An engaging scientist...

So it turns out, that after you get engaged, you spend a lot more time thinking about science.

Well, about where to do it and what sort to do. Or whether it will be possible to carry on doing research at all.

Staying in science means mastering the secrets of statistics, understanding the elusive nature of funding grants and turning exciting new ideas into plausible action plans. All of these things are exciting and challenging.

But a future in science now also means finding an interesting position in the same place as my future husband. Who would also like to take on the hurdles of post-doc applications and stay in research.

So more than ever before, I’ve been thinking, how do people manage to stay in the same place? How do they find promising positions? And how does having a family fit into this puzzle?

I recently attended a talk on "Women in Science". Given my interest in this area, I was really looking forward to the talk. Unfortunately, it turned out to be a lot of numbers and not enough stories. And I quite like numbers.

The numbers say that few women stay in STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) subjects after the postgraduate level. There are even slick plots like the scissor diagram to demonstrate this. There are multiple surveys (like this EU report) offering different statistics as to why this is. The pay gap, the lack of role models, the lack of support for looking after family.

But this was one case in which I didn’t find scientifically justified explanations to be useful. I wanted inspiring and heartwarming stories. More of an insight into possible futures. Actual role models, not a count of the number of women who felt they lacked them.

So I looked for some.

Here are a couple of stories I found in this paper on women ecologists. I would still like to know more about these women, but even this brief view of their lives was uplifting:

Harriet George Barclay completed her doctorate in 1928 at University of Chicago and married another botany graduate. Unlike many married women of her time, Barclay had children but still taught university students and continued her research on plant ecology. Her ‘infectious enthusiasm’ inspired many undergrad and graduate students, and her extensive collections greatly increased the knowledge of Rocky Mountain and Andean plants. She was also an unstinting leader in conservation, for which she received numerous awards, particularly for her efforts in locating and preserving unique natural areas in Oklahoma, and she was elected to the Oklahoma Hall of Fame.

Margaret Nice with sparrow's nest

Margaret Morse Nice did not have a PhD. However, she obtained a MA in zoology in 1915 and later received honorary doctorates from two different institutions. Her husband and five children enthusiastically supported her field studies and publications. Her work on territoriality in birds and especially her research on the life history of the Song Sparrow gained her recognition as an outstanding ornthilogist. She published more than 250 titles on birds in journal articles, seven of book length, and 3313 reviews of the works of others. She was highly praised by respected scientists including Niko Tinbergen and Ernst Mayr. Konrad Lorenz even referred to her as “the true founder of ethology”.

Both these women became ecologists about 100 years ago. The challenges that they faced were undoubtedly greater than those I am anticipating. C21st female ecologists, at the very least, have the advantage of access to stories about predecessors that successfully made a career in the field they loved. I’m hoping that this blog will help us share those stories.