Girls in STEM is failing both girls and STEM? 99

[moltenmetal]

https://www.thestar.com/opinion/com...m-culture-is-failing-both-girls-and-stem.html

Read the article, THEN discuss...

Growing up, I increasingly saw my good grades as a trap locking me into a single career: STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics). It felt like a dystopian YA novel, and my high school report card was The Choosing. A’s in math and science? Here are your jeans and sweatshirt.

Well-meaning people lied to me. They said computer science was a great work-from-home career if I wanted children (when in fact a majority of women quit STEM because the culture of poor work-life balance makes it too difficult to raise a family), that STEM careers are secure (actually the industry has frequent layoffs and is very competitive), and more....

 

[solid7]

Mathematical induction is based precisely on being able to solve a concrete problem and proving that if it's true for n, it's true for n+1.

Mathematical induction is but one method of proof, and is not suitable for all problems requiring proof. Proof requires that you be able to prove the concept, without starting with the thing that you're trying to prove. It also requires that the condition hold true for ALL cases. So, if you'd like to use proof by induction to apply to this concept, then you must absolutely prove that it holds true for ALL cases. (so if you're woman who has been discriminated against, then the implication is that it happens to every woman) Ok, you're up.

There is most certainly insufficient evidence to prove that women and girls are being artificially barred from pursuing STEM education and careers.

EDIT: It is also worth noting that mathematical induction applies to properties of numbers, not to specific problems. So, it's not a concrete example. Induction usually begins with something like P. (abstract)

 

[lacajun]

Recently I did a presentation on navigating a career to a women's support group at an engineering firm. They were looking to me to provide examples of companies that do not discriminate or harass against women. They observed that I was unable to do that in spite of all of the places I have worked.

Is it rampant, I can't say. But I can say from my experiences that many women are discriminated against and harrassed in the workplace. The bar is set much higher for women than men. I experienced it and many other women have, too.

Every woman that I have discussed workplace problems with has stated that it "just gets old" having to deal with all of the games men play in the workplace. Speaking for myself, I am tired of it. I just wanted to go to work and do the best job possible and go wherever my talent took me. That became increasingly hard to do because of the nasty politics men practiced.


Pamela K. Quillin, P.E.
Quillin Engineering, LLC
NSPE-CO, Central Chapter
Dinner program:

http://nspe-co.org/events.php

 

[solid7]

Recently I did a presentation on navigating a career to a women's support group at an engineering firm. They were looking to me to provide examples of companies that do not discriminate or harass against women. They observed that I was unable to do that in spite of all of the places I have worked.

If you're speaking to a woman's support group, wouldn't that imply that you're already an affected member of the group in question?
Wouldn't that question imply bias from the outset?
It was entire companies discriminating against you, and/or harrassing you? (as opposed to individuals in the group)

This is where this whole issue gets contentious. If I ask you how you handled it, to better understand your point of view, now I'm viewed with suspicion - if not outright accused of taking sides with men. If I provide a counterexample,it's summarily dismissed, because it doesn't match your own experience. Mind you, I ask questions because I don't know you at all, and I have a tendency to always ask for more information, rather than to just accept one person's account. (when I say "you", that's in general, not you, specifically.)

So how does one advance a conversation like this?

Is it rampant, I can't say. But I can say from my experiences that many women are discriminated against and harrassed in the workplace. The bar is set much higher for women than men. I experienced it and many other women have, too.

I could provide counterexamples that would show that most men in the workplace are scared to their soul about sexual harrassment claims - whether real or perceived. I could also show you cases of women who were thoroughly pleased with the handling of their complaints, either by way of Human Resources, or their attorneys. And yet again, I could show you examples of women who were never inconvenienced, at all.

But then again, I could also show you this in EVERY profession. How does any of that address the assertion that STEM related jobs are culpable for gender related failings?

 

[IRstuff]

"There is most certainly insufficient evidence to prove that women and girls are being artificially barred from pursuing STEM education and careers."

This does not prove that they aren't barred. The keyword here is "artificially," since it has been demonstrated in numerous studies that name, height, skin color, etc. DO present discrimination opportunities, when all else is equal. When identical resumes are offered to companies, but only those with non-ethnic names are picked for further evaluation, is that "artificial" barring?

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[IRstuff]

"Ok, you're up."

I was merely addressing your erroneous statement, "In mathematics, you cannot use a concrete problem to rigorously prove an abstract concept," which you apparently agree is erroneous: "Mathematical induction is but one method of proof."

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[solid7]

This does not prove that they aren't barred. The keyword here is "artificially," since it has been demonstrated in numerous studies that name, height, skin color, etc. DO present discrimination opportunities, when all else is equal. When identical resumes are offered to companies, but only those with non-ethnic names are picked for further evaluation, is that "artificial" barring?

Well, I guess it depends on what perspective you debate from. Is it what comes naturally to people - i.e., tribal behavior - or is it a violation of some social construct? But honestly, it's irrelevant to my point, which has been missed over, and over, and over again.

- The general topic suggests that this is a problem endemic to STEM.
- I didn't see STEM one single time in your response.
- The STEM factor has been omitted in so many cases, for convenience of presenting emotional arguments

I feel that we've agreed multiple times that this is not a STEM issue, without anyone actually having the courage to concede the point. We can debate social justice all day long. But we can't do so from such a limited perspective. We have not established any grounds to paint it in the context of STEM. Since I'm in a STEM field, that's the point for me, right now.

It's not a STEM related issue. It's not a failing of an academic institution. It's not even a failing of people. It's an altogether different beast. Or we're off-topic, and discussing the wrong things. It's one or the other, or both. (logic)

 

[solid7]

I was merely addressing your erroneous statement, "In mathematics, you cannot use a concrete problem to rigorously prove an abstract concept," which you apparently agree is erroneous: "Mathematical induction is but one method of proof."

Erroneous? It's erroneous because you chose an inappropriate form of proof to draw a parallel on? I hardly think that's right. You chose the wrong tool to do the job, simple as. I maintain that it is entirely true that you cannot perform a proof by demonstrating that it works on the problem that you're trying to prove the concept for. Proofs are based on theorems and axioms that must be met before the statement can apply. You cannot prove that 1+1 is 2 by doing the math, and saying, "see, I told you so!"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_proof

There's a nice little section in there about the different methods of proofs.

 

[nonplussed]

solid7, you're fighting a losing battle. Even if you provide inextricable evidence that low female participation is not caused by sexism then people will always counter with personal experience. And if the personal experience was had in a STEM workplace, then it is automatically attributed to the STEM profession.

Most of the personal stories I've read in this thread I don't even attribute to sexism. For example; someone interrupted you mid sentence then shouted over you? Yep that happens all the time to me and I'm male. Having to deal with nasty male politics? Yep that's literally the story of my life and I have to deal with that every single day and I am also incredibly tired of it. Someone stealing your idea and claiming it as their own? Happens to me too. Being told that what you're wearing is inappropriate for the workplace? Yep happened to me and I learned my lesson. All men wear the same thing: button up long sleeve shirt and black pants with black shoes. If you ask all women to wear matching neutral clothing then you're being sexist. Someone slapping your ass in the kitchen while you're getting coffee? Yep, one of the older admin women does this to me every other week. If anyone of these happened to women it would immediately be labeled as sexism.

The 'mansplaining' term really gets to me; do people honestly believe men treat other men like saints and don't talk over them or aggressively explain something they already know and treat each other like shit? If someone 'mansplains' to you then I would consider that they are treating you exactly like they treat other men, which is indeed the opposite of sexism.

I have a male friend who works as a nurse. Whenever he tells people he's a nurse they automatically assume he's gay. At this point I honestly believe there's an endemic plot to keep straight males out of nursing. Or maybe he should just tell them he's not gay and not immediately take offence? "But he wouldn't need to tell people he's not gay if nursing wasn't so heterophobic".

 

[CWB1]

CWB1, they are largely blocked from judgeships, which are male dominated.

Unless you're suggesting the general population is biased against women that makes even less sense as ~90% of judges are elected.

I have no doubt that there is a biological tendency for folks to be more friendly towards others of the same sex and race but honestly don't believe that there is anything more than a tiny minority of folks in the US today who are biased enough against others to discriminate against them. I've heard my share of bs between my time in the military, trades, and now as an engineer, and I honestly sympathize with folks who get burnt out in this profession as I believe it to be one of the more stressful. IME there certainly is a lot more nonsense in the office than on the shop floor despite the pretense of being a "professional" environment.

 

[solid7]

solid7, you're fighting a losing battle.

I do not choose to see it that way. In no way am I fighting a losing battle, so much as the others are playing a zero sum game.

We have been asked to believe that there is a failing on the part of STEM with regards to gender bias. And despite all of the passion on the topic, there is still ZERO evidence that there is a STEM specific factor that is driving the perceived problem. By the suggestion of the topic, it was my opinion - that of the neutral observer, who was willing to hear the arguments - that was ripe to be swayed. And yet, no convincing arguments have been put forth. In fact, in the course of all of this, my own curiosity led me to research the reports of gender bias by profession, and STEM fields are far from the top of the list. (if you believe that sort of thing, anyway)

With regards to 'mansplaining', I am, personally, quite comfortable with people using those kinds of terms. I believe that everyone should be allowed to say as they please, for the sake of transparency. By a person's words, you can easily ascertain whom they are, and what their values are. So by all means, let people wear their true colors openly.

 

[lacajun]

nonplussed, men are horrible to other men. No doubt. I know men who have had their ideas stolen by other men. Realizing how horrible men are to other men helps me to understand how poorly they've treated me, too. Anyone smacking someone's rear is illegal. Do you say anything to her to stop it?

CWB1, if you doubt the words of the law professor, take it up with him. They're studying their profession just as people study STEM. I'm sure they know more about everything than I do.

Pamela K. Quillin, P.E.
Quillin Engineering, LLC
NSPE-CO, Central Chapter
Dinner program:

http://nspe-co.org/events.php

 

[solid7]

PEOPLE are horrible to PEOPLE. Men do not have a monopoly on that.

Imagine any man here justifying a position, using the same basic words that you have. (regardless of the position they are trying to justify) "Realizing how horrible women are to other women helps me to understand how poorly they've treated me, too."

I can't even begin to imagine the outrage that would be met with, had any man said it.

Will you also tell us that women don't treat people as poorly as men do? Will you open that floodgate, and further divert this topic away from its original logical fallacy?

 

[moltenmetal]

My wife can tell you exactly how nasty women can be to other women, having worked in a nearly totally female-dominated field.

Sex segregation brings out the worst, most exaggerated sex stereotypical problems of BOTH sexes. Anyone who has been to a sex-segregated school, as I have, will know this first hand.

The problem with STEM careers and engineering in particular wasn't that it was engineering, but that it was effectively sex segregated. This allowed the same exaggerated expression of stereotypical male behavior to flourish. It was natural that women would be uncomfortable in such an environment.

Fortunately though, it doesn't take pure parity to mitigate the result of sex segregation. Having even 10% women in a male-dominated area, or 10% men in a female-dominated area, makes a huge difference to the behavior, even without active management intervention. Most people aren't jerks, and are capable of some degree of social self-regulation. Some are expert at it. Some people don't come to that naturally and need to be trained. And some just can't, or won't- some people are jerks, or sociopaths, or worse, and though it might be possible to fix them, it's usually not worth trying unless they're far more than mere co-workers.

None of this is any excuse for management to tolerate the exaggerated behaviors arising from sex segregation when they affect the workplace for the under-represented sex, or for any other under-represented group. It may be natural for people to tend to behave this way, but we know we have to repress all sorts of rather natural behaviors to get along in a workplace.

 

[IRstuff]

I don't think that anyone was claiming that STEM was the ONLY place where discrimination occurs. Nor that there's necessarily a "conspiracy" to commit discrimination; just because everyone discriminates does not imply that they all agreed to discriminate, or that they were even aware that they discriminate. Clearly, and demonstrably, discrimination occurs pretty much everywhere and anytime in life. Studies have shown a preference for the tall Nordic male phenotype over shorter Nordic, or shorter ethnic, etc. in business settings, even to the degree that "ethnic" first names have been shown to adversely affect the likelihood of getting a resume through the wickets. Did someone issue a memo stating that everyone was supposed to do that? No, yet they do.

The last great world war was driven by someone who perceived the white phenotype as being superior, and even those that fought against the over domination of the world by that phenotype were from that same phenotype, for the most part. And humans have evolved to rank order people according to basic needs and possible threats, so family, tribe, nation, etc., are subconscious ranking systems we all apply to the people we interact with. We behave, to a large degree, based on genetics and cultural programming, to the extent that toddlers going to Walmart for the first time recognize that a certain aisle with an abundance of pink as being the "girls" toy aisle. Even the purple dinosaur has trouble with things like that; one episode talking about what to be when the kids grew up tilted heavily into stereotypical gender roles, teachers and nurses were female, firefighters, chefs, etc., were male. We have a huge amount of cultural baggage that we carry around that would need to be completely dumped before we could even remotely begin to determine whether ANYTHING we do is a completely unbiased and un-coerced decision. We know from tons of research that girls excel in math and science in elementary school, up until the tail end of junior high, and then, poof! the laggardly boys suddenly become math stars. That's certainly odd from a purist perspective. But, we know that in that period of life, biological imperatives take over, and certainly, when I was growing up, "smart" girls were not the popular girls, particularly in high school.

There have been claims that in the currently assessed as egalitarian countries, mostly Nordic, oddly enough, women eschew math and science, but there are hints that other things are going on behind the scenes that might be skewing the results.

Oh, and SWMBO does a LOT of womansplaining to me, so there's that.

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[lacajun]

Federal Bureau of Prisons, Statistics, Gender

IRstuff, I was never popular with the boys and I'm still not popular with men. They claim I'm too smart but I certainly don't think that of myself. Some have said they wouldn't be able to "get away" with anything, which makes me question what they want to "get away" with. Are their intentions devilish or angelic? So, I'm glad they're not interested. You raise some really good points, too.

I've not worked in a female dominated environment so I don't know. I suspect they are catty, snarky, etc. I've not had near the trouble with women that I've had with men, professionally or personally.

I also think we cannot take a snapshot of today and fully understand it, which partially gets to IRstuff's points. We need the history to make sense of today. History matters.


Pamela K. Quillin, P.E.
Quillin Engineering, LLC
NSPE-CO, Central Chapter
Dinner program:

http://nspe-co.org/events.php

 

[moltenmetal]

lacajun: it's been my observation that smart women only scare insecure men. Secure men can find intelligence incredibly attractive in women. Sounds like either a) you've met a lot of men who are insecure, or b) there's more going on than just you being smart (the excuse they're giving you, which you are trying to deny out of modesty), or likely a bit of both. I know brilliant women who are extremely popular with men, and others equally brilliant who find men to be nothing but trouble and annoyance on an interpersonal level and always have. I know very intelligent men who vary across that spectrum widely too. People of both sexes vary greatly in their social skills and ability to adapt socially, and that seems to be quite independent of what we might consider to be conventional intelligence.

I don't know you so I could of course be totally wrong. But it seems to me that you've never had the trouble with women than you've had with men because, by your own admission, you've studied and then worked in a male dominated profession- study and work are both very significant portions of a person's life- enough so to be formative in terms of attitudes etc.

Again, I don't think that engineering or other STEM fields have anything about them that make them inherently misogynistic, nor do I believe you're claiming that they do. They are, or perhaps were, primarily male-dominated areas of study and work, and hence have experienced the same exaggerated expression of stereotypical male-ness that comes out in sports locker rooms etc., except extended to a professional context. That expression can and does make men like myself quite uncomfortable- and, unchecked, it can have the sorts of negative outcomes for women that you've encountered. Similar, but different, exaggerated expressions of stereotypical female-ness occur in female-dominated professions as my wife can attest. The discomfort is still there, but the outcomes are different because the behaviors and attitudes are different. Interestingly, in her observation, the presence of gay men in a female-dominated workplace doesn't change the dynamic much at all.

 

[IRstuff]

Sure, smart women intimidate insecure men, but there are few people who are truly secure; which is one of the reasons why the world is so messed up. One's parents, social mores, etc., all "conspire" to make everyone wonder if they're smart enough, tall enough, endowed enough, etc. For the normal person, then, there's likely to be more than one insecurity, and when it comes to relations with the opposite gender, almost everyone has tons of baggage.

It's certainly been a long-standing cliche that smart girls and women "dumb down" to attract men, so there's at least a modicum of truth there, and it's been around a long time. English literature abounds with women who are too smart for the average man.

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[solid7]

I was never popular with the boys and I'm still not popular with men. They claim I'm too smart

I get that. All of the girls used to say that I was too good looking - and if it wasn't that, I was too funny, or too rich. I feel your pain.

No offense, but I really don't think that men are universally put off by intelligence. (most men seem to want a second mother - and smart ladies make fine second mothers) It's far more likely some other reason.

I also think we cannot take a snapshot of today and fully understand it, which partially gets to IRstuff's points. We need the history to make sense of today. History matters.

History matters right up to the point that it prevents you from living in the present, and/or moving forward. Sometimes, we really need to adopt contemporary attitudes, quit painting everything in a historical perspective, and stop being so hung up on the past. Otherwise, we don't move beyond it, and we live with perpetual suspicion and angst.

 

[IRstuff]

"quit painting everything in a historical perspective, and stop being so hung up on the past. Otherwise, we don't move beyond it, and we live with perpetual suspicion and angst."

That only works if we're computers and get loaded with fresh, untainted, operating systems. The mere fact that 30 yrs after the "sexual revolution," Barney couldn't come up with non-stereotypical gender roles is a clear indication that biases are deeply ingrained. We'd all like to "move on," but no everyone wants to, or can, and therein lies the problem. It's like being the best driver in the world, and all that means is that everyone else is a worse driver.

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[solid7]

You are proving the point brilliantly.

You must keep the past as a reminder, but you mustn't dwell on it.

That's like saying you forgive someone for something, but reminding them of it, for any reason, when you're upset about something.