields **


 * //1. http://www.socwomen.org/socactivism/stem_fact_sheet.pdf//**

=**Michelle**=


 * Discrimination against women in the workplace:**
 * Gender stereotyping in family, education and media suggesting that boys are better at maths and science and that men are better suited to careers in science, causing girls to become negative and anxious about their science potential **

media type="custom" key="7097209"
 * This video talks about how women are paid about 16% less than men in many professions in Belgium. It also talks about what they have been doing to try to**
 * make the pay equal. By fighting for this, jobs were reassessed, and women will finally be able to earn the same amount as men.**

media type="custom" key="7097313"


 * Speaking about why there aren't as many females in the science field.**
 * - Stereotyping**
 * - On average women find computer tech and engineering less interesting even if they have the ability**

=**PHOEBE**:= []

The nearer the top of the academic hierarchy, the lower the proportion of women. Indeed, universally, women are just a tiny minority of people in top scientific jobs.

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Out of 69,300 science and engineering full professors in 2006, a mere 600--less than 1%--were African-American women.

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Statistics
Since 1966, the number of women receiving [|bachelor's degrees] in science and engineering in the U.S. has increased almost every year, reaching 202,583 in 2001, approximately half of the total.[|[16]] The number awarded to men has not increased significantly since 1976. The proportion of women graduate students in science and engineering has risen since 1991, reaching 41% in 2001. Substantial differences between subjects are seen, however, with women accounting for almost three-quarters of those enrolled in psychology in 2001, but only 30% in computer science and 10% in engineering.[|[16]] Both the number and the proportion of doctoral degrees in science and engineering awarded to women have increased steadily since 1966, from 8% in 1966 to 37% in 2001. The number of doctoral degrees awarded to men peaked in 1996 and has since fallen.[|[16]] Research on women's participation in the "hard" sciences such as physics and computer science speaks of the "[|leaky pipeline]" model, in which the proportion of women "on track" to potentially becoming top scientists falls off at every step of the way, from getting interested in science and math in elementary school, through doctorate, postdoc, and career steps. Various reasons are proposed for this, but the vast differences in the "leakiness" of this same pipe across countries and times argue for a cultural interpretation. The leaky pipeline is also applicable in other fields. In biology, for instance, women in the United States have been getting Master's degrees in the same numbers as men for two decades, yet fewer women get Ph.D.s; and the numbers of women P.I.s have not risen.[|[17]] In the UK, women occupied over half the places in science-related higher education courses (science, medicine, maths, computer science and engineering) in 2004/5.[|[18]] However, gender differences by individual subject were large: women substantially outnumbered men in biology and medicine, especially nursing, while men predominated in maths, physical sciences, computer science and engineering. In the U.S., women with science or engineering doctoral degrees were predominantly employed in the education sector in 2001, with substantially fewer employed in business or industry than men.[|[16]] In January 2005, [|Harvard University] President [|Lawrence Summers] sparked controversy when, at an NBER Conference on Diversifying the Science & Engineering Workforce, he made comments suggesting the lower numbers of women in high-level science positions may be due to innate differences in abilities or preferences between men and women. This frustrated many conferencegoers who felt that these issues, or at least his presentation of them, had been thoroughly refuted during the conference, and that moreover such statements were irresponsible coming from a university president. The resulting controversy was a factor in his later resignation.[//[|citation needed]//]