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Women in Engineering II 54

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lacajun

lacajun

Electrical
Apr 2, 2007
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Since the first post on this is closed, I decided to begin a new post.

This is a dated but interesting report that I'm working my way through. As I read through it, I see improvements that can be made to benefit women as well as men.

Women in Engineering: An Untapped Resource

Pamela K. Quillin, P.E.
Quillin Engineering, LLC
NSPE-CO, Central Chapter
Dinner program:
 
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beej67 said:
they'd need to put all the causes on the table, establish a truly robust data set, and do the math properly.
Click to expand...

Except that's impossible. Don't give up just because of that. Not all things that people believe strongly are actually based in robust data.
Rather than throw up our hands because there's no hard data, instead we can figure out where our stance is going to be, based on what we think is the right choice.
I've already decided what I think is right, personally, so I need to teach myself how to act in a way consistent with my beliefs. Looking at data like the articles you posted and the other stuff like Gapminder can inform me of the causes of disparity (if I don't get confused in the process) so that hopefully I can be aware of the consequences of my own actions. And I think it helps.

No one believes the theory except the one who developed it. Everyone believes the experiment except the one who ran it.
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I'm not sure why I didn't find that article either. If memory serves, other articles came up about enrollment being down across the board. It's hard for me to conceive that a patriarchal, theocracy that has such beliefs would allow women to outdo the men. I'll have to research it more.

Pamela K. Quillin, P.E.
Quillin Engineering, LLC
NSPE-CO, Central Chapter
Dinner program:
 
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lacajun said:
It's hard for me to conceive that a patriarchal, theocracy that has such beliefs would allow women to outdo the men.
Click to expand...

If I postulate that maybe the subjugation of women in certain countries may be exaggerated as a story for the pleasure of the western audience, rather than a factual situation, would you be inclined to consider the possibility? The research you do may refute what I'm saying, of course, so let me know what you find.

Also... a woman doesn't have to "outdo" a man to receive an education... it's not winners and losers... IMO, this is more economic where the wealth of social classes in such societies determine the number of opportunities available, not so much gender.

I try to take note where the statistics report "education" rather than "profession" or "years of experience working in a profession". That chart I posted earlier is a good example. "STEM graduates" is says. That's only worth so much. I still do suspect that there are many women, perhaps most women the world over, who get an education (engineering and otherwise) but don't fulfill it once the family arrives. So when I see statistics that report only "education", I suspect they are missing the part of the story 10 years after school, when the most men are still in engineering and the women are less. There is such a long way to go.

No one believes the theory except the one who developed it. Everyone believes the experiment except the one who ran it.
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SparWeb, I am willing to consider that possibility. However, even within Christendom, another patriarchal religion, men don't want women to outdo them and they don't want women to know things only men should know. I've heard it more than once. A man once stated he wouldn't date me because I knew things only men should know. Well, some men don't know how to change a tire on a car. I do because of necessity.

I agree about "winners" and "losers" but only to a point. You and I have a different way of thinking about some things. Others do not and, for them, education does represent a situation of one "outdoing" another. In my experience, gender amplifies it.

As an example, because I have a MS in engineering, some people including engineers feel I have outdone them. Getting it had nothing to do with anyone else especially people I didn't/don't know. That's unrealistic thinking on their part but that's what they engage in mentally. Because I got my MS from Pitt, some believe I have outdone them. Again, that's unrealistic thinking but that's what they believe and it comes out in speech and treatment. So, I don't think education can be divorced from the "outdoing" a man piece. Gender amplifies it. I've seen it in various interactions.

I suspect some percentage of women leave engineering once kids come. My sister left engineering for that reason. Many do want to work outside the home and find it increasingly difficult to do that because of the male attitudes and behaviors. After years, it's just old and tiring. I think Corporate America would be better served to work more with families. It would benefit the mother, father, the kids, and the corporation.

I hope you are not diminishing the problems in your own mind with your train of thought.

Pamela K. Quillin, P.E.
Quillin Engineering, LLC
NSPE-CO, Central Chapter
Dinner program:
 
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Except that's impossible. Don't give up just because of that. Not all things that people believe strongly are actually based in robust data.
Click to expand...

Well then we're at an impasse. That's the problem.

If Pamela and I both attempt to intuit the underlying causes of the STEM gap, I'm going to conclude that it is at least partially due to the fact that 80% of single parents are women, and single parents of both genders are almost literally excluded from STEM jobs due to the time constraints wrapped up in them. I conclude this because of my experience as a business owner soon to be single parent, and the fact that in decades working at larger firms I never once saw the sorts of things Pamela is talking about, neither in the presence of women nor behind closed doors with ornery old men. On the flip side, Pamela is going to conclude that (at least most of) the thing is due to sexism because of the giant laundry list of sexist things she's seen, and has spoken about in this thread, and I have no legitimate ground by which I can tell her she didn't experience those things. I'm sure she did experience them, and if I had experienced those things I would absolutely come to the same conclusions she has.

So what's the answer?

The problem with defaulting to lived experience as the foundation of a theory, be it my theory or her theory or anybody else's theory, is that each lived experience is only one data point. The worse thing in the public dialogue, is that human beings are psychologically trapped into binary thinking, so we tend to think that these two theories (or others) are mutually exclusive when they technically aren't. Pamela and I could both be right. The actual question, if framed properly, should be more like this:

What percentage of the STEM gap is attributable to each of the following factors:

[ul]
[li]Sexism against women[/li]
[li]Social Pressures[/li]
[li]Measurable personality trait differences at the population level in terms of interest (the people/things divide)[/li]
[li]The Work Life Balance in STEM jobs is garbage and women often value life over work more than men (we might call this a "corporate culture" issue, and a good case could be made that it's damaging men)[/li]
[li]Single parenting isn't evenly distributed (work/life balance sub-issue, but it raises the question - would the STEM gap shrink if courts gave custody to men more often?)[/li]
[li]Women are more likely than men to become caregivers to sick or elderly family members (work/life balance sub-issue)[/li]
[li]Technical capability (I only include this because I'd like to mention that this one is proven to be basically 0%, in good, peer reviewed journals - both genders are equally technically capable at the mean)[/li]
[li]Male Variability Hypothesis (only applicable at the tails, and the tails probably don't matter that much unless the discussion is CEOs instead of project managers)[/li]
[/ul]

Some percentage of the STEM gap is probably due to each of those things, some more than others. And some of those things aren't technically "problems" at all.

And some of them flow from social pressures in the opposite direction. For instance, at a statistical level, men and women seek different things in choosing a mate / life partner. Men tend to skew towards appearance, and women tend to skew towards earning capacity, in their mate preferences. That's solid, peer reviewed science, and it's not a function of culture, because they controlled for that. It shows up in all cultures equally. What that means, is that men at a population level are going to seek a different work/life balance than women, because that's literally part of attracting a mate. And they're doing it because that's literally what women want. So the Social Pressures bullet swings both ways.



Hydrology, Drainage Analysis, Flood Studies, and Complex Stormwater Litigation for Atlanta and the South East -
 
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There are gaps in technical capability but those are not the result of differences in ability. If you never had a mentor, your skills will advance slower. If you never got the special assignment because your skills weren't adequate , you won't get exposure required to be the expert. If weren't considered the expert or go-to-person on something, you weren't given the chance to stick out. If you didn't stick out, you won't get promoted. If you didn't get promoted, you will never get put in a position of influence. At that point, it can be easy to make the assumption that whatever group is just not as dedicated, capable, interested ,ect. After all that, there will be a large technical gap created between the person who was afforded certain opportunities and those that weren't. I don't think opportunities should be distributed equally or such but it is very easy for technical gaps to be created indirectly. Maybe, I am just interpreting technical capability differently but just being smart is not enough for someone to turn into a technical expert or director or whatever. No one just becomes technically capable.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If you can't explain it to a six year old, you don't understand it yourself.
 
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I have issue that they really controlled for anything, since it was strictly an opinion poll, which means that the respondent potentially answers what they think they should answer, rather than with how they actually behave, and that there may be gender differences in how they respond, as well.

I'm really having trouble with the " Men tend to skew towards appearance, and women tend to skew towards earning capacity" given that I had/have a high earnings capacity, but didn't attract girls, or women, for that matter. Most of the women I met were interested in the dark, handsome, bad boys, who were most likely to wind up in jail.

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert! faq731-376 forum1529 Entire Forum list
 
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lacajun said:
As an example, because I have a MS in engineering, some people including engineers feel I have outdone them. Getting it had nothing to do with anyone else especially people I didn't/don't know. That's unrealistic thinking on their part but that's what they engage in mentally. Because I got my MS from Pitt, some believe I have outdone them. Again, that's unrealistic thinking but that's what they believe and it comes out in speech and treatment. So, I don't think education can be divorced from the "outdoing" a man piece. Gender amplifies it. I've seen it in various interactions.
Click to expand...

As soon as I read it coming back to me I knew I didn't believe it either. Sorry Pam, I seem to be debating as much with my own self than the others. Working it out rhetorically rather than just figuring it out clearly before I start typing.

Case in point; I got back from a long business trip to China, where I encountered many people with university degrees. Most considered themselves very lucky to have the degree because it set them up for their career very directly. I said some things to one person about the value of education, expressing a common "american" attitude that experience is the better teacher, before seeing their shocked expression and realizing that I had better shut my mouth. They don't see it like I do at all.

Then there's the recent US scandal about parents bribing officials to secure places in prestigious universities...

So I take back my musings about education and status. To many people, it can mean EVERYTHING.


No one believes the theory except the one who developed it. Everyone believes the experiment except the one who ran it.
STF
 
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Back to the old numbers game. Off the top of your head how many male composers of classical music can you name? (I'm guessing sixty) Female? (Four) What is the structural reason why there is this imbalance, it can scarcely be due to physical requirements? Or is it innate? If I do the same with novelists there is a much smaller mismatch.

Cheers

Greg Locock


New here? Try reading these, they might help FAQ731-376
 
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"What is the structural reason why there is this imbalance, it can scarcely be due to physical requirements? Or is it innate? If I do the same with novelists there is a much smaller mismatch."

The simplest answer is that the bulk of classical music played are from male composers. Who decides what music to play; is that not mostly white males? If you don't get played, you're not going to be known and possibly not continue.

The obvious difference with novelists is that they go directly to the reader and the reader decides, albeit, the novels have to get published first. Even then, almost all genres of novels had a majority of male authors, and only in the last 30 yrs have some genres gotten to parity or even majority female. But, some genres are still heavily dominated by men: spy/politics, adventure, fantasy/Sci-fi, and suspense.
The other difference is that classical music is heavily dominated by "classical" music, namely Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, etc., making it hard for any composer of any gender to get airtime.

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert! faq731-376 forum1529 Entire Forum list
 
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'Who decides what music to play; is that not mostly white males? "

Well, do some research and tell me. Why would white males give a monkeys' who wrote a piece of music, any more than white publishers and literary agents choosing which book to print?





Cheers

Greg Locock


New here? Try reading these, they might help FAQ731-376
 
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Who decides what music to play; is that not mostly white males?
Click to expand...

IME most wives would disagree, particularly on longer drives. Mine wont even begin to suffer my outlaw country the majority of the time.
 
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'Who decides what music to play; is that not mostly white males? "

Seriously, was there even a remote doubt; does anyone actually think that there isn't a gender gap in conductors and music directors? There are almost ZERO female conductors, and conductors have a major say in what gets played; concert masters have somewhat better numbers. I couldn't find the statistics for radio stations, but I wouldn't have much doubt that the statistics are comparable. This means that radio and live performances are mostly dictated by males. So, on a long drive, the classical music that's available to be heard is mostly selected by men, mostly composed by men, and mostly played by men.


TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert! faq731-376 forum1529 Entire Forum list
 
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Yes, when we're driving, I have to skip-over all of my Janice Joplin, Woody Guthrie, Bob Dylan and Pete Seeger although she will tolerate my Buddy Holly and Elvis. Of course, I've had to include on my iPod her Michael Bublé and Susan Boyle.

Years ago, before my iPod, we had a Cadillac with a so-called 'juke-box' system where you would load a 12-CD cartridge in a unit in the trunk. We bought an extra cartridge so that I had mine and she had hers, and we would switch-off during long trips. Now I have an iPod Plus buried in the center console with a 1,000+ tunes on it.

John R. Baker, P.E. (ret)
EX-Product 'Evangelist'
Irvine, CA
Siemens PLM:
UG/NX Museum:

The secret of life is not finding someone to live with
It's finding someone you can't live without
 
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You are assuming male conductors (etc) would pick works by male composers. Since this demonstrably does not happen with novel publishing, I think you are making assumptions.

Cheers

Greg Locock


New here? Try reading these, they might help FAQ731-376
 
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"You are assuming male conductors (etc) would pick works by male composers. Since this demonstrably does not happen with novel publishing"

And your explanation is what?

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert! faq731-376 forum1529 Entire Forum list
 
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As I said, there may be an innate difference in women's minds on average, when it comes to composing, and hence perhaps engineering as well.

Cheers

Greg Locock


New here? Try reading these, they might help FAQ731-376
 
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Rather than try to guess why it's so, how about asking the musicians themselves where the gender gap comes from?


About halfway down this article asks "where are the women?" but doesn't actually analyze the question:

They must have received some feedback about the missing info. They made up for it several years later, here:

No one believes the theory except the one who developed it. Everyone believes the experiment except the one who ran it.
STF
 
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"As I said, there may be an innate difference in women's minds on average, when it comes to composing,"

And yet, there is a less of an INNATE difference in Swedish composers 37% vs. 16% in the US; must be all the blondes.

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert! faq731-376 forum1529 Entire Forum list
 
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Just did a quick computation, based on the published schedule from now to October, for the RSP Orchestra - There are 53 separate works being played, of which 10 have female (or mostly female) composers. So, closer to 19% than 37%.

edit: here is the link to RSP website:
I'm not sure that classical music shows current trends, as a lot of the playlist for any orchestra will have dead white European males in the majority. I.e. the long tail of history works against female composers - they have to compete against several hundred years of bias built into the play list. Contemporary music might be a better gage of who can make money at the composing racket...though authoring music and making money from it are two completely separate things, and I just don't care enough to go mucking about in that data.

Bestselling authors, male vs. female, seem to have climbed since the '70s, and hover near 50/50 parity today, according to the chart here:

But other sources say the price of books written by females vs. males is generally lower -
 
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