[Senate Hearing 107-1117]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 107-1117
TITLE IX AND SCIENCE
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY, AND SPACE
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON COMMERCE,
SCIENCE, AND TRANSPORTATION
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED SEVENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
OCTOBER 3, 2002
__________
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SENATE COMMITTEE ON COMMERCE, SCIENCE, AND TRANSPORTATION
ONE HUNDRED SEVENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
ERNEST F. HOLLINGS, South Carolina, Chairman
DANIEL K. INOUYE, Hawaii JOHN McCAIN, Arizona
JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER IV, West TED STEVENS, Alaska
Virginia CONRAD BURNS, Montana
JOHN F. KERRY, Massachusetts TRENT LOTT, Mississippi
JOHN B. BREAUX, Louisiana KAY BAILEY HUTCHISON, Texas
BYRON L. DORGAN, North Dakota OLYMPIA J. SNOWE, Maine
RON WYDEN, Oregon SAM BROWNBACK, Kansas
MAX CLELAND, Georgia GORDON SMITH, Oregon
BARBARA BOXER, California PETER G. FITZGERALD, Illinois
JOHN EDWARDS, North Carolina JOHN ENSIGN, Nevada
JEAN CARNAHAN, Missouri GEORGE ALLEN, Virginia
BILL NELSON, Florida
Kevin D. Kayes, Democratic Staff Director
Moses Boyd, Democratic Chief Counsel
Jeanne Bumpus, Republican Staff Director and General Counsel
------
Subcommittee on Science, Technology, and Space
RON WYDEN, Oregon, Chairman
JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER IV, West GEORGE ALLEN, Virginia
Virginia TED STEVENS, Alaska
JOHN F. KERRY, Massachusetts CONRAD BURNS, Montana
BYRON L. DORGAN, North Dakota TRENT LOTT, Mississippi
MAX CLELAND, Georgia KAY BAILEY HUTCHISON, Texas
JOHN EDWARDS, North Carolina SAM BROWNBACK, Kansas
JEAN CARNAHAN, Missouri PETER G. FITZGERALD, Illinois
BILL NELSON, Florida
C O N T E N T S
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Page
Hearing held October 3, 2002..................................... 1
Statement of Senator Wyden....................................... 1
Article dated August 1, 2002, from The Associated Press,
entitled New Study says more Oregon students plan to major
in sciences, by Julia Silverman............................ 45
Witnesses
Bayh, Hon. Birch, Venable, Baetjer, and Howard, LLP.............. 3
Prepared statement........................................... 8
Brown, Dr. April S., Professor and Chair, Department of
Electrical and Computer Engineering, Duke University........... 17
Prepared statement........................................... 19
Greenberger, Marcia, Co-President, National Women's Law Center... 22
Prepared statement........................................... 26
Jones, C. Todd, Deputy Assistant Secretary, Office for Civil
Rights, Department of Education................................ 10
Prepared statement........................................... 12
Murphy, Margaret ``Digit'', Head Coach, Women's Ice Hockey, Brown
University..................................................... 13
Prepared statement........................................... 15
Richmond, Dr. Geraldine L., Richard M. and Patricia H. Noyes
Distinguished Professor, Department of Chemistry, University of
Oregon......................................................... 36
Prepared statement........................................... 38
Appendix
American Association of Engineering Societies, prepared statement 57
WEPAN--Women in Engineering Program and Advocates Network,
prepared statement............................................. 59
TITLE IX AND SCIENCE
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THURSDAY, OCTOBER 3, 2002
U.S. Senate,
Subcommittee on Science, Technology, and Space,
Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation,
Washington, DC.
The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:35 p.m. in
room SR-253, Russell Senate Office Building, Hon. Ron Wyden,
Chairman of the Subcommittee, presiding.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. RON WYDEN,
U.S. SENATOR FROM OREGON
Senator Wyden. The Subcommittee will come to order. Today,
the Subcommittee on Science, Technology, and Space convenes the
third in a series of hearings on the subject of women studying
and working in math, technology, engineering, and the so-called
hard sciences such as physics and chemistry. Congress may not
be able to legislate away the entrenched attitudes of the math
and science establishment that women are somehow second-class
scholars in these fields, but as Chair of this Subcommittee I
am determined to see the Title IX statute fully enforced to
give women equal opportunity in the critical fields of science,
engineering, and math education.
As one of our witnesses today knows, the enforcement of
that common sense rule has brought women much closer to parity,
if not all the way, in high school and college sports. In my
view, if Title IX can do that on the playing fields of this
country, it ought to be able to do it in the classroom, where
its help was originally directed, and making sure that Title IX
protects women in and out of the sports arena is more important
than ever before as the administration opens up a commission to
review and possibly revise the Title IX rules.
In June of this year, I laid down a new challenge before
this Subcommittee. In this hearing room, I called on the
Administrator of NASA, Sean O'Keefe, to determine how his
agency could help triple the number of women graduating and
working in math, science, and technology. At a hearing in July,
Dean Kristina Johnson of Duke University Pratt School of
Engineering encouraged the Subcommittee to pursue the
enforcement of Title IX as a tool to ensure equal opportunity
for women in math, science, and engineering education.
Title IX is all about a simple principle. The entire
statute reads, no person in the United States shall, on the
basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the
benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any
education program or activity receiving Federal financial aid.
The evidence of discrimination against women in math, science,
and engineering is both empirical and it is anecdotal. The
numbers raise your eyebrows, but the stories ought to raise
your hackles.
According to the National Research Council, young women
studying science and math are pushed into traditional female
roles such as teaching, while their male counterparts receive
almost all the research fellowships that pay more completely
for graduate school. Without a research background, women are
less likely to obtain tenured track faculty positions. They
earn less money and they lose the chance to encourage still
more young women. And the discrimination does not stop with
students; full professors who happen to be women tell stories
of losing their lab space to associate professors who are male.
The consequence of systematic discrimination is immediately
visible to women across this country, and it is more subtly
damaging to the country as a whole. The Hart-Rudman Commission
on National Security warned that America's failure to invest in
science and reform math and science education is the second
biggest threat to our national security. Only the threat of a
weapon of mass destruction in an American city is a greater
danger. Yet in essence, 51 percent of the population is being
actively discouraged from entering these fields that
desperately need new experts and practitioners.
Last week the Commerce Committee approved an amendment that
I wrote with Senator Cleland. The amendment calls for a 10-year
retrospective report on NSF program to promote participation of
women, minorities, and persons with disabilities in science and
engineering.
This week, I intend to offer another amendment to the
National Science Foundation authorization bill. I want the
National Academy of Sciences to report on how universities
support their math, science, and engineering faculties with
respect to Title IX. This can cover hiring, promotion, tenure,
even allocation of lab space.
The Federal Government should share some of the spotlight
on this issue as well. I intend to request the academy's report
also detail how many Federal grants for scientific research are
given to men and women, and why. It is time the Congress
quantified and qualified the realities facing women in the
sciences. Only then is it possible to come up with truly
effective solutions.
I also think it would be remiss today to not mention our
late colleague, Congresswoman Patsy Mink. She made
extraordinary contributions in this field, and was absolutely
instrumental, as I know Senator Bayh recalls, in getting Title
IX through the House. Sadly, Patsy Mink died this past weekend
in Hawaii, and her obituary recalled that Title IX was one of
the accomplishments she felt most strongly about.
We have a terrific panel of witnesses from the
administration. We welcome Mr. C. Todd Jones, Deputy Assistant
Secretary for Civil Rights at the Department of Education,
former Senator Birch Bayh, who I have long considered a friend
and admired for all of his great work is here today, the author
of the Title IX statute, Marcia Greenberger of the National
Women's Law Center, who has testified before me in both the
House and the Senate, and we acknowledge her outstanding work.
Dr. Geraldine Richmond of the University of Oregon, we are
pleased that you could be with us Dr. Richmond, Dr. April
Brown, chair of the Duke University Department of Electrical
and Computer Engineering, Coach Margaret ``Digit'' Murphy of
the Brown University Women's Hockey Team, and Senator Reed in
particular was so pleased that you could come, and while he is
not a witness, special recognition goes to Brian Kevin, who
turns 11 tomorrow, and where is Brian? Is he out in the
audience? Why don't you stand up, and we are glad that you are
in the cheering chorus for your mom. I am certain he is a
strong supporter of Title IX.
We thank all of you. This has been a busy session for this
Subcommittee. We have been able to make contributions in the
homeland security legislation with respect to creating a
testbed to evaluate products to fight terrorism and the
National Emergency Technology Guard.
We began this session with a big success in terms of
extending the Internet tax freedom legislation. Several weeks
ago when we moved forward with an important bipartisan bill to
promote nanotechnology, essentially, what we call the small
sciences. In all of these areas Senator Allen, who could not be
with us this afternoon, has been instrumental. This is
potentially, and I use that word advisedly, the last hearing of
this Subcommittee for this session, but in my view you cannot
get any more important than this issue.
I do not think that statute has been utilized as fully and
as aggressively as it could be to deal with an issue that I
think is of enormous importance to the country. It is an issue
of basic fairness, and our country cannot afford to duck
vigorous enforcement of Title IX as it relates to creating
opportunities for women in the hard sciences. This may be late
in the session, but those who have worked with me in the past
know that when I feel strongly about something we do not tend
to let it slide quietly by, and that is my plan here, so I very
much appreciate all of you in coming.
We will make your prepared remarks a part of the hearing
record in their entirety, and we are very pleased that Senator
Bayh could be here. If you really look in the last half-century
at the names of those who have been there on the important
civil rights issues and the important statutes that really made
progress for this country in terms of creating opportunity,
Birch Bayh's name shows up again and again and again.
Senator Bayh, we thank you for all of your efforts on
behalf of these important causes, we are very honored to have
you here today, you may proceed with your statement.
STATEMENT OF HON. BIRCH BAYH, VENABLE, BAETJER, AND HOWARD, LLP
Senator Bayh. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and fellow
panel members. It is a privilege to be here. I appreciate more
than I can say all the compliments that you gave me. I wish my
wife had been here to hear them all, and you could have left
out a few of those again and again's. My back reminds me how
old I am.
[Laughter.]
Mr. Chairman, I for one have marveled at your perseverance
against great odds. It is a tribute to you and to the Committee
that you would take your time in a very crowded Senate schedule
to have these hearings on discrimination against women,
particularly in the critical areas of mathematics, engineering,
and hard sciences, which are probably one of the last vestiges
where we have not really opened up the door and let the
sunshine in. I hope this hearing will help us to do that.
It is obvious that in the high tech world in which we are
living today we cannot ignore the need to fully develop the
talent of all of our citizens in these critical areas. I am a
baseball fan. My dream in life was to be a professional
baseball player, and somehow or another they discovered I could
not hit--they discriminated against males who could not hit
curve balls, so I am here just as a plain baseball fanatic. I
think that to deny the society the benefit of women in these
particular areas is somewhat like saying to the Arizona
Diamondbacks that Randy Johnson, and to the New York Yankees
that Roger Clemens would not be permitted to participate in
these playoff games as we go down the road to the World Series.
This is a special degree of talent that women will possess
when fully trained, and that are sorely needed. Mr. Chairman,
as much as you are a real student of discrimination across the
board, permit me to suggest that for a complete and most
alarming view of discrimination and its effect on our families
and standard of living, and on our relationships between
husbands and wives and the constant drain on our society as
well, I highly recommend Ann Crittendon's book entitled, The
Price of Motherhood.
I used to read that at night before going to sleep, but I
have to confess that in reading it I became so angry I could
not go to sleep, so I stopped reading it, at least at that
time. It will show the degree, the insidious nature in which
this permeates our society and why we need to lay it to rest.
The other witnesses on the panel here are extremely well-
versed. It is good to have the Department of Education so ably
represented. I want to particularly say that it is a marvelous,
fortuitous circumstance that Dr. Richmond would travel all the
way across the country to be here today. She will contribute
greatly, and she will have the chance to see her Senator in
action, which she probably already has done before, and can be
proud of him.
I also suggest to my friends on the Committee that you read
carefully the testimony and the statistical analysis provided
by Marcia Greenberger's statement, take it home and put it
under your bed and pillows at night--under your pillow, not
your bed. Ms. Greenberger and the National Women's Law Center
have over the years, about 30 years now, provided a service
like a modern day Paul Revere, or should I say Abigail Revere,
as far as a wake-up call for America in the area of
discrimination against women. It is a privilege to have a
chance to serve with Marcia, as well as the other members of
this panel.
It is appropriate and typical of the Senator from Oregon to
point out the passing of Patsy Mink. I became involved in the
legislative efforts to root out discrimination against women
really back before Title IX, when we had a rather tortuous,
lengthy effort to try to get the equal rights for women
constitutional amendment passed. I would be remiss if I did not
point out that Congresswoman Mink and many of her peers, such
as Edith Green, Shirley Chisholm, Bella Abzug, Barbara
Mikulski, Pat Schroeder, and others both within and outside the
Congress, were responsible for moving forward to get the Equal
Rights Amendment passed. Unfortunately it fell three
legislatures short of becoming part of our Constitution, but
also to move forward in Title IX, which could become law
without the passage of a constitutional amendment.
Most of the publicity with Title IX, Mr. Chairman, as you
are aware, has been devoted to the accomplishments of women in
the area of athletics, Olympic champions, World Cup soccer,
championships, the annual trip to the final four of women's
basketball, and in ice hockey I should say, out of respect to
Coach Murphy. All of those athletic accomplishments are there
for us to see. And I must confess, as one who wonders if you
ever make a difference in this meat grinder up here where we
work in Congress, I have to tell you that I have been told by
countless numbers of these women who are presently
participating that this would not have been possible for them
to do personally were it not for the opportunity given to them
by Title IX.
Now, I must confess that athletics were in my heart. As you
may know, Mr. Chairman, my father coached four sports at
Indiana State, and I inherited all of his enthusiasm for
athletics but not a lot of his talent. But with all of that
love for athletics, I thought when we were moving forward with
equal rights, I thought the greatest benefit to society
generally would become an opening up of economic opportunities
and academic opportunities that would be the basis for any
economic opportunities.
We looked at some of the discrimination going on. Women
were not getting equal pay for equal work. Women were not
treated equally in our court system. They were given more
serious penalties, because women were not supposed to do that
kind of thing, and so it was. But again, the one place that
just leaped out at me was what was happening in the area of
education, where twice as many scholarships would go to boys as
girls, and the amount of those scholarships would be half as
much, and on and on.
Enrollment of women in higher education was in the 40's
some place, in the low 40's when we passed Title IX. Today, I
think we can say with some degree of pride and hope, that women
constitute approximately 53 percent of the student bodies on
the campuses. A careful, analytical analysis of the
disparities, which has again been provided by Ms. Greenberger
and the Women's Law Center, can show you the degree to which
that discrimination exists, particularly in the area in which
you call us together here today.
We have faced a situation where traditionally, as you
pointed out, at an early age boys and young men have been
somewhat stereotyped to go down one path. They take vocational
training in some of the more sophisticated science courses
while women are basically trained to be homemakers and perhaps
teachers in some of the liberal arts areas. But interestingly
enough, it is really apparent that the wage difference between
the stereotype for women's jobs as training through colleges
and universities is significantly lower than that for men.
Permit me to zero in on the one area of the several that
you are covering here today as special education, and that is
engineering. At some of our institutions, such as MIT and
Berkeley, the percentage of entry-level students in engineering
gets as high as almost 30 percent.
If one looks at overall averages for the year 2001,
students in the entering class for engineering, about 18
percent got bachelors' degrees, 20 percent got masters'
degrees, and Ph.D.s went to about 16.7 percent, while the
faculty as a whole, women's faculty in the area of engineering
constitute about 8.9 percent. That is in our country today, not
prior to Title IX, and the senior faculty, about 4.4 percent of
all the administrators in our engineering schools throughout
the country, only about 2 percent of that number is women.
Now, I am an optimist when I look at this rather depressing
picture in the engineering area. I am an optimist because I
think we can see what we have accomplished in some areas as a
result of Title IX, and I do not see why we could not do the
same thing in this particular area if we give it the kind of
attention that I think your hearing is going to give it.
Unfortunately, at the risk of offending some of you and
your colleagues on the Committee, I do not think this problem
is going to be solved by congressional awareness, or by passage
of legislation. Congress can send a clear message to those in
the Department of Education, the institutions of higher
learning throughout the land, and the mothers and fathers, that
this type of second class standard is not going to be accepted
for our girls and our women.
To solve this problem in the long run requires dealing with
a more fundamental problem, it seems to me, that is really
beyond our control immediately. In my judgment, this problem
must be first addressed at the breakfast and the dinner tables,
where mothers and fathers need to understand that equal
opportunity should be expected for their daughters as well as
for their sons.
Psychiatrists tell us that observations conclude that young
women or girls tend to decide for themselves early on in their
lifetime what path they are going to be following from what
they hear at home and what their parents expect of them, or
what their peers are prepared to do. Perhaps by the tenth
grade, if we do not have some sort of an impact, it is going to
be more difficult to make an impact.
The encouraging note, Mr. Chairman, as I jog around the
American University soccer field, and see a public athletic
field close by there, what used to be filled by little boys on
Saturdays and Sundays now is occupied at least half of the time
by little girls playing soccer, and so it is in the gymnasiums
playing basketball, and on the softball field with the girls
and young women playing softball. I think girls are
participating in athletics basically because their parents urge
them to do so. The father standing on the sidelines saying,
``Annie, don't stand there, get that ball,'' is what fathers
used to do for sons, and I think it is that kind of
encouragement which has led women to excel as they have in the
area of academics.
Now, we recognize the significant participation, not as
much as we would like to see in athletics, but it is important
for us to understand that we need to have similar participation
in the academic field, and I would hope that the Department of
Education, which has required rigid standards toward
compliance--I say toward compliance, because we are not fully
there yet, but the Department of Education is doing its best to
enforce those regulations, and we are moving toward compliance.
I would like to see similar regulations established for
academia, and I think that we would see a great deal of
progress.
I think we also need to look for role models for young
women in the area of academia and in the private sector. We
know about Chamique Holdsclaw, Cynthia Cooper, Mia Hamm and
others, and so do our daughters, but it is important also for
them to understand that there are also CEOs and members of
corporate boards that are women.
We stereotyped earlier on, when we first started Title IX
and Equal Rights Amendment discussions, that we had it in our
mind that young women should not apply to law schools or
medical schools. Only an infinitesimally small number were
permitted. Now, if you are in a law firm and you are recruiting
for young lawyers, you are going to find in the upper 10
percent at least half of them are women, and probably the
number 1 student is a woman, and they make excellent lawyers.
That is what we have learned, and we need to tell our daughters
that that opportunity is available for them, and that it is
also available for them in the other areas that you are
studying here today.
I think it is important to understand, as I laid out the
sad statistical record, how in the world can that happen. Well,
I had a lengthy discussion with somebody who I think can be a
role model for a woman in the area of engineering. I cannot
tell you how proud I was to pick up the Purdue University
alumni magazine and find out that a distinguished woman by the
name of Linda Katahe had been appointed dean of engineering of
the Purdue University Engineering School.
Now, 20 years ago that would have been unbelievable. That
is the good news. The bad news is, she is only one of five
deans of engineering out of 150 in the whole darn country.
Now, we need to use her as an example of what can be
accomplished. In discussing her and in reading I ask myself,
what is it that deters students who want to go into engineering
from either not doing so, or not proceeding on to the
profession of engineering. Unfortunately I think the record
shows that young women before they go into engineering, that is
high school seniors, or perhaps even in junior and freshman and
sophomore years, when they are thinking about changing courses
and have an opportunity, they are talking to the peers that
just preceded them. They are being told that the environment
that they face in the engineering curriculum, in the
engineering laboratory, is often a hostile one for young women.
You find students that harass the women. You find some
faculty members which are outright negative in their assessment
of the women's capabilities right in an open classroom. Mr.
Chairman, I think that students like that ought to be dismissed
and faculty members ought to find some place else to work.
But also, as you look at the promotion path to be a dean,
you find it is sort of a tortuous path. You have to get in 7 or
8 years before you can get tenure, and then before you get
tenure in many, if not all of the institutions, you have to be
approved by all of the faculty members in the engineering
school. Most all of the faculty are men, and sometimes it is a
secret vote. You wonder whether the male attitudes are
uncomfortable with seeing women succeed. So it is when you go
on up the ladder of promotion with the schools.
Well, Mr. Chairman, you have been very kind. I succumbed to
my tradition of speaking more than I should, but thank you for
your patience, and for this opportunity to be heard.
[The prepared statement of Senator Bayh follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Birch Bayh, Venable, Baetjer, and Howard,
LLP
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee, it is a privilege to
have the opportunity to share some thoughts with you this afternoon on
a subject which is near and dear to my heart. It is a tribute to the
entire Committee that you recognize the subject of discrimination
against women in those highly skilled areas of mathematics, engineering
and the hard sciences as one of the most critical remaining vestiges of
discrimination. In the high tech world in which we are living, we as a
country cannot tolerate the underutilization of more than half of our
population which happens to be women. To compete in today's world
America must fully utilize all of its resources and we are far from
meeting this goal in the education areas which are the subject of this
hearing. To put it into today's terms, it is like telling the Arizona
Diamondbacks that Randy Johnson and the New York Yankees that Roger
Clemens will not be permitted to pitch in the early stages of the trip
toward the World Series. Discrimination against women is to a great
extent an unconscious, yet insidious fact of today's life. Most of our
society does not realize that it exists. That makes the public
awareness potential of your hearing extremely valuable.
When I became involved with discrimination against women in a very
personal way, I was blessed to have an Oklahoma wheat farmer's daughter
as my bride. Marvella was an outstanding human being, extremely
intelligent, and recognized with many honors at the tender age of 18,
whose dream was to become a student at the University of Virginia. Upon
application she was informed that girls need not apply. She provided me
with a masters degree in awareness of how discrimination affected the
lives of our women for the next 26\1/2\ years. I am presently blessed
by my wife, Kitty, who has been providing me with a Ph.D. degree in
awareness of how American women are treated in business and corporate
society. To get a complete and alarming view of discrimination and its
effects on our families and their standard of living, on the
relationship between husbands and wives, and the consequent drain on
our society's well-being, I highly recommend Ann Crittenden's The Price
of Motherhood. It presents a truly frightening picture as far as
equality is concerned. This Committee is dealing with a critical and
perhaps least-known element of this hurdle in our efforts to see that
all American citizens are treated equally, and that America realizes
its full potential.
The other witnesses on the panel are extremely well qualified to
assist in your efforts. For a statistical analysis of this problem, I
suggest that after reading my friend and colleague Marcia Greenberger's
statement, you take it home and put it under your pillow at night. Ms.
Greenberger and the National Women's Law Center have over the years
served as modern-day Paul Reveres, or should I say Abigail Reveres,
with a message of ``Wake up, America.'' Permit me to give you some
personal reflections of what these statistics mean, and share my
thoughts about some of the factors which should be considered as the
Committee fulfills its responsibilities.
From a policy perspective, I became involved in the legislative
efforts to root out discrimination against women, as the principal
Senate sponsor of the Equal Rights Amendment. Before proceeding
further, I should point out that the death of Congresswoman Patsy Mink
this week should remind us that she and many of her peers, Edith Green,
Shirley Chisholm, Bella Abzug, Barbara Mikulski, Pat Schroeder and
others both within and outside the Congress, worked tirelessly to
achieve our common goal. I was shocked at the degree of discrimination
that existed across the board. Women did not receive equal pay for
equal work. Women were often treated more harshly by the nation's court
system, because ``women are not supposed to commit such crimes.''
However, it was immediately apparent that the most egregious and
damaging discrimination existed in the area of education. Tomes have
been written about the fact that the future of our boys and girls and
our country depends upon the quality of our education system. I need
not repeat the impact of shortcomings in this area to the future well
being of our country in today's high-tech environment to those of you
who are well aware of this fact.
Most of the publicity about Title IX's existence has been from the
accomplishment of our women athletes. Olympic champions, the World Cup
in soccer, Olympic medals, the annual trip to the Final Four in women's
basketball, and the extraordinary capabilities of the women who nightly
perform in the WNBA, have been visual reminders of what women athletes
can accomplish. I have been told by countless numbers of these women
personally involved that their opportunity to participate would not
have been possible were it not for Title IX.
I most confess that this athletic success warms my heart but it
also reminds me that at the time we were considering the Equal Rights
Amendment and Title IX, I thought that the greatest benefit would come
from opening the doors of our education system so that girls, young
women, faculty members and administrators could fully utilize their
God-given talents in the academic area. As Marvella would remind me on
occasion, ``We cannot ignore the need to develop the thought processes
and talents of 52 percent of the nation's population.''
We have made significant progress in opening the doors of education
to America's young women in the last 30 years. Before Title IX, womens'
enrollment in higher education was in the 40s. Today, women constitute
approximately 53 percent of the student bodies on our campuses, however
a careful statistical analysis of the disparities which exist among the
various degree programs causes one to be less enthusiastic and to
realize that, despite this progress, unacceptable elements of
discrimination continue to exist. Marcia Greenberger and her associates
at the National Women's Law Center have provided a detailed study which
permits us to focus on where the problem of discrimination is greatest.
At the risk of over simplifying a complex problem, boys and young men
have, from an early age, been prepared to follow one educational track.
Girls and young women have been sensitized to follow another. It has
been the age old stereotyping in which educators have assumed that
girls and young women are better qualified to fulfill certain roles in
society and boys and young men have been educated to fulfill another.
Prior to Title IX, our nation's education system provided boys with
shop and vocational education and girls took home economics. The
opportunity to train for jobs in the automotive, aviation, food and
maritime trades was reserved almost entirely for boys. At the post-
secondary level, young men traditionally received training for jobs in
trade and industry and technical occupations. At the same time young
women were traditionally educated to be homemakers, teachers or in the
health occupations and cosmetology, all of which were lower paying
jobs. It is readily apparent that wages received in male-oriented
occupations provided a better standard of living for the worker and his
or her family.
Permit me to zero in on one of the areas of education and that is
engineering. Although at some institutions such as MIT and Berkeley the
percentage of entry level students is 30 percent, if one looks at
overall averages for the year 2001, students in the entering class
averaged 18 percent, bachelor degrees 20 percent, and Ph.D. degrees
16.7 percent. For the faculty as a whole, women faculty constituted 8.9
percent and senior faculty 4.4 percent. Approximately 2 percent of
executive positions were filled by women. This constitutes a dismal
picture and it is easy to become depressed at the discrimination which
exists in this area. Permit me to suggest that rather than dwell on
failures, we recognize the successes which have been made in other
areas of education. I am an optimist, I am confident that if our
institutions of higher learning set the proper standards and follow the
proper practices which are designed to accomplish the goal of equal
education opportunities for women in the engineering field, we will
reach this goal.
Unfortunately, the problem cannot be solved by Congressional
awareness or by passage of legislation. Congress can send a clear
message to those in the Department of Education and the institutions of
higher education throughout the land that present standards will not be
accepted. However, to solve this problem in the long run requires
dealing with a more fundamental problem. In my judgment, this problem
must be addressed first at the breakfast and dinner tables where
mothers and fathers need to understand that equal opportunity should be
expected for their daughters as well as their sons. Psychiatrists have
observed that young girls/daughters begin developing expectations for
themselves at a very early age. It is encouraging to note that soccer
and baseball fields and basketball courts are filled with girls at an
early age on into high school. Those girls are participating in
athletics because their parents have encouraged them to do so and have
been on the sidelines encouraging them to participate and to be
successful. Women would not now be participating at significant
percentages in athletics at our colleges and universities and playing
for the WNBA if it were not for encouragement at home or in the early
ages of primary and secondary education. Also, it should be pointed out
that the Department of Education had rigid requirements which were
regularly enforced across the nation's athletic fields. Despite the
notoriety and justifiable pride which has accompanied women's
accomplishments in the athletic field, it is imperative to recognize
that only a very small percent of the student body in our universities
and colleges ever play varsity athletics.
Also, it is critical to note that young women need role models
which help them focus and develop self-esteem. In the athletic area
they have Chamique Holdsclaw, Cynthia Cooper and Mia Hamm, but who are
the role models in the academic area? Before Title IX women were
suspect if not outright prohibited from studying in the areas of law
and medicine. Today, in the upper 10 percent of most graduating classes
you will find at least half of them are women, often the number one
graduate is a woman. We need to inform our daughters of the
accomplishments of women in corporations and businesses where numerous
women are CEOs and serving on corporate boards. But what about the
fields of engineering and science? Who do they have for role models? We
need to alert our daughters to accomplishments in these areas. Of
course, we recognize the exploits and the sacrifices of women
astronauts such as Christina McAuliffe and Sally Ride. Permit me to use
an excellent example of a peer model in the area of engineering.
Recently, my alma mater, Purdue University, appointed a woman, Linda
P.B. Katehi, as the university's Dean of Engineering. This is all well
and good, but Dean Katehi is one of only 5 women deans out of the top
150 engineering schools in the country. What happens to young women who
determine to enter the engineering field? I have already cited the
abysmal record in this area. Why do so few women choose engineering as
a career? Here is only one snapshot. To advance as a faculty member, it
is critical to be granted tenure. This status is not available until
seven or eight years of faculty experience. Often the first stage to
granting tenure is to receive the majority support of your peers on the
faculty which is mostly constituted of men. Often the vote is held in
secret and one cannot help but wonder whether male faculty members vote
no because they are not comfortable to have female faculty members
succeed. Permit me to suggest that the Subcommittee ask the Department
of Education to allocate sufficient funds to establish specific
criteria which must be met for institutions to comply with Title IX in
the academic area. The Department should establish a system of careful
examination and enforcement such as that which now exists in the field
of athletics.
I am sure that Members of the Subcommittee can, from their own
experiences, develop ideas which will help provide little girls, older
girls and young women with examples and programs which will result in
them developing the self esteem and incentive to make their mark in
areas where now they are not comfortable.
Unbelievable as it may sound, often young women report that the
reason for not pursuing an engineering education is that reports from
women who have preceded them are to the effect that often male students
have made life miserable for them and their professors have often
exhibited outright hostility. If we mean business, I suggest that such
students should be expelled and such professors should find new
employment.
Thank you for providing me with the opportunity to express my
thoughts.
Senator Wyden. Thank you very much, Senator Bayh, for your
passion, this is a fight that you were willing to take on quite
some time ago, and we are going to pick up where you left off,
and we just so appreciate your outstanding comments.
Mr. Jones.
STATEMENT OF C. TODD JONES, DEPUTY ASSISTANT
SECRETARY, OFFICE FOR CIVIL RIGHTS, DEPARTMENT OF
EDUCATION
Mr. Jones. Good afternoon. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank
you and the Subcommittee today for the opportunity to testify,
because it gives me an opportunity to discuss one of the most
important civil rights laws in our Nation's history, Title IX
of the education amendments of 1972.
As you know, we just celebrated the 30th anniversary of
this landmark legislation. Without a doubt, Title IX has opened
the doors of opportunity for generations of women and girls to
compete, to achieve, and to pursue their American dreams. I
actually am too young to remember personally what schools were
like prior to 1972, when Title IX first prohibited schools that
received Federal funds from discriminating on the basis of sex.
Back then, it was not uncommon for high school girls to be
steered to courses that narrowed their future options. High
schools routinely excluded girls from classes that stood to
give them the skills to compete for higher paying jobs.
Mr. Chairman, you asked me to speak today about Title IX
and the sciences, increasing the number of women pursuing
degrees and careers in math, engineering, and hard sciences.
Fortunately, I am here to deliver good news. Society and
education have changed since Title IX was passed, and Title IX
played an important part.
Title IX has contributed to the progress made by girls
enrolled in high school math and science classes. Boys and
young men previously dominated these fields to the extent that
only an exceptionally gifted and talented female was thought
able to take advanced math and science classes. Today, both
male and female high school students are making strides in math
and science. By 1999, nearly one half of the finalists in the
Intel Corporation and Science Service, the competition that was
formerly known as the Westinghouse Science Talent Search, were
girls.
In 1999, 2000, and 2001, the winners of Intel's largest
scholarship were high school girls. Today, the majority of
college students are women, and many are entering professions
that once eluded them in the sciences. In 1972, only 9 percent
of medical degrees went to women as compared to nearly 43
percent today. Also in 1972, only 1 percent of dental degrees
went to women as compared to 40 percent 2 years ago. The
percentage of computer science graduates who are women doubled
from 14 percent in 1972 to 27 percent in 1997. The percentage
of engineering graduates who are women rose from 1 percent in
1971 to 17 percent in 1997. Among the physical sciences majors,
the proportion of women graduates was 15 percent in 1972 and
rose to 37 percent in 1997. Half of all zoology graduates were
women in 1997, versus 22 percent in 1972.
OCR has supported this progress in part through conducting
compliance reviews that focus on specific, systemic problems.
For example, beginning in 1994, OCR conducted 15 broad-based
compliance reviews that examined whether high schools and
higher education institutions were discriminating against girls
and women in math and science programs, but there are still
areas for improvement. As a society, we must continue to avoid
steering girls away from math and science, and continue to meet
their developing interest in these areas. Title IX shares in
the progress that they have made.
Senator thank you for inviting me to testify on behalf of
the administration today, and I look forward to any questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Jones follows:]
Prepared Statement of C. Todd Jones, Deputy Assistant Secretary, Office
for Civil Rights, Department of Education
Good afternoon. Thank you Chairman Wyden for that introduction. I
thank the Chairman and all Members of this Subcommittee for the
opportunity to testify before you today because it gives me the
opportunity to discuss one of the most important civil rights laws in
our nation's history: Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972.
As you know, we just celebrated the 30th anniversary of this
landmark legislation. Without a doubt, Title IX has opened the doors of
opportunity for generations of women and girls to compete, to achieve,
and to pursue their American dreams. I am actually too young to
remember personally what schools were like prior to 1972 when Title IX
first prohibited schools that receive federal funds from discriminating
on the basis of sex.
Back then, it was not uncommon for high school girls to be
``steered'' to courses that narrowed their future options. High schools
routinely excluded girls from classes that stood to give them the
skills to compete for higher paying jobs.
Mr. Chairman, you asked me to speak today about Title IX and the
sciences--increasing the number of women pursuing degrees and careers
in math, engineering, and the hard sciences. Fortunately, I am here to
deliver good news.
Society and education have changed since Title IX was passed, and
Title IX played an important part. Title IX has contributed to the
progress made by girls enrolled in high school math and science
classes. Boys and young men previously dominated these fields to the
extent that only an exceptionally gifted and talented female was
thought able to take advanced math or science courses. Today, both male
and female high school students are making strides in math and science.
By 1999, nearly half of the finalists in the Intel Corporation and
Science Service (the competition formerly known as the Westinghouse
Science Talent Search) were girls. In 1999, 2000, and 2001, the winners
of Intel's largest scholarship were high school girls.
Today, the majority of college students are women. And many are
entering professions that once eluded them in the sciences:
In 1972, only 9 percent of medical degrees went to women--
as compared to nearly 43 percent in 2000.
Also in 1972 only 1 percent of dental degrees went to
women--as compared to 40 percent two years ago.
The percentage of computer science graduates who were women
doubled from 14 percent in 1972 to 27 percent in 1997.
The percentage of engineering graduates who were women rose
from 1 percent in 1971 to 17 percent in 1997.
Among physical science majors, the proportion of women
graduates was 15 percent in 1972 and rose to 37 percent in
1997.
Half of all zoology graduates were women in 1997, versus 22
percent in 1972.
OCR has supported this progress in part through conducting
compliance reviews that focus on specific systemic problems. For
example, beginning in 1994, OCR conducted fifteen broad-based
compliance reviews that examined whether high schools and higher
education institutions were discriminating against girls and women in
math and science programs. But, there are still areas for improvement.
As a society, we must continue to avoid steering girls away from math
and science and continue to meet their developing interest in these
areas. But unquestionably, this country has changed, and Title IX
deserves to share the credit.
Mr. Chairman, this month OCR will release a new document entitled
``Title IX: Thirty Years Later.'' Many of these statistics are drawn
from that publication, and while it has not returned from the printer
yet, I have brought some bound versions of the page proofs for your
review.
Thank You. I will be happy to take your questions.
Senator Wyden. Mr. Jones, thank you, and we will have
questions in a few moments.
Ms. Murphy, welcome.
STATEMENT OF MARGARET ``DIGIT'' MURPHY, HEAD COACH, WOMEN'S ICE
HOCKEY, BROWN UNIVERSITY
Ms. Murphy. It is a little different than being at the
Frozen 4 press conference, but it is fun all the same. Thanks.
It is certainly a pleasure to be here today. It is an honor. My
name is Margaret ``Digit'' Murphy, and I am head coach of the
Brown University Women's Hockey Team. I have been at Brown for
14 years.
You might be wondering what a college ice hockey coach has
to say about educational opportunities for girls in math and
technology. Let me begin by letting you know that a hockey puck
travels 60 miles per hour because of the torque applied to the
stick, which in turn creates a force on the puck and transfers
momentum. I do not think I ever said those words in high
school. Those are tough ones for a jock to get out.
But seriously, the world of sports used to look like the
world of math and technology, all boys and no girls. Today, 42
percent of all high school and college athletes are female, and
it is interesting to note that there has been 847 percent
increase in girls participating in high school athletics since
1972, 847 percent, but participating on the field, in the pool,
or on the ice is only part of the story. There are huge
benefits associated with athletics that go well beyond the X's
and O's. Research studies show that girls who play sports enjoy
greater physical and emotional health and are less likely to
engage in a host of risky behaviors, drug use, smoking,
drinking, than nonparticipants do.
As a girls' ice hockey player growing up in Rhode Island I
was an anomaly. Girls simply did not play ice hockey. Boys did.
The only time it was acceptable for girls to be on the ice at
that time was to be a figure skater and wearing a tutu. That
was not something I wanted to do. It was difficult to grow up
with that stigma that you did not engage in normal girls'
sports like field hockey or softball, but the opportunity that
ice hockey provided me to be recruited by an Ivy League school
made it ultimately worthwhile.
As a collegiate athlete at Cornell University from 1979 to
1983, the team that I played on traveled in vans, stayed four
players to a hotel room, had minimum per diem for meals, our
equipment was self-provided, our ice time was what the men's
team did not want, our head coach was paid little more than a
volunteer, recruiting budgets were what our coach could pay out
of his pocket, and administrative help was minimal. Strides
have certainly been made in all areas of our sport.
Unfortunately, we had to wait until 1995, after Cohen v. Brown,
for Title IX to be enforced at my institution.
Presently, our student athletes are Brown enjoy vastly
different conditions than I did in 1979. Today's budgets are
adequately funded in regard to team transportation, lodging,
per diem, equipment, scheduling, facilities, ice time, and
recruiting. We have three full-time coaches, myself and two
assistants. These conditions of equitable treatment for women's
hockey players can be seen throughout all NCAA programs in the
country.
The number of institutions sponsoring women's ice hockey
has grown from nine collegiate teams in 1981 to 71 teams today.
Collegiate participation in women's hockey has grown 392
percent. Grassroots development of girls playing hockey in both
the U.S. and Canada has grown as a result of Title IX and its
trickle-down effect.
In the U.S., the number of girls playing hockey has grown
from 6,336 in 1990 to 39,693 in 2001. The Olympic movement for
women's hockey was equally a beneficiary of Title IX. With so
many women playing in our sport, the pool of Olympians has
grown substantially. I am sure you all remember the first ever
gold medal won in women's hockey in 1998 by the U.S.
Unfortunately, we did not do so well last time, but there might
be some lessons to be learned from our experiences in fighting
for gender equity in the previously all-male sports
environment.
First, because the media is interested in sports, they
produce report cards comparing men's and women's sports
benefits and numbers. When these report cards made the
educational institution look bad, change happened. Public
embarrassment has a way of persuading schools that they had
better get their acts together. Congress added the Equity in
Athletics Disclosure Act in the late 1990's to be sure that
report cards were issued in a public way, and now critical
participation and expenditure data on college athletics is
available on the web and used by the press to remind the
schools of their obligations to comply, so my first
recommendation is to require regular reporting of critical
indicators on the status of girls and women in math and
technology, hugely important.
The second reason why sports has advanced more so than
other Title IX areas is because there are many lawsuits brought
by parents. I lived through one at Brown. Let me tell you, it
was not pretty. To be employed at an institution that is
completely committed to the equitable treatment of our students
on all fronts, and to have the ultimate test of equity in
athletics challenged and interpreted, pitted the male
population against the female population.
To this day, there are lasting implications of the lawsuit.
Lawsuits are not good. They put parents, kids, and educational
institutions at each other's throats, rather than looking for
solutions. The Office of Civil Rights must do a better job
enforcing the law. These types of situations should not
continue to exist.
The third and most important reason why Title IX was a
success--there needs to be more done, however--is because the
newspapers, always preoccupied with controversy in sports,
served as an effective mechanism for educating the American
public. When parents understood their daughters' rights, they
used the mechanisms of civic engagement for holding school
boards accountable, to bring lawsuits, to make educational
institutions responsive.
We must require our schools to educate students and their
parents about Title IX. Unfortunately, math and technology are
not sexy enough to get free press, but as the parent of a 7-
year-old girl, I firmly believe that if parents were more
informed of opportunities or lack thereof for their daughters
in the math and sciences, they would be as vocal and as engaged
as they are in their quest for equality in athletics.
In athletics, we have learned that it is really the
intangibles that count. At Brown, our philosophy statement
calls for the development of the total person. We focus on the
process of being a team, and not the end result. Our athletes
learn the values of teamwork, cooperative learning, discipline,
personal responsibility, and commitment. These are the life
lessons we teach through athletics that help our athletes when
they continue on to their careers.
Teachers encourage girls to play, showing up for the games
and celebrating their victories. Teachers and administrators
must inspire, encourage, and motivate young girls in the same
way that they inspire, encourage, and motivate the young boys.
We cannot allow educators to come to the stereotypical belief
about boys being more interested in math and science than
girls. Stereotyping has a way of becoming a self-fulfilling
prophecy. We cannot allow this to happen to our children.
On a final note, I would like to convey the immediacy of
this problem with the recent appointment of the Commission on
Title IX by the Bush administration. If Title IX is weakened,
it will not only have a profound impact on athletics, it will
send a clear message that maintaining and progressing
opportunities for our daughters in all program areas is not a
priority.
I would like to close by conveying the message that girls
hit hockey pucks, girls are great mathematicians, girls check,
and girls love technology. If you create an environment that
sends such a message to girls, they will come.
Thank you so much for having the opportunity to speak to
you guys today.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Murphy follows:]
Prepared Statement of Margaret ``Digit'' Murphy, Head Coach, Women's
Ice Hockey, Brown University
You might be wondering what a college ice hockey coach has to say
about educational opportunities for girls in math and technology. Let
me begin by letting you know that a hockey puck travels 60 miles per
hour because of the torque applied to the stick which in turn creates a
force on the puck and transfers momentum.
Seriously, the world of sport used to look like the world of math
and technology--all boys and no girls. Today, 42 percent of all high
school and college athletes are female. And it is interesting to note
that there has been an 847 percent increase in girls participating in
high school athletics since 1972. But participating on the field, in
the pool, or on the ice is only one part of the story. There are huge
benefits associated with athletics that go beyond the X'S AND O'S!
Research studies show that girls who play sports enjoy greater physical
and emotional health and are less likely to engage in a host of risky
behaviors (ie. drug use, smoking, drinking) than non-participants.\1\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Title IX at 30: Report Card on Gender Equity, Women's Sports
Foundation June 2002
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
As a girls' ice hockey player growing up in RI, I was an anomaly.
Girls simply didn't play ice hockey. Boys did. The only time that it
was acceptable for girls to be on the ice at that time was to be a
figure skater. It was difficult to grow up with the stigma that you did
not engage in ``normal'' girls' sports like field hockey or softball.
But the opportunity that ice hockey provided me: to be ``recruited'' by
an Ivy League school made it ultimately worthwhile.
As a collegiate athlete at Cornell University from 1979-1983, the
team that I played on traveled in vans, stayed four players to a hotel
room, had minimum per diem for meals, our equipment was self provided,
our ice time was what the men's team didn't want, and our head coach
was paid little more than a volunteer. Recruiting budgets were what our
coach could pay out of his own pocket, and administrative help was
minimal.
Strides have certainly been made in all areas of our sport.
Unfortunately, we had to wait until 1995 after Cohen v. Brown for Title
IX to be enforced at my institution.
Presently, our student athletes at Brown enjoy vastly different
conditions than I did in 1979. Today's budgets are adequately funded in
regard to team transportation, lodging, per diem, equipment,
scheduling, facilities, ice time, and recruiting. We have three full
time coaches--myself and two assistants. These conditions of equitable
treatment for women's hockey players can be seen throughout all NCAA
programs in the country.
The number of institutions sponsoring women's hockey has grown from
9 collegiate teams in 1981 to 71 teams today. Collegiate participation
in women's hockey has grown 392 percent \2\ Grass roots development of
girls playing hockey in both the U.S. and Canada has also grown as a
result of Title IX and it's trickle down effect. In the U.S., the
number of girls playing hockey has grown from 6,336 in 1990 to 39,693
in 2001 \3\. The Olympic movement for women's hockey was equally a
beneficiary of Title IX. With so many women playing our sport, the pool
of Olympians has grown substantially. I'm sure that you all remember
the first ever gold medal won in women's hockey in 1998 by the United
States.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\2\ NCAA Year-By-Year Sports Participation 1982-2001
\3\ USA Hockey Website 2002
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
There might be lessons to be learned from our experiences in
fighting for gender equality in a previously all-male sport
environment:
1. Because the media is interested in sport, they produced
``report cards'' comparing men's and women's sports benefits
and numbers. When these report cards made the educational
institution look bad, change happened. Public embarrassment has
a way of persuading schools they had better get their acts
together. Congress added the Equity in Athletics Disclosure Act
in the late `90s to make sure the report cards were issued in a
public way and now critical participation and expenditure data
on college athletics is available on the web and used by the
press to remind schools of their obligations to comply. So, my
first recommendation is to require regular reporting of
critical indicators on the status of girls and women in math
and technology.
2. The second reason why sport has advanced more so than other
Title IX areas is because there were many lawsuits brought by
parents. I lived through one at Brown. Let me tell you it was
not pretty. To be employed at an institution that is so
completely committed to the equitable treatment of our students
on all fronts, and have the ultimate test of equity in
athletics challenged and interpreted pitted the male population
against the female population. To this day there are lasting
implications of the lawsuit. Lawsuits are not good. They put
parents, kids and educational institutions at each other's
throats rather than looking for solutions. The Office of Civil
Rights must do a better job enforcing the law. These types of
situations should not continue to exist.
3. The third and most important reason why Title IX was a
success (there is more to be done however) is because the
newspapers, always preoccupied with controversy in sports,
served as an effective mechanism for educating the American
public. When parents understood their daughter's rights, they
used the mechanisms of civic engagement--from holding school
boards accountable to bring lawsuits--to make the educational
institution responsive. We must require our schools to educate
students and their parents about Title IX. Unfortunately, math
and technology aren't sexy enough to get free press. But as the
parent of a 7 year old girl, I firmly believe that if parents
were more informed of the opportunities or lack thereof for
their daughters in math and science, they would be as vocal and
engaged as they are in their quest for equality in athletics.
4. In athletics we learned that it is really the intangibles
that count. At Brown, our philosophy statement calls for the
development of the total person. We focus on the process of
being a team, and not the end result. Our athletes learn the
values of teamwork, cooperative learning, discipline, personal
responsibility, and commitment. These are the life lessons that
we teach through athletics that help our athletes when they
continue on to their careers. Teachers encourage girls to play,
showing up for their games and celebrating their victories.
Teachers and administrators must inspire, encourage and
motivate young girls in the same way that they inspire,
encourage and motivate young boys. We cannot allow educators to
succumb to stereotypical beliefs about boys being more
interested in math and science than girls. Stereotyping has a
way of becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy. We cannot allow
this to happen to our children.
On a final note, I would like to convey the immediacy of this topic
with the recent appointment of the Commission on Title IX by the Bush
administration. If Title IX is weakened, it will not only have a
profound impact on athletics but will send a clear message that
maintaining and progressing opportunities for our daughters in all
program areas is not a priority.
I would like to close by conveying the message that, girls hit
hockey pucks, girls are great mathematicians, girls check and girls
love technology. If you create environments that send such messages to
girls, they will come.
Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today. I welcome
any questions.
Senator Wyden. Thank you. It is an excellent statement, and
on your point that girls hit hockey pucks and girls are capable
of making big contributions in the hard sciences is an
excellent one. Let me just add, when girls are doing all that
hard work, Congress is going to make sure that Title IX is
enforced, and I want to thank you again for an excellent
statement.
Dr. Brown.
STATEMENT OF DR. APRIL S. BROWN, PROFESSOR AND CHAIR,
DEPARTMENT OF ELECTRICAL AND COMPUTER
ENGINEERING, DUKE UNIVERSITY
Dr. Brown. Thank you. Mr. Chairman and congressional staff,
thanks. I am honored to have this opportunity to talk to you
about my perspective on how we can apply an existing law, Title
IX, to increase the number of women engineers and scientists,
and I know that you have been working, as you said, for a
number of months on identifying the barriers that face women in
science and engineering, so I am going to focus, from my
experience, on a specific barrier, and then how Title IX can be
used to eliminate that barrier.
I am a professor in the field of electrical and computer
engineering. Like many other women engineers, I considered
engineering as a career because I had an engineer, in my case
my father, who was an engineer, in the family. We really must
reach a point in this country where we do not have to rely on
family members to interest girls in engineering, and where we
are committed as a society to the participation of girls and
women in engineering and the sciences. We must develop role
models in order to do this, successful and visible women
engineers and scientists in the academy, in industry, and in
Government.
My specific focus is on the success of women engineers in
sciences in the academy. They are the role models and shapers
of education and research. Their experience starts in graduate
school, as this is the initial training ground of our future
professors. We must increase the number of women faculty
members in science and engineering to increase the number of
women and engineers in the work force.
Women students are drawn to women faculty, and they seek
them out. Studies have shown that women faculty members are the
primary research advisors to a larger number of female students
than men. Many women are lost along the way if they cannot
identify and relate to a teacher for guidance toward a
successful career. My own experience certainly bears this out.
When I was a graduate student at Cornell University, I joined a
group led by Professor Lester Eastman, who actively sought out
female graduate students, which was a rarity at that time. When
I took my place on the faculty at Georgia Tech in 1994, female
students sought me out in turn. My first two Ph.D. students
were women.
Women graduate students and engineers in the professorate
have different experiences than men. The MIT Study on the
Status of Women in the Sciences made headlines in 1999, when
the university unveiled its self-assessment showing that women
received a smaller share of important resources, including
space, startup research funding, salary, et cetera, in
comparison to men.
In 1998, I co-chaired the Task Force on Opportunities for
Women in Engineering at Georgia Tech, and this showed that
women were significantly concerned about the balance of work
and family and achievement in their field in the university.
Just last week, the University of Michigan unveiled its climate
study, which showed similar outcomes.
Studies have shown that women have less access to important
resources, fewer mentors, fewer graduate students, and they
serve on more Committees than men, but they do not Chair
Committees as often as men. Social and organizational practices
are both important, and their interplay creates this
inequitable situation, and Senator Bayh mentioned the example I
am going to discuss for a minute, which is that of the tenure
and promotion process. This faces all tenure-track faculty
members.
Tenure decisions are made approximately 7 years after entry
into the professorate at the assistant professor rank. The
model for this evaluation assumes a trajectory for career
success after attaining a Ph.D. or completing a post-doc that
does not take into account that this is also the prime time for
having children and starting families. Research by Dean Sue
Rosser at Georgia Tech shows that balancing a career and family
is, in fact, the most significant challenge facing women
engineers and scientists today.
I was personally quite taken by this when I moved from
industry to the university in 1994. I had my first child at
Hughes Research Lab, and then a year later moved to Georgia
Tech and found that many women felt they must forego childbirth
and child rearing until after achieving tenure. Since tenure is
often awarded in a person's early to mid-thirties, peak
fertility is bypassed by doing this, and this is an incredible
disincentive to women in the academy.
So how can we use Title IX to help women graduate students
and faculty in the academy? During the past 30 years, Title IX,
as we heard here, has created tremendous change in athletics.
Now is the time we must use its power for science and
engineering, with the hope that the results will be as
dramatic. Universities must comply with Title IX to receive
Federal funding. The Government can and should do more to
ensure compliance in the specific areas of educational
opportunities for women in science and engineering.
First, since graduate programs across the Nation are the
primary training ground for our future faculty members,
universities can be required under Title IX to create more
institutional graduate support, such as scholarships for women
graduate students. Successful recruiting and retention of women
in graduate school creates the new faculty members we need.
Second, engineering programs can and should do more to
ensure that their female faculty members and students have an
equitable share of the resources provided by the institution.
Title IX can be used to ensure that the financial aid and
research support are equitably distributed among graduate
students.
Third, university leaders must be accountable for the work
environment they steward. They can be held accountable under
Title IX provision for continuous improvement in the
environment for women, and there are many approaches for doing
this that will address the student and faculty needs. For
faculty, these include better work-family policies, including
tenure clock extension, and for students these could include
requiring mentoring programs such as women in engineering
programs.
Federal funding is critical to science and engineering, and
we must ensure that women principal investigators are well-
represented in funding agencies, research, and education
portfolios. The NSF has been proactive in its goal to support
more women scientists and engineers through specific programs,
and one such program, called Advance, supports not only
individual women but activities that lead to institutional
change. This type of program could prove to be a model.
In conclusion, I would just like to say from my experience
dedicated leadership clearly does lead to positive change. When
I moved from Georgia Tech to Duke University in July of this
year, Dean Kristina Johnson at the Pratt School of Engineering
had just completed a year of hiring new faculty in which she
hired--over 50 percent of the entering new faculty were women,
which was really an incredible thing to occur in an engineering
program, so the growth of the women faculty members will
profoundly affect the environment of the women faculty and
students alike.
As my closing statement I would just say, as the mother of
two boys that I actively encourage and hope some day may decide
to be engineers, I fully believe these changes will benefit
them as well as their female friends.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Brown follows:]
Prepared Statement of Dr. April S. Brown, Professor and Chair,
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Duke University
Senator Wyden, Members of the Subcommittee on Science, Technology
and Space, and congressional staff, I am pleased and honored to have
the opportunity to share my perspective with you today on how we can
take important steps to remove a formidable threat to our future: the
declining number of engineers and scientists. Our opportunity today is
to consider how we can apply an existing law, Title IX of the Education
Amendments of 1972, to increase the number of women engineers and
scientists.
This panel has already heard compelling testimony that describes
how the shrinking pool of scientists threatens our national security,
including a citation of the Hart-Rudman Commission on National Security
to 2025, which warned that America's failure to invest in science and
to reform math and science education was the second biggest threat to
our national security; and NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe's revelation
that NASA's current over-60 workforce is three times larger than its
under-30 workforce.
I know you are well aware of the barriers to success women and
girls face in scientific and technological careers from your previous
work on this Committee, so I will focus today on the opportunity
provided by Title IX to eliminate them.
Though its most visible success has been in athletics, Title IX is
an education law, not a sports law. Universities and governmental
funding agencies can apply Title IX toward bringing more women into
careers in science and engineering. The resulting pool of scientists
and engineers will be larger and more diverse, which means we as a
nation will be better prepared for the technological challenges our
future will bring.
I am a professor in the field of electrical and computer
engineering. Like many other women engineers, I considered engineering
as a career because I had an engineer--my father--in the family. We
must reach a point in this country where we do not have to rely on
family members to interest girls in engineering, and where we are
committed as a society to the participation of girls and women in
engineering. We must develop role models--successful and visible women
engineers in academia, industry, and the government. Role models show
young women that they, too, can do it! Role models are especially
critical at educational transitions from high school to college and
then on to graduate school. It is during these transitions that we lose
many women on the journey to full and successful careers in engineering
and science.
Reasons why we lose many would-be engineers include inadequate math
and science preparation in K-12 education, the poor public
understanding of engineering, and the traditional delivery of
engineering education, but my specific focus is on the success of women
engineers in the academy. They are the role models and shapers of
education and research. Their experience starts in graduate school--the
initial training ground of our future professoriate.
We must increase the number of women faculty members in science and
engineering to increase the number of women engineers and scientists in
the workforce. Less than 10 percent of engineering faculty members are
women. My field, electrical and computer engineering, is the most
rapidly growing engineering discipline. Yet in ECE, only 7 percent of
the professoriate are women. Even the engineering programs with the
highest percentages of female faculty in the country have less than 30
percent women.
Women science and engineering faculty members are necessary for an
excellent engineering education. William Wulf, president of the
National Academy of Engineering, identified diversity as a key
imperative for an agenda for change in his article ``A Makeover for
Engineering Education,'' in the journal Issues in Science and
Technology, Spring 2002. He states, ``Our creative field is deprived of
a broad spectrum of life experiences that bear directly on good
engineering design.'' He's saying that engineering is about solving
problems, and the more viewpoints that examine a problem, the better
the chances of solving it. The undergraduate and graduate educational
experience shapes our future engineers and scientists. A diverse
faculty offers a much richer educational and research experience to
these students.
Women students are drawn to women faculty and seek them out.
Studies have shown that women faculty members are the primary research
advisors to a larger number of female students than men (Mary Frank
Fox, in Equal Rites, Unequal Outcomes: Women in American Research
Universities, edited by L. Hornig. New York: Kluwer Academic/Plenum
Publishers, 2002). Many women are lost along the way if they cannot
identify and relate to a teacher for guidance toward a successful
career. My own experience bears this out. I joined a graduate research
group at Cornell University led by Professor Lester Eastman, who
actively sought out female students--a rare occurrence at the time. I
worked most closely with other women in my group. When I took my place
on the faculty at the Georgia Institute of Technology in 1994, female
students sought me out. My first two Ph.D. students were women: Dr.
Carrie Carter-Comen and Dr. Georgiana Dagnall.
Understanding the Barriers to Women Scientists and Engineers in the
Academy
Women graduate students and engineers in the professoriate have
different experiences from men. The MIT Study on the Status of Women in
Sciences made headlines in 1999 when the university unveiled its self-
assessment showing that women received a smaller share of important
resources: space, start-up research funding, etc. in comparison to men.
In 1998, I co-chaired the Task Force on Opportunities for Women in
Engineering at Georgia Tech that showed that women are significantly
concerned about the balance of work and family. Just last week, the
University of Michigan unveiled its climate study on women faculty in
science and engineering.
Studies have shown that women have less access to important
resources than men. Women report fewer mentors than men. Women have
fewer graduate students than men. Women serve on more committees than
men, yet they do not Chair Committees as often as men.
Research done by Mary Frank Fox, a sociologist at Georgia Tech,
shows that engineers and scientists must be part of social networks for
success in their fields. Developing collaborations, attracting the best
graduate students to their laboratories, receiving guidance through
mentors, and being asked to serve on important conference committees
are critical to career success and happen through social interactions.
The environment is created by the interplay of social processes and
organizational policies and practices, such as ways in which people are
evaluated and rewarded. They cannot be separated from each other.
Professor Virginia Valian, a psychologist at Hunter College, shows
in her recent book Why So Slow: the Advancement of Women that despite
general gains we have made in understanding the personal and social
ills created by discrimination, day-to-day decisions that impact people
are often unconsciously made on the basis of generalizations, or
schemas. These schemas, still supported by media images, tell us that
engineering remains a ``masculine'' profession, and women are less
likely than men to attain success in science and engineering. Women
find themselves disadvantaged by the cumulative effects of a succession
of decisions based on these schemas that place more resources in the
hands of their male colleague down the hall.
Organizational practices and policies are just as critical. One
example is the tenure and promotion process that faces all tenure-track
faculty members. For most of us, tenure is more about continuing on in
our positions, than about a lifetime job guarantee. Tenure is granted
to the successful faculty member by an in-depth evaluation of his or
her research and educational contributions by peer faculty committees.
Gender schemas obviously come into play in this process. Tenure
decisions are made approximately seven years after entry into the
professoriate at the assistant professor rank. The model for evaluation
assumes a trajectory for career success after attaining the Ph.D. that
does not take into account that this is also the prime time for having
children and starting families. Research by Dean Sue Rosser at Georgia
Tech (Journal of Women and Minorities in Science and Engineering, vol.
8, pp. 163-191, 2002) shows that balancing a career and family is, in
fact, the most significant challenge facing women engineers and
scientists today.
I was personally quite taken by the real impact the timing of
tenure and promotion has on people when I moved from industry to the
academy. I had my first child after earning my Ph.D. and while working
at Hughes Research Laboratories. When I joined Georgia Tech one year
later as an associate professor, I learned that many women feel they
must forgo childbirth and rearing until after tenure. Since tenure
often is awarded in a person's early to mid-thirties, peak fertility is
bypassed. This is an incredible disincentive to women in the academy.
How can we use Title IX to help
Title IX's regulations require institutions that receive federal
funding to provide equitable athletic opportunities for all students,
regardless of sex, in three separate areas: participation, treatment of
athletes, and athletic scholarships. But Title IX does not just apply
to athletics. The law states that ``No person in the United States
shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be
denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any
educational program or activity receiving federal financial
assistance.''
During the past 30 years, Title IX has created tremendous changes
in athletics. Now is the time to use its power for engineering and
sciences, with the hope that the results will be as dramatic.
Universities must comply with Title IX to receive federal funding.
The government can and should do more to ensure compliance in the
specific area of educational opportunities for women in science and
engineering.
First, since graduate programs across the nation are the primary
training ground for the professoriate of the future, universities could
be required under Title IX to create more institutional graduate
support (scholarships) for women graduate students. Successful
recruiting and retention of women in graduate school creates the new
faculty members we need to attract more women undergraduates to science
and engineering.
Second, engineering programs can and should do more to ensure that
their female faculty members--and students--have an equitable share of
the resources provided by the institution. Title IX can be used to
ensure that both financial aid and research support are equitably
distributed among graduate students.
Third, university leaders must be accountable for the work
environment they steward. They can be held accountable under Title IX's
provision of continuous improvement of the environment for women, and
there are many approaches for doing that for both students and faculty
members. For faculty, these include better work-family policies,
including tenure clock extensions. For students, these include
supporting mentoring opportunities, such as Women in Engineering
programs.
Federal funding is critical to science and engineering, and we must
ensure that women principal investigators are well represented in
funding agencies' research and education portfolios. The NSF has been
proactive in its goal to support more women scientists and engineers
through specific programs. One such program, ADVANCE, supports not only
individual women, but activities that lead to institutional change.
This program may prove to be a model for the type of organizational
change we need in the academy.
Conclusion
Dedicated leadership clearly leads to great positive change. One
reason for my move from Georgia Tech to Duke University was the
representation of women leaders in the highest positions at Duke: Dean
Kristina Johnson at the Pratt School of Engineering and President Nan
Keohane. President Keohane has spearheaded a campus-wide initiative on
the status of women at Duke. Through Dean Johnson's leadership, more
than half of the faculty members hired in the Pratt School this past
year are women. The growth of women faculty members in the Pratt School
will profoundly affect the environment for women faculty members and
students alike.
As the mother of two boys that I hope will someday consider
becoming engineers, I fully believe that these changes will benefit
them as well as their female friends.
Senator Wyden. Thank you. Very helpful.
Ms. Greenberger, welcome.
STATEMENT OF MARCIA GREENBERGER, CO-PRESIDENT, NATIONAL WOMEN'S
LAW CENTER
Ms. Greenberger. Thank you very much, Senator Wyden. Thank
you for your leadership in this most important area, for
holding these hearings, and for all of the other areas that you
have been such an important force for advancing the interest of
women and families both in the House of Representatives and now
in the Senate. We are very grateful for all that you have
accomplished, and look forward to your leadership in this area
in the future.
With me are Jocelyn Samuels and Leslie Annexstein from the
National Women's Law Center, who have been working tirelessly
on the issue of Title IX across the board, and two new
advocates beginning their careers with the National Women's Law
Center working on this testimony, Melissa McKenna and Erin
Fitzpatrick. It takes a lot of effort and time to chronicle the
kinds of problems that this Committee has been studying and
identifying in the area of women in science and engineering,
and it takes sustained effort.
One of the important lessons that athletics has taught us,
is that it has been a sustained effort with public attention,
as has been pointed out, that has been required to get women as
far as they have in the area of athletics, and we know with
only 32 percent of athletics budgets, for example, going to
women, even with the progress there is much more to be done in
that area, let alone the areas we are discussing today.
It is also a great pleasure to be here with the other
Members of this Committee, but I have to single out Senator
Bayh for his extraordinary leadership not only in pushing Title
IX forward--without his leadership we would not have a Title
IX--but that leadership has continued over time through
assaults on Title IX and up to this day. With those assaults,
Senator Bayh speaking out and being a champion in our quarter
is really a wonderful asset.
The Center, as Senator Bayh has said, was founded 30 years
ago, just as Title IX was passed. We work in the areas of
education, employment, health and reproductive rights, and
economic security for women, and so it is no accident that
Title IX has been a central part of our focus over those years.
One thing to point out about Title IX that is so important
to focus on, especially for this Committee, is that of course
it applies, as has been pointed out, to elementary and
secondary schools and colleges and universities across the
country, but it also applies to other education programs and
activities, whether they are part of schools or not, that
receive Federal funds. That means research labs, whether they
are connected to universities or not. They can be in academic
settings or they can be in commercial settings.
Title IX has an extraordinary reach and promise, and it is
exactly right that it has not been given the kind of
enforcement and attention that is necessary in this area. I
will not repeat some of the statistics that have been discussed
today about the serious under-representation of women in math
and science and engineering and technology, and I appreciate
our statement being introduced for the record that goes through
those statistics.
I do want to say two quick things. First of all, we are not
seeing a steady improvement across the board. These problems do
not improve on their own. One very distressing fact is a
downward trend, for example, in the number of women receiving
bachelor's degrees in computer and information sciences, which
reached a high of 37 percent in 1984, but dropped to 28 percent
in 1999 to 2000. And while the Department of Education official
rightly pointed to progress of 1 percent to 17 percent in
engineering, for example, from the passage of Title IX to
today, who could be satisfied with a 17 percent figure as a
testament to what Title IX has accomplished.
Senator Wyden. Ms. Greenberger, let me make sure I got that
number. You said that the number of women graduating in
computer science has dropped, 9 percent, did you say, from 37
to 28?
Ms. Greenberger. Yes, from 1984 to 1999-2000.
Senator Wyden. Just out of curiosity, while we are on this
point, do you disagree with that, Mr. Jones?
Mr. Jones. I am actually not aware of what the specific
number is. I assume that is from the Digest of Educational
Statistics from the Department of Ed.
Ms. Greenberger. I know it is footnoted in the written
testimony.
Senator Wyden. We will get into some of these issues in
questions. Excuse me.
Ms. Greenberger. And I did want to point out one other
important statistic that shows that we are not always making
progress, even slow progress. The gap between the median annual
salaries of men and women in science and education occupations
has increased over time. In 1999, women earned an average of
$14,000 less than their male counterparts, compared to $10,000
less in 1993.
Now, what is happening here, and what can we do about it?
There are clearly areas of discrimination, discouragement,
steering, harassment that have been documented that are
violations of Title IX. There is a recent study that found that
71 percent of male teachers believe that male students are more
interested in the mechanics of computer technology, and are
more likely to attribute boys' success in technology to talent,
while dismissing girls' success as due to luck or diligence.
There has been deficient career counseling in secondary
schools. We have seen post secondary programs with female
students transferring out of these areas more often than their
male counterparts. We have seen the problem of low faculty
expectations and gender bias. The National Women's Law Center
released a study in June of this year looking at the area of
vocational and technical high schools across the country, where
we found shocking statistics showing virtually no progress over
the last 30 years, with AP courses in calculus, statistics,
biology, chemistry, physics, or computer science far less
likely to be even available to young girls that are in
vocational and technical high schools in traditionally female
programs than in traditionally male programs.
Those young girls often are tracked with choices they make
in the eighth grade, and then they find themselves without the
kinds of core math and science courses that allow their talents
to shine through, so that by the time they get to college, or,
let alone to post secondary programs of different sorts, many
of these options are behind them. So, we would urge that while
a focus certainly be kept on the college and post college
level, the tracking that happens far below those levels for
younger girls not be ignored.
I want to also quickly point for a minute to some of the
studies and some of the disturbing arguments that I must say I
hear more and more over the last couple of years that really
resonate with what I remember hearing when Title IX was passed
in 1972, and that is that women are either not as good in these
areas because of biology, or that they are not interested in
these areas and they like going into the kind of areas where
there is less pay, less opportunity for promotion, and less
career advancement. The argument is that these are the women's
choices.
We hear that more and more, of course, in the area of
athletics. The Title IX commission that has been established
has been told that the fact that only 40 percent of athletes
are women is a reflection of women's interests, that they are
really not interested in having a 50-50 chance to play, and
that women are unsuited to competitive athletics. These are
like the arguments that women are not suited to the kinds of
math or science careers that are the subject of this hearing.
Finally, I want to look at the issue of Title IX
enforcement, and there has been a discussion about attitudes,
for sure, that are needed to be changed, but attitudes often
get changed when we have laws and enforcement of those laws
that set out our principles of equal opportunity. We do not
wait for attitudes to change, and fortunately we did not wait
for attitudes to change when we passed the landmark civil
rights laws, and whether people had racist attitudes or not the
law went in, the enforcement went forward, and people learned
because of the enforcement about the talents and the skills of
all of our population.
I have to admit that I did grow up at a time pre Title IX.
I did go through college and law school before Title IX was
passed. I was sitting here trying to think about whether I
would publicly say it, but I will. In any event, I do know from
first-hand personal experience of a time when I was told that
going to law school was not something that a woman would be
interested in, that it was inconsistent with having a family,
that it was not possible to be a good lawyer because women were
not as aggressive and, as a matter of fact, that it would be
something that I would not like doing anyway.
It was for a variety of reasons that I was able to overcome
those stereotypes and, as Senator Bayh pointed out, there are
many, many young women who have followed into law schools now,
and nobody would suggest women do not make good lawyers today,
but those attitudes die hard. The challenges and attacks on
Title IX are serious. They will affect all of Title IX, and I
want to go through what I think are absolutely critical areas
for this Committee.
Senator Wyden. If you could just highlight your additional
concerns, we will make them a part of the record in their
entirety.
Ms. Greenberger. I would like to just talk about some of my
concerns with the Office for Civil Rights' enforcement that is
happening right now, and what I hope this Committee will do in
addition to the very important things, Senator Wyden, that you
had outlined in the beginning of the hearing. All of those
actions I think are absolutely essential and are very, very
important for this Committee to pursue.
I was concerned to hear the statistics from 1994 of
compliance reviews being done in the area of math and science.
I would like to know what statistics there are with respect to
compliance reviews being done in 2002, not 1994. It is our
understanding that there are very few of those compliance
reviews being initiated by the Office for Civil Rights right
now.
It is also my understanding from testimony from the head of
the Office for Civil Rights that sexual harassment guidelines
and policies that are in place may be under review, and that
has been a very important barrier that has to be broken down in
opening up nontraditional areas such as math and science for
women. If it is true that those sexual harassment policies are
under review, just as the Title IX athletics policies are, and
other policies are, then we are really turning the clock back,
and I think serious oversight with respect to that is
essential.
When the Center issued its report with respect to
vocational education, it filed 12 petitions for compliance
reviews in each region of the country with the Office for Civil
Rights. We do not know to this day whether even one compliance
review in this area per region will be conducted or is planned.
Further, the National Science Foundation, NASA, the
Department of Energy, and the National Institutes of Health,
who give major grants and conduct their own programs as well as
fund others, have Title IX responsibilities. One of the things
that President Clinton did in acknowledgement of the 25th
anniversary of Title IX was to ensure that all of the
departments and agencies that have Title IX responsibility,
actually issue regulations under Title IX.
Now that they have, or not every single one has, almost all
have, we are very concerned that they take those regulations
and actually enforce them, so we would want and hope that you
would look at what the National Science Foundation, NASA, and
other parts of Government agencies that are subject to this
Committee's jurisdiction, are doing with respect to their own
Title IX regulations.
What are they doing with respect to their own programs, not
just doing the studies, but what kind of compliance reviews
have they scheduled? Are they getting complaints? Have they
informed anybody in the public that they could file complaints
with them, that they do not have to look only at colleges and
universities, but major research labs in private industry,
nonprofit research labs are subject to Title IX as well, and
also what kind of coordination with the Office for Civil Rights
at the Department of Education is going on.
We would suggest as well some serious look at a number of
bills proposed with respect to funding to help train teachers
and improve their skills with respect to math and science and
technology, to include skills and teaching all of students,
both male and female students, and also programs to encourage
young girls to look more broadly with respect to their career
horizons, and finally, GAO studies to look at what kind of
compliance activities are happening in the Government, what
kinds of strategies are useful. The kind of GAO research could
be very, very instrumental.
And my final sentence comes from Representative Patsy Mink.
I think she is on all of our minds. She was actually, during
the brief period when she was not in public service, on the
board of the National Women's Law Center, and so her loss is a
personal one to us as well as, obviously, a great loss to women
and men across the country.
She said in 1971, ``discrimination against women in
education is one of the most damaging forms of prejudice in our
Nation, for it derives a high proportion of our people an
opportunity for equal employment, and equal participation in
national leadership.'' We know, you know how true those words
are, and we are very grateful for your leadership in pursuing
Title IX.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Greenberger follows:]
Prepared Statement of Marcia Greenberger, Co-President, National
Women's Law Center
I am Marcia Greenberger, Co-President of the National Women's Law
Center. Thank you for the invitation to appear before you today to
discuss the applicability of Title IX of the Education Amendments of
1972 (Title IX) to opening up opportunities for women interested in
pursuing degrees and careers in mathematics, engineering and the hard
sciences. We are especially pleased to have this opportunity because
this year is the law's 30th anniversary. While much progress has been
made in the last three decades, much remains to be done to ensure that
women have equal access and opportunities in all areas of education.
The Center is a non-profit organization that has worked since 1972
to advance and protect the legal rights of women and girls across the
country. The Center focuses on major policy areas of importance to
women and their families, including education, employment, health and
reproductive rights, and economic security--with particular attention
paid to the concerns of low-income women. Founded in the year that
Title IX was passed, the Center has devoted much of its resources to
ensuring that the promise of Title IX becomes a reality in all aspects
of education.
Title IX was enacted in 1972 as a broad proscription against
discrimination in any federally funded education program or activity.
It states simply:
No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be
excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of or be
subjected to discrimination under any education program or
activity receiving Federal financial assistance.\1\
\1\ Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, 20 U.S.C.
Sec. 1681 et seq.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Title IX applies to most elementary and secondary schools and
colleges and universities. It also applies to programs and activities
affiliated with schools that receive federal funds. It was intended to
ensure equal opportunity for women and girls in all aspects of
education--from access to higher education, to equal opportunities and
fair treatment in elementary and secondary classrooms, to equal
opportunities in athletics programs. In passing Title IX, Congress
recognized that it is through education that women have the means to a
better economic future for themselves and their families. Congress'
vision has borne fruit: thirty years after enactment of the law, we
have more women doctors and lawyers, as well as women athletes winning
medals and trophies--all of whom help defy gender stereotypes about the
interests and abilities of women and girls.
I. Women and Girls are Underrepresented in Math, Science, Engineering
and Technology.
Despite this progress, women remain underrepresented in the
traditionally male fields of math, science and engineering. Gender
disparities in math and science start small and grow as students
advance in school, with boys outperforming girls on standardized tests
and participating in math and science classes at higher rates in high
schools, and men majoring in math and science at higher rates than
women at the post-secondary level.\2\ Similarly, at both the high
school and post-secondary levels, female students are less likely than
their male counterparts to receive training in computers and technology
beyond the traditionally female areas of word processing or data
entry.\3\ This underrepresentation is particularly problematic at this
time in our history, when proficiency in science, math and the
information sciences is critical to jobs in a technological society.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\2\National Coalition for Women and Girls in Education, Title IX at
30: Report Card on Gender Equity, 37 (June 2002).
\3\ Id. at 52.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
While women have made remarkable progress in pursuing college
degrees, they are still underrepresented in the areas of math, science
and engineering--underrepresentation that grows larger at the master's
and doctorate degree levels. In fact, the only science in which women
receive bachelors' degrees in rough proportion to their presence in the
student body is the biological /life sciences, where women receive 58
percent of bachelor's degrees and 55 percent of master's degrees. But
even in this field, women lose their majority to men at the doctorate
level, with women receiving only 44 percent of doctorate degrees.
And in other fields, the news about women's participation is worse.
For example:
In mathematics and physical sciences women are working
towards parity with men at the bachelor level where women
receive 47 percent of bachelor's degrees in mathematics and 40
percent of bachelor's degrees in physical sciences. However,
women are awarded only 25 percent of doctorate degrees in each
of these areas.
In computer and information sciences, there is actually a
downward trend. The number of women receiving bachelor's
degrees in computer and information sciences reached a high of
37 percent in 1984, but dropped to 28 percent in 1999-2000.
The most disturbing disparity lies in engineering, where
women receive only 18 percent of bachelor's degrees, 21 percent
of master's degrees, and 15 percent of doctorate degrees. (See
attached charts.)
These disparities in the student body are mirrored by similar
gender disparities in the employment of female professors in math,
science and engineering. For example, in engineering, women are only
8.9 percent of tenured or tenure-track faculty, and only 4.4 percent of
full professors.\4\ They are only 25 percent of the full-time
instructional faculty in natural sciences.\5\ (See attached chart.)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\4\ Margaret Mannix, Facing the Problem, Prism Journal of
Engineering, Vol. 12, No. 2 (October 2002).
\5\ U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education
Statistics, Digest of Education Statistics (2001), at http://
nces.ed.gov/pubs2002/digest2001/tables/dt.235.asp.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
As Representative Patsy Mink stated in 1971, ``discrimination
against women in higher education is one of the most damaging forms of
prejudice in our Nation for it deprives a high proportion of our people
of the opportunity for equal employment and equal participation in
national leadership.'' \6\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\6\ 117 Cong. Rec. 2658 (1971).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Moreover, while girls the gender gap is narrowing in mathematics
and science at the high school level, girls continue to lag behind
their male counterparts in several key areas. For example:
Girls score 35 points below boys on the math portion of the
SAT.\7\
\7\ The College Board, 2001 Profile of College Bound Seniors.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Across all racial and ethnic groups, males are more likely
than females to attain high scores on the AP biology
examination and the AP calculus examination.\8\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\8\ Educational Testing Service, Differences in the Gender Gap:
Comparisons Across Racial/Ethnic Groups in Education and Work, pp. 38-
39 (2001).
In 1997, girls comprised only 37 percent of students
enrolled in Advanced Placement (AP) computer science classes
across the nation, and in twelve states comprised less than 20
percent of the students.\9\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\9\ U.S. Department of Education, Office for Civil Rights, 1997
Elementary and Secondary School Civil Rights Compliance Report,
National and State Projections (December 1999).
Girls are less likely than boys to take math courses beyond
algebra II, and boys far outnumber girls in physics and
computer classes.\10\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\10\ American Association of University Women, Gender Gaps: Where
Schools Still Fail Our Children, 13-14 (1998).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
II. This Underrepresentation has Significant Consequences for Women.
The gender disparities in math, science, engineering and technology
have a deep impact on the earning power and career prospects of women.
For example:
Women employed in science are most likely to work in
natural sciences, where they comprise 35 percent of the
workforce. The annual mean income for natural sciences
occupations is $47,790. This is significantly less than the
annual mean income for computer and math occupations--$58,050--
or for engineering (including architecture) occupations,
$54,060. Women comprise only 30 percent of the computer and
math workforce and a meager 11 percent of the engineering
workforce.\11\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\11\ U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics, at
http://stats.bls.gov/oes/2000/oes--15Co.htm.
Even where women and men have attained the same degree
level, salary differentials persist. Women with a bachelor's
degree in an area of science or engineering, earn 35 percent
less than similarly situated men, and those with a doctorate
degree earn 26 percent less than their male peers.\12\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\12\ Association of Women in Science, Salary Differentials
controlling for individual characteristics: 1999, at http://
www.awis.org/statistics/statistics.html
The gap between the median annual salaries of men and women
in science and engineering occupations has increased over time;
in 1999, women earned an average of $14,000 less than their
male counterparts, compared to $10,000 less in 1993.\13\ (See
attached chart.)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\13\ American Women in Science, Median Annual Salaries of Men and
Women in Science and Engineering Occupations, at http://awis.org/
statistics/statistics.html.
Indeed, a 1997 report issued by the U.S. Department of Education
noted several trends that inhibit educational and career opportunities
for women, including women's lower number of degrees in computer
science, engineering, physical science, and math compared with men, and
the underrepresentation of women in jobs in scientific fields.\14\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\14\ U.S. Department of Education, Title IX: 25 Years of Progress,
15-16 (June 1997).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
III. Women and Girls in Math, Science, Engineering and Technology Face
Persistent Barriers.
This pattern of underrepresentation at both the secondary and post-
secondary levels of education is directly linked to the continuing
barriers that female students face in these programs. For example, a
recent study found that 71 percent of male teachers believed that male
students were more interested in the mechanics of computer technology,
and were more likely to attribute boys' success in technology to talent
while dismissing girls' success as due to luck or diligence.\15\ And
deficient career counseling in secondary schools has been found to
reduce women's entry into science and engineering at the university
level.\16\ Additionally, some research has demonstrated that in post-
secondary programs, female students transfer out of science,
engineering and technology-related majors more often than their male
counterparts, in part due to experiences of gender bias and low faculty
expectations.\17\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\15\ American Association of University Women Educational
Foundation, Tech-Savvy: Educating Girls in the New Computer Age, at 24
(2000).
\16\ Carolyn B. Ramsey, Subtracting Sexism from the Classroom: Law
and Policy in the Debate Over All-Female Math and Science Classes in
Public Schools, 8 Tes. J. Women and L.1 (1998).
\17\ Congressional Commission on the Advancement of Women and
Minorities in Science, Engineering and Technology Development, Land of
Plenty: Diversity as America's Competitive Edge in Science, Engineering
and Technology, at 31 (September 2000).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Further, many of our young women do not enjoy equal access to math,
science or technology-related opportunities because of decisions made
by their education systems about the placement of such opportunities.
For example, an investigation conducted by the National Women's Law
Center into educational opportunities for female students in New York
City's vocational and technical high schools found that none of the
four predominantly female vocational schools offer any AP courses in
Calculus, Statistics, Biology, Chemistry, Physics, or Computer Science,
although such courses are provided at the predominantly male vocational
schools. According to our calculations, approximately 67 percent of
male vocational students, but only 35 percent of female vocational
students, attend a school that offers at least one math or science AP
course. Similarly, the New York City Board of Education has implemented
Cisco Networking Academies, which lead to industry certification in
computer networking, at some of the vocational high schools, but has
not placed this program in any of the predominantly female schools.\18\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\18\ See National Women's Law Center, Letter to Chancellor Harold
O. Levy, August 15, 2002, at http://www.nwlc.org/pdf/LevyLetter.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thus, a 2000 report of the United States Commission on Civil Rights
found that ``[t]hrough lack of counseling; stereotypical socialization;
discouragement; less aggressive inclusion of parents in designing
programs; gender-biased teaching styles, resources, and testing; and
other barriers, girls are steered from math, science, engineering, and
other technical fields.'' \19\ Similarly, the Congressional Commission
on the Advancement of Women and Minorities in Science, Engineering and
Technology Development concluded that same year that ``[a]ctive
discouragement . . . contribute[s] to girls' lack of interest in
[science, engineering and technology] careers.'' \20\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\19\ United States Commission on Civil Rights, Equal Educational
Opportunities and Nondiscrimination for Girls in Advanced Mathematics,
Science, and Technology Education: Federal Enforcement of Title IX, 7
(July 2000).
\20\ Land of Plenty: Diversity as America's Competitive Edge in
Science, Engineering and Technology at 2.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Women faculty members also face barriers at their institutions. A
recent study on the status of female professors in science at
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) drew national attention
when the university publicly acknowledged discrimination against women
faculty. In 1994, tenured women faculty in the School of Science at MIT
formed a committee to investigate whether their individual experiences
of veiled discrimination represented a broader framework of
inequality.\21\ The committee's report relied upon and analyzed data
and interviews conducted with women faculty and department heads.\22\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\21\ A Study on the Status of Women Faculty in Science at MIT, MIT
Faculty Newsletter, Vol. XI, No. 4, March 1999, at http://web.mit.edu/
fnl/women/women.html.
\22\ Id. at 4.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The report found that tenured women faced ``patterns of
difference,'' evidenced by consistently lower salaries than their male
peers, unequal access to resources and persistent exclusion from any
substantive power at MIT.\23\ The report also revealed a correlation
between these ``patterns of difference'' and the tenured women's
consistent reports of feeling excluded, disempowered, ``invisible'' and
``marginalized'' within their departments as their careers
progressed.\24\ According to the report, ``as of 1999, there ha[d]
never been a woman department head, associate head, or center director
in the School of Science in the history of MIT.'' \25\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\23\ Id. at 7.
\24\ Id. at 7-8.
\25\ Id. at 12.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Unfortunately, despite evidence of the very real barriers that
women and girls continue to face in these fields, gender stereotyped
arguments about the abilities and interest of women and girls persist.
Allegations continue to be made today, for example, that males
outnumber females in doctoral degrees in fields such as physics and
engineering because their spatial and mechanical aptitudes are superior
to those of women, and that sex hormones are the cause of these
differences between males and females.\26\ These types of arguments
have also been made repeatedly in an effort to deny women equal
athletics opportunities, where critics of Title IX have asserted that
women are less interested in sports than men. However, as Congress and
the courts have consistently recognized, Title IX was enacted in order
to remedy discrimination that results from stereotyped notions of
women's interests and abilities and the law must be vigorously enforced
to eradicate those discriminatory assumptions.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\26\ Patricia Hausman, Independent Women's Forum, Plenty of
Nonsense, How the Land of Plenty Report Denies Female Scientific
Achievement, 14-15 (November 2000).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
IV. Title IX Enforcement is Critical to Eliminating Barriers.
As this information demonstrates, vigorous enforcement of Title IX
is necessary to ensure that discrimination on the basis of sex is
stamped out. The Title IX regulations, promulgated in 1975, require
federally funded education programs to take a variety of steps to
prevent and address sex discrimination.\27\ In particular, education
programs may not discriminate in recruiting, counseling, admissions or
treatment of students. For example:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\27\ 34 C.F.R. Part 106.
Programs must ensure that counseling is not discriminatory
and does not steer female students away from non-traditional
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
areas, such as math and science.
Programs must designate an employee to ensure Title IX
compliance and to investigate complaints of sex discrimination.
Programs must implement and disseminate a written policy
prohibiting sex discrimination, with a process for filing
grievances.
Importantly, the Title IX regulations require that if a program
finds that a particular class is disproportionately male or female,
that program must make sure that this is not the result of sex-biased
counseling or the use of discriminatory counseling or appraisal
materials.\28\ Thus, math, science, engineering and technology-related
programs have an affirmative obligation to review their own practices
and remedy discriminatory practices that lead to underrepresentation of
women in these areas.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\28\ 34 C.F.R. 106.36 (c).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights (OCR) is
recognized as the primary enforcement agency under Title IX. However,
OCR has a mixed record on Title IX compliance and enforcement
activities relating to women and girls in math and science education.
For example, a recent review of OCR's activities indicated that few of
OCR's Title IX cases have evaluated female students' access to and
participation in science and math.\29\ Moreover, it is unclear whether
OCR is providing adequate technical assistance in this area. In April
1996, OCR released a ``promising practices'' document regarding access
for women and minorities to math and science programs, to help school
districts with an underrepresentation problem devise ways to ensure
equal educational opportunity.\30\ It is unclear whether OCR continues
to make this document available to education programs today as it
conducts technical assistance, or whether the underrepresentation of
women and girls in math, science, engineering or technology programs is
a priority issue for the office.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\29\ Equal Educational Opportunities and Nondiscrimination for
Girls in Advanced Mathematics, Science, and Technology Education:
Federal Enforcement of Title IX , at 65.
\30\ U.S. Department of Education, Office for Civil Rights,
Promising Programs and Practices: Access for Women and Minorities to
Mathematics and Science Programs and Gifted and Talented Education
Programs, April 1996.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
With its enforcement powers, OCR can effect great changes, but this
requires resources and a greater commitment to enforce Title IX in all
areas of education. Compliance reviews and other enforcement measures
are needed to ensure that schools and programs are meeting their
obligations under the law. In fact, OCR could be asked to undertake
compliance reviews to determine the causes for women's lower
participation in math and science, which decreases even more at the
post-secondary level, and to take action to eliminate all forms of sex
discrimination. Indeed, in a related area, in June 2002, the Center
filed 12 Petitions for Compliance Review with each of the regional
offices of OCR, requesting full investigations of the sex segregation
in high school vocational and technical programs in specific
states.\31\ It is our hope that OCR will conduct full investigations
and remedy any discrimination that has resulted in barriers to full
educational opportunity for young women in these programs. Similar
requests for compliance reviews of math, science, engineering and
technology programs could generate beneficial results.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\31\ See National Women's Law Center, Petitions for Compliance
Reviews of High School Vocational and Technical Programs by the United
States Department of Education, Office of Civil Rights, Regional
Offices, at http://www.nwlc.org/details.cfm?id=1138§ion=education.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In addition to proactive compliance reviews conducted by OCR, any
student or interested group may file a Title IX complaint with the
federal government to challenge discrimination in math, science and
engineering programs. Individuals whose rights under Title IX have been
violated may also be able to bring a federal lawsuit against the
education program or institution.
Conclusion
While there has been progress made over the last 30 years under
Title IX, many battles still must be fought to eradicate sex
discrimination in education and enable women and girls to realize their
full potential. Women and girls continue to face unacceptable barriers
in the non-traditional fields of math, science, engineering and
technology. These barriers must be eliminated, and strong enforcement
of Title IX is necessary to open up the door to equal educational
opportunity. After 30 years of this important law, we still fall short
of the educational landscape that the late Representative Edith Green
and former Senator Birch Bayh envisioned when they sponsored Title IX--
namely, complete elimination of the ``corrosive and unjustified
discrimination against women'' in education. As long as math, science,
engineering and technology remain hostile fields for women, we will not
have realized Title IX's promise. We must recommit ourselves today to
making the letter and the spirit of the Title IX law a reality across
all areas of education.
Thank you very much.
Senator Wyden. Well said. We will have some questions in a
moment.
Dr. Richmond, welcome.
STATEMENT OF DR. GERALDINE L. RICHMOND, RICHARD M. AND PATRICIA
H. NOYES DISTINGUISHED PROFESSOR,
DEPARTMENT OF CHEMISTRY, UNIVERSITY OF OREGON
Dr. Richmond. Thank you, Senator Wyden, and your staff
members, for inviting me to attend this important hearing, and
I am particularly proud, Senator Wyden, that my Senator has
taken on this issue. It is a treat. I am a scientist, I am a
researcher, and I am an educator at the University of Oregon. I
have been doing chemical physics for the last 23 years as a
faculty member. I have graduated numerous Ph.D. students who
work in companies, Government labs, colleges and universities
around this country, and I have taught introductory chemistry
to several thousand undergraduates. Although you may think that
is a little frightening, it is actually fun.
My research program involving laser spectroscopy and optics
is supported by the National Science Foundation, the Department
of Energy, and the Office of Naval Research. I have published
volumes of research papers and served on more national and
State-wide Committees than I care to count to oversee the
health and vitality of the science enterprise in this country.
I am passionate about my science, my students, and my
desire to see more women have the opportunity of a rewarding
career that I have had. In 1997, I founded a group called COACh
(Committee on the Advancement of Women Chemists)--how
appropriate for this group--which is comprised of the most
senior women academic chemists in this country. We are funded
by the National Science Foundation, the Department of Energy,
and the National Institutes of Health, and we seek solutions to
the problems that are being addressed here.
As we seek a way to get more women into science careers, we
must understand the scientific enterprise. Our country
continues to be a world leader in science and technology
because of the excellent training and exceptional
accomplishments of our scientists. Those that scale the career
ladder to obtain advanced degrees in science and engineering
are the intellectual engines of this enterprise. The peer
review process is a tool we use to measure scientific quality
in this basic research and identify and reward the best
science.
Unlike sports, where women's sports and men's sports are
often separated, we do not separate our science by gender, nor
do we want to. Our bodies are different, but our minds are
comparable and strong, intellectually equal. The ladder one
must climb to be a professor in a research university or
laboratory is daunting to any incoming student. It takes 4 to 5
years to get a B.S. in science, 5 to 7 more to get a Ph.D., 2
to 4 additional years as a post-doctoral associate. All are
usually done at different schools in different cities across
the country.
The rigors of graduate school often demand a 60 to 70 hour
work week, with an average stipend of 18 to 20 thousand
dollars. This equates to $5 to $6 an hour. This low stipend
makes it very difficult to pay off undergraduate student loans,
buy a house, save money, or have children. Those fortunate
enough to be hired in a faculty position get to then spend the
next 5 or 6 more years working even harder in order to get job
security, or what we call tenure. For those counting, now you
are in your mid to late thirties.
Further success in your endeavors leads you to promotion
from associate professor to full professor, and if you are
eventually elected to the National Academy of Sciences and
Engineering, our hall of fame, you have reached the top rungs
of the ladder.
The attrition of female scientists from this ladder is
well-documented. As I travel the country, the concern I most
frequently hear from female undergraduates and graduate
students is the uncertainty about being able to handle a family
and an academic science career, and how and when to fit
children into this lengthy educational process, concerns of
availability of good and flexible child care, financial
stability, lack of maternity policies in most academic
departments, particularly at the graduate student level. Others
cite the lack of good role models, gender biases in the
environment, and isolation, all of which contribute to our
diminished ability to populate our academic institution with
female faculty and consequently female students. It is no
wonder so few women even think about applying for academic
positions.
For those women who do choose to become professors, many
factors slow their progress. These factors have a very damaging
cumulative effect on their careers, outlined in Virginia
Valian's book, Why So Slow? They arise from biases that
originate in the culture of our scientific community and
society. COACh has collected many stories of these factors in
our workshops with women faculty from around the country. They
make you cry, they make you mad, they make you wonder if it
will ever get any better.
Gender bias in the peer review and teaching evaluation
process, unfair tenure processes, heavy teaching and service
loads, lower salary, less recognition for equal work, and
resentment by colleagues for awards and recognition received
that are only available for women, are all documented negative
factors that accumulate over time, and lessen her ability to
make it to the top rungs of the ladder and be an influential
player in the education and research enterprise. Those familiar
with accumulated interests know that even a small, 1 percent
lower investment per year leads to an overall lower investment
value of 25 percent over a 30-year period.
For women to flood the higher ranks of science as they have
in sports, it is critical that we recognize the inherent
differences in these two very different career paths as we seek
to devise a solution. If Title IX is used as a tool, the key is
in the implementation. Because of the flexibility that Title IX
provides, there are good solutions and there are bad solutions,
and we must seek only what is best for both the scientific
enterprise and women.
My academic female colleagues in COACh believe that the
approach must be targeted at three different levels, the
individual researchers, the academic institutions, and the
funding agencies.
First, every researcher and educator that receives Federal
funding for scientific research that involves graduate students
and research associates has the responsibility to assist in
broadening the participation of women in the scientific
enterprise. The National Science Foundation is on the forefront
of trying to make this change in the culture, with the October
1 mandate that all research proposals will now be judged on
both scientific excellence and broader impact, what we call
criteria 2, which includes the recruitment and retention of
women in under-represented fields.
Second, all funding agencies that support research programs
that involve training, such as research undergraduate students,
graduate students, and post-doctoral associates, need to take
appropriate action to assure that women are active players and
leaders in the current and future scientific and technological
workforce. This includes NSF, Department of Energy, NASA, NIH,
and the DOD mission agencies. They all fund graduate students,
and they need to be reminded that this is important. At a
minimum, they should be following NSF's model of following
criteria 2 in the evaluation process.
And third, educational institutions receiving Federal
research funding need to demonstrate a commitment and sustained
progress on increasing the number of female educators and
participants in the scientific enterprise. The Advance program
which was alluded to earlier at NSF has brought in lots and
lots of ideas from institutions across the country. Seventy-two
proposals were received this week from institutions across the
country for changes that can happen in different universities.
Only about eight or nine will be able to be funded. That is
really unfortunate, but what we need to do is to make sure that
those ideas get the kind of funding that they deserve in order
to have these women see the lifeline coming to them.
It is vital for both the security of our Nation and the
health of our global economy that this Nation's workforce be
comprised of the brightest and the best minds in this country.
I look forward to the day when more women can have the deeply
rewarding career that I have had in my science, teaching, and
friendships with other women scientists at the University of
Oregon and sprinkled around the country.
Thank you very much for your attention to this issue,
Senator Wyden.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Richmond follows:]
Prepared Statement of Dr. Geraldine L. Richmond, Richard M. and
Patricia H. Noyes Distinguished Professor, Department of Chemistry,
University of Oregon
I wish to express my sincere pleasure in being asked to speak at
this important hearing on my two favorite topics, science and women in
science. I come to you as a practicing scientist, researcher and
educator. I have the best job in the world. Back home in my wonderful
state of Oregon, and the University of Oregon, I have the privilege to
spend my days working closely with my research students on experiments
that employ lasers to understand chemical and biological processes at
surfaces. In my 23 years as a professor in the field of chemical
physics I have graduated numerous Ph.D. students who currently occupy
positions in companies, government laboratories, colleges and
universities around the country. In order to carry out this state-of-
the-art research program, each year I spend endless hours raising at
least a half million dollars from the Federal research agencies
relevant to my work, from agencies such as NSF, DoE and DOD. I have
published volumes of papers on our results and have served on numerous
national and statewide committees that oversee the health and vitality
of the scientific enterprise in this country. Through all of this, a
passion of mine has been the recruitment and promotion of females in
scientific careers, from my first faculty appointment at Bryn Mawr
College to my current role as founder and chair of a national
organization called COACh, the Committee on the Advancement of Women
Chemists that is based at the University of Oregon.
In my parallel role of mother, I have the opportunity to spend part
of my days hanging around rainy soccer and baseball fields. One of the
unexpected pleasures of this has been to watch hordes of young girls
playing team sports, an experience that I never had as a young girl
since I was pre-Title IX. As I watch these girls learning to be
aggressive, competitive, goal oriented and team players, I wonder if
these personality traits will translate later into them being more
capable of dealing with workplace issues for which many of us were not
prepared. For the girls who choose to go into male dominated fields of
science and engineering, will these traits make the daily battles
easier? Will they have the benefit of female science teachers in their
college education and graduate school who can serve as role models,
coaches, confidants and cheerleaders, a benefit that most of us in my
peer group never had. For those young women entering college today, the
likelihood is low, particularly if they attend one our top 50 research
universities. In engineering, they will have to look beyond 12 male
faculty members to find the female. Physics is worse, chemistry and
computer science slightly better at around 1:10. Unfortunately, these
numbers have shown minimal improvement in recent years relative to the
increase in the number of female undergraduate students in these
disciplines, Why? The factors are complex, just as the potential
solutions. Given the challenges that lie ahead in national security,
technology and the global economy, we can not afford to leave half of
our population behind. We must recruit, educate and promote a higher
percentage of our women in technical fields.
Our country continues to be the world leader in science and
technology because of the excellent training and exceptional research
accomplishments of scientists in this country. Those that scale the
career ladder to obtain advanced degrees in science and engineering are
the engines of the enterprise. Science breakthroughs generally depend
upon years of accumulation of data from fundamental or basic research.
This basic research is largely done at universities, decreasingly at
government laboratories, with the assistance of graduate students and
postdoctoral associates. The peer review process is the tool we use to
measure scientific quality in this basic research, the backbone of our
research enterprise that is essential to identifying and rewarding the
best science. Unlike sports where women's sports and men's sports
programs are often separated, we do not separate our science by gender,
nor do we want to. Our bodies are different, but our minds are
comparable and strong, intellectually equal.
The ladder that one must climb to make contributions to the
research enterprise is daunting to anyone. The 4-5 years spent to
obtain a bachelors of science or engineering degree is followed by 5-7
years of graduate research work leading to masters and Ph.D. degrees.
Those interested in becoming a professor at a college or university, or
research leader at a government laboratory require an additional 2-4
years of postdoctoral experience. All of these levels are usually done
at different schools in different cities across the country. The ones
who choose to go into academia enter as assistant professors with 5-6
more years to establish an independent national reputation that will
ensure them a tenured position, i.e. secure employment. Receiving
tenure in those 5-6 years is generally the biggest career challenge. It
entails developing a research program that includes building a
laboratory with state-of-the-art research instrumentation, obtaining
research funds from peer reviewed proposals sent to numerous funding
agencies, recruiting and training as many graduate students and
postdoctoral associates as you can afford with the money you raise,
conducting the experiments with the knowledge that only a fraction of
your ideas will produce publishable results, publishing the results in
peer reviewed journals, hoping that your discoveries will make a
significant contribution to your field, giving talks all around the
country to get your work known, and in the end, having your final
research portfolio judged by experts from around the world who
collectively believe that you deserve tenure. Your teaching
accomplishments have a varying influence on the final decision
depending on your university. Once you receive tenure the next 5-7
years are spent trying to advance from associate professor to full
professor rank. Advances beyond this point make you increasingly
eligible to win major awards or be elected to the prestigious National
Academy of Sciences and Engineering--our Hall of Fame which is open to
both men and women.
For an 18 to 22 year old, the climb up the ladder appears to be
filled with uncertainty, professionally, financially and personally.
The rigors of graduate school often demand a 60-70 hour work week. With
an average stipend of $18-20K, this equates to roughly $5-6 per hour.
This low stipend leaves little if any ability to pay off undergraduate
student loans, buy a house, save money, afford children or associated
childcare. For females, each rung that one climbs on the ladder brings
additional, gender-based, challenges. For many departments, there are
few if any female faculty to serve as role models, advisors or mentors.
One recurring concern that I hear from female undergraduate and
graduate students around the country who are interested in an advanced
degree or academic career path relates to the possibility to pursue
this path and still have a family. Academic institutions in general do
not send a positive message to women about having children. Unlike
industry and government laboratories, most academic science and
engineering departments have no policy for pregnancy or maternity leave
for graduate students. Affordability, availability of good and flexible
childcare, delaying children until after tenure, low income and long
work hours, the lack of family friendly graduate policies all
contribute to women jumping off the academic science ladder and leaving
science, or choosing a career that does not assist our ability to
populate our academic institutions with more female faculty members and
consequently female students.
For those women who choose to move further up the academic ladder,
many factors slow their progress relative to their male colleagues.
These factors have a very damaging cumulative effect on a woman's
career. \1\ They arise from biases that originate in the culture of our
scientific community and society. For example, research shows that for
two identical papers, one version with a female first author and the
other with a male first author, harsher reviews were obtained for the
version with the female author. \2\ A Swedish study shows that women
have to have five times the accomplishments as their male colleagues in
order to get similar recognition. \2\ Women, for various reasons are
often saddled with heavier service and teaching loads than their male
colleagues, providing an additional impediment to their career
advancement. \1\ Both women and men react negatively to women who take
a leadership role in a group \3\. \4\ Awards or programs that are given
exclusively to women to assist in their progress up the ladder are
largely ignored or often resented in the tenure, promotion and award
process because these advances are perceived to not have been given the
rigorous review process of nongender based advances. My women
colleagues around the country often hear ``she won that award or got
elected to that position only because she was female''. The message
that she is not deserving of her accomplishments comes through
unequivocally, and can be very damaging. This accumulation of
disadvantage means that, as the years progress, the impact on her
ability to make the top rungs of the ladder and be an influential
player in the education and research scene can be substantial. Those
familiar with accumulated interest know that even a small 1 percent
lower investment per year leads to an overall lower investment value of
25 percent over a 30 year period.
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\1\ Valian, V. 1998. Why So Slow? Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
\2\ Wenneras, C. and Wold, A. 1997. Nepotism and sexism in peer-
review. Nature 387:341-43.
\3\ Brown, V. and Geis, F. L. 1984. Turning lead into gold:
Leadership by men and women and the alchemy of social consensus.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 46:811-24.
\4\ Butler, D. and Geis, F.L. 1990. Nonverbal affect responses to
males and female leaders: Implications for leadership evaluation.
Journal of Personality and social Psychology, 58:48-59.
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The bottom line is, in order for women to ``flood'' the higher
ranks of science as they have in sports it is critical that we
recognize the inherent differences in these two very different career
paths as we seek to devise a solution. If Title IX is used as a tool,
the key is in the implementation. Because of the flexibility that Title
IX provides, there are good solutions and bad solutions and we must
seek only what is best for both the scientific enterprise and women. I
and my academic women colleagues of COACh believe that the approach
must be targeted at a number of identifiable levels:
(1) Every researcher and educator that receives federal funding
for scientific research that involves graduate students and
research associates has the responsibility to assist in
broadening the participation of women in the scientific
enterprise. The National Science Foundation is on the forefront
of trying to make change in the culture with the October 1
mandate that all research proposals will now be judged on both
scientific excellence and the broader impact (Criteria 2) which
includes the recruitment and retention of women in
underrepresented fields.
(2) All funding agencies that support research programs that
involve trainees such as research undergraduate students,
graduate students and postdoctoral associates need to take
appropriate action to assure that women are active players and
leaders in the current and future scientific and technological
workforce. At a minimum, all need to follow the lead of NSF
Criteria 2 in the evaluation process if the research grant
involves training of graduate students and postdoctoral
associates.
(3) Educational institutions receiving federal research funding
need to demonstrate a commitment and sustained progress in
increasing the number of female educators and participants in
their scientific enterprise and eliminate barriers that impede
the progress of these groups in their institutions. Those
involved in hiring, tenure and promotion need to be aware of
the documented factors that contribute to the slow rate of
progress of women in their academic pursuit and act
appropriately.
It is vital for both the security of our nation and the health of
our global economy that this nation's workforce be comprised of the
best and brightest minds that this country can supply. I look forward
to the day when young women coming up the system enthusiastically
embrace the joy and satisfaction that comes with a career in science. I
deeply appreciate this opportunity to share with you some of the joys
and concerns associated with being a woman in science. Thank you very
much, Senator Wyden and Senator Allen.
Senator Wyden. Dr. Richmond, thank you. All of you have
been very good and very helpful.
If I might begin with you, Mr. Jones, you came and said you
were here to deliver good news, to characterize your statement.
It sure looks like everybody else on the panel does not think
that the news is so great. Are they wrong, and how would you
respond to the comments that have been made by the other
panelists?
Mr. Jones. Well, I can only address the comments of the
other panelists as it relates to the work of OCR. I can comment
on their characterizations of how things have changed more
broadly, but let me pick up on a few issues.
Senator Wyden. But you do continue to believe that the news
is good, in spite of what----
Mr. Jones. Indeed. The progress is significant and
substantial. Let me give you another example. The gateway
course to higher education in mathematics today would be AP
calculus. Today, 7 percent of boys complete AP calculus. This
is based on data 2 years ago. 6 percent of girls do, yet when
we look back to when the earliest statistics were available,
back in the early eighties, it was twice as many boys as girls
completing AP calculus. That is progress.
Yes, 17 percent is not a substantial proportion. It would
be a minority of women in engineering, but the difference
between 1 percent and 17 percent, that is substantial progress,
and frankly, with the exception of the statistic that Ms.
Greenberger brought up, I did not hear any areas where there
was what I might call backsliding. The progress may not be at
the speed to which folks are looking for, but as I am looking
at it there progress being made, and there continues to be.
Senator Wyden. Let us talk about some of those specific
areas, because I do not think your numbers and Ms.
Greenberger's, if you really look at them in the right context,
are in disagreement. For example, it looks to me, when you take
your numbers and Ms. Greenberger's numbers, she is right with
respect to the reduction in computer science graduates over the
last several decades, and let me give you an example of why I
think the numbers square.
I think that what you have in your testimony on page 4,
which she has in her testimony on page 2, indicates that the
number of computer science graduates who are women was about 14
percent in 1972, then increased very dramatically in the middle
of the 1980's to about 37 percent, and then the two of you are
in agreement that by the late 1990's that had fallen to 27 or
28 percent, so it looks to me like your numbers, if they are
taken in the right context, confirm the fact that there has
actually been a reduction in the number of women getting the
degrees in computer science. Do you find that at all troubling?
Mr. Jones. Well, again, I have not seen the source. I am
going to assume, just for her benefit, that the source is the
same, the Digest of Education Statistics, and it certainly
indicates that there are fewer women since 1984 who have
completed the degree. Given that, I would be interested in
looking at the data more closely through the whole spectrum of
years, but I will make the overarching comment there are two
issues at play when we are looking at the number of degree
completions.
There are issues that Senator Bayh talked about on the
Senate floor when the law was being passed back in 1972, issues
of discrimination, issues of denial of access, issues of
exclusion from participation. These are issues for which the
law was passed and the remedies were created.
There are also issues of self-selection. I do not know
enough about the sociology of those in the computer science
field, or the nature of broader industry discrimination,
whether it exists or does not exist. What I can speak to are
the areas I talked about, and frankly I wish I had the Diary of
Ed Statistics with me.
But I look at statistics like algebra. In 2000 there were,
I believe it was 64 percent of women completing Algebra II, and
the figure for men is in the high fifties, and I may be off a
little there, but it is actually more women than men completing
that, the gateway to higher math. These, taken in the
aggregate, I still see as outweighing, again, that being the
sole statistic I have seen, and I would still see it as one,
depending upon the timeframe, that represents progress since
the passage of Title IX.
Senator Wyden. Dr. Brown.
Dr. Brown. If I could say something about computer science,
because I think it is very good that this example came out, and
I think it sheds light on some of the issues that we are
talking about here today.
Computer science initially did attract the interest of
numbers of girls, as this was a new field, very exciting new
field, with the technology and development of computers, and
something that interested girls and boys alike, so early on
educational programs saw a good percentage of girls.
I believe what happened then, when you see the attrition of
women from this field in larger numbers than men so that the
percentage is lower, and this is a well-known fact that you can
gather more statistics on, you see that there really is
something wrong with the environment.
I mean, here is a situation where girls are attracted, they
enter the programs, and programs that have addressed improving
their educational methods in a way that engages male and female
students better and creates a better environment for girls do
see less attrition of girls out of those programs, so it is a
very good example. These are very real statistics, and it shows
fundamentally the problem with the environment in those fields.
Ms. Greenberger. I wonder if I could just pick up one quick
point, too, because as an official with the Office of Civil
Rights, the whole point is to determine if there is
discrimination going on. That is the job of the Office for
Civil Rights, and when the statistics are as skewed as they
are, let alone when we are actually looking and seeing some
decreases in areas, but when we are still talking about 17
percent we can argue about 1 percent to 17 percent, is the
glass three-quarters empty or not, or a quarter full, to round
up a bit, but that still means that the Office for Civil Rights
should be trying to figure out whether there are problems of
discrimination, and not just looking at statistics and assuming
because there has been some progress the news is good.
That is why it is so important to be doing compliance
reviews. That is the job of the Office for Civil Rights, and
that kind of discrimination means sexual harassment, and by
sexual harassment we also mean the kind of harassment--this is
what the Title IX law says--that girls do not belong in this
class, girls are not as good in this class. Those kinds of
statements are actual violations of Title IX. Biased counseling
is a violation of Title IX.
That is the job of the Office for Civil Rights to answer
the very question that was posed. When an official says, I do
not know if there is discrimination or not, that is the job of
this very official to find out.
Mr. Jones. Senator Wyden, would you like me to respond to
that?
Senator Wyden. Sure. At some point I will ask some
questions, rather than everyone asking each other questions.
No, feel free.
Mr. Jones. Senator, there are thousands of Federal funds
recipients in this country. There are hundreds of thousands of
students. I am not going to tell you today that sexual
harassment does not go on, that there is not discrimination.
Our office received, 6,000, over 6,000 complaints a year on all
six of the statutes we enforce. We take action in many, many of
those. I can tell you that is discrimination. I would not be in
the position I am if I was not interested in enforcing those
laws, but as to the issue of compliance reviews, that is
something distinct, and the question is, how should the office
go about it?
Telling are the cases we talked about. Under the Clinton
administration in 1994, 15 compliance reviews were launched.
The majority of those, there was a finding of no discrimination
on the basis of sex in those math and science programs, the
majority of them.
Now, I cannot comment on the following 6 years of the
previous administration, and up until April of this year the
Senate was conducting its advice and consent function for my
boss, Assistant Secretary Reynolds, and since he came in in
April--his team was completed in July--we started with the
fiscal year practice of identifying where we are going to
allocate resources for compliance reviews.
That process is occurring as we speak, and our career
officials from each of the 12 offices are recommending where
they believe in their regions compliance reviews are important.
We are going to be pulling that together over the coming
months, which is the very standard practice of the Office for
Civil Rights.
Senator Bayh. Mr. Chairman, let me make just a couple of
observations, and I consider the Office of Civil Rights an ally
to rooting out this discrimination, but I think I would urge
you to, as we talk about, two or three of us, the goal of young
women, that girls set for themselves, all the offices in our
administrative bureaucracies, I would think that the Office of
Civil Rights would be establishing high goals.
Now, it sounds pretty good to say the majority found no
discrimination. I do not think you ought to rest on that. I
would be very stern on those that found discrimination, and I
am one who believes in persuasion rather than coercion, that
honey gets more support than vinegar, but some people are not
going to pay any attention unless there is a consequence.
That is what happened in athletics. You got results when
people knew they were going to lose Federal funding, and I
think as much as I hate to say that, I think that is what
really needs to be addressed, and the people out in the school
rooms, the universities, the deans' offices, the presidents'
offices, the provosts' offices, they need to understand if they
do not get their own house in order--they are the ones that can
do it. You cannot do it for them, but you can sure tell whether
it is done or not. Excuse me if I get a little excited here.
Ms. Greenberger. Senator Wyden, I know you want to ask a
question, but I know we have talked about the majority of
findings of no discrimination. Actually, the way the letters of
findings work as a routine matter with the Office for Civil
Rights, is that after an investigation, if a school agrees to
enter into corrective action and has voluntarily changed
practices, the resulting letter after a compliance review will
find no discrimination, because of those voluntary agreements.
So actually the fact that there was a finding of no
discrimination does not mean even for those particular schools
that there have not actually been Title IX problems that were
surfaced during the investigation.
Mr. Jones. I would say in a majority of those cases no
action on the basis of Title IX was required, or included, or
directed for those institutions. They had to do nothing related
to Title IX. Now, these were reviews more comprehensive. There
were title VI issues in some of these cases, but the majority
of them had those institutions taking no action on the basis of
any Title IX issue.
Senator Wyden. Well, we are going to crunch the numbers a
little more here in the hearing, but here is what it comes down
to. Mr. Jones, when the number of women participating in sports
has increased more than 800 percent, I do not think it is good
enough to say that we cannot do better than 17 percent in the
engineering area, and the 27 or 28 percent that reflects an
actual drop off in the number of women in computer sciences,
and that is what I find so troubling, and let me go to some
questions about how this process actually goes forward at your
office.
My understanding from your answer with respect to
compliance reviews is that it has been your watch here since
January of 2001, but as of now there has not been a compliance
review in the math or science area as of today, is that
correct? You said you are talking about allocating dollars for
your priorities. I would just like to know, on your watch, as
of now, since President Bush took office in January of 2001,
whether there have been any compliance reviews in math and
science.
Mr. Jones. I can say both since January of 2001 and since
April of 2002, when my boss, Gerry Reynolds, was appointed by
the President to the position to lead this office, there have
been no compliance reviews commenced under Title IX.
It would be my view, and I believe it is the Secretary's
view, that while there is a candidate for the position
nominated before the Senate it would be inappropriate to
foreclose the leadership opportunities of that Assistant
Secretary by determining compliance reviews that requires
multiple years of work and starting them during a period.
Compliance reviews can take 1, 2, 3, 4 years, and to begin a
course of work of that length when the expectation is there
will soon be an Assistant Secretary would be to diminish the
leadership role of that Assistant Secretary.
Senator Wyden. Well, no quarrel about the fact that
appointees ought to be able to drive their own priorities, but
at the same time, shutting down an operation, which is almost a
conclusion you come to if there are no compliance actions at
all, is a different story.
Tell me, if you would Mr. Jones, there are very focused
criteria to judge compliance with respect to Title IX in
athletics. What criteria are used now to judge Title IX
compliance when it comes to academics?
Mr. Jones. Academics actually have the same criteria for
compliance, broadly speaking, as all other areas of
implementation of Title IX, with two exceptions, I would say,
athletics and vocational education.
What is notable about both of those areas is the extensive
legislative history, and in the case of vocational education
the actual specific statute that was enacted in the late
seventies relating to vocational education that require
additional detail, in other words, academics, whether it be
employment, whether it be scholarships, whether it be
admissions are all governed by the same standard, the standard
driven by those words on the blue chart to your left.
Senator Wyden. Let me talk to you about the situation in my
home State of Oregon, because I think it sort of reflects again
why it is hard to see what you call an exercise in delivering
good news. A report just came out--it was done by the Oregon
university system--saying, of course, far fewer women than men
are involved in the field. It said 20 percent of the students
surveyed, these are the students heading for college in Oregon,
said that they would major in science and technology, and they
said only 14 percent of those students were women, and I want
to read you a couple of comments by those who are involved in
this work and get your reaction as to whether or not you think
these are valid concerns.
I will just quote here. It is from an Associated Press
article, August 1, 2002, and Mr. Recorder, if we might, let us
put that into the record at this point.
[The information referred to follows:]
The Associated Press, August 1, 2002
New Study says more Oregon students plan to major in sciences
By Julia Silverman
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP)--Increasing numbers of Oregon students plan to
study the sciences in college, a new report from the Oregon University
System says.
But far fewer women than men are interested in the field, according
to the report, which surveyed 800 Oregon College-bound students.
Overall, 20 percent of the students surveyed said they might major
in science and technology.
But only 14 percent of those students are women. The numbers remain
low despite decades of outreach programs aimed at recruiting more women
into the sciences.
Jan Cuny, a professor of computer and information sciences at the
University of Oregon, said there are a range of reasons woman have not
historically been drawn to her field.
``Exposure that kids have to computers is usually through games,''
said Cuny. ``And there are not that many games that appeal to girls.
Girls may take a little computer science in high school, but guys play
games, start thinking that graphics are cool, and start programming. By
the time they get to college, they often have much more experience.''
There's also a lack of female role models in science fields, and a
lingering stereotype around computer science students, Cuny said.
``The stereotype is the nerd who sits in a cubicle who works 24 a
day,'' she said.
Kenneth Krane, a professor of physics at Oregon State University,
said he thought the numbers were surprising, especially after teaching
a 500-person Introduction to Physics class that he remembered as evenly
split between the genders.
``The percentage of (science) bachelor's degrees given to women has
been growing steadily over the past 20 years,'' he said.
The survey also showed that:
Seventy-three percent of students planning to major in engineering
or related fields will attend either an in-state community college or
four-year Oregon university. Of the students not interested in science
or technology majors, 66 percent plan to attend an Oregon school.
Of students interested in science fields and planning to go to a
four-year in-state school, 56 percent chose OSU, 15 percent picked
Oregon Institute of Technology, 12 percent enrolled at Portland State
University, 17 percent chose other four-year schools, and seven percent
picked a private school in Oregon.
Senator Wyden. In this article it quotes Jan Cuny,
professor at the University of Oregon, saying there are a range
of reasons women have not historically been drawn to our field.
It quotes Professor Cuny, Mr. Jones, as saying exposure that
kids have to computers is usually through games. There are not
that many games that appeal to girls. Girls may take a little
computer science in high school, but guys play games starting
to think the graphics are cool and start programming. By the
time they get to college, they often have much more experience.
The professor also says there are a lack of female role
models in the science fields and a lingering stereotype around
computer science. The stereotype, the professor says, is the
nerd who sits at a computer in a cubicle who works 24 hours a
day.
Do you think these are problems?
Mr. Jones. Do I think it is a problem that men are
perceived as the only ones who should enter computer science,
and that women are discouraged from entering it? I could
certainly see that as a sociological problem if that is what is
occurring.
Senator Wyden. Do you dispute that it is occurring? That is
what I am trying to find out. I am not talking about a legal
case. I just read you some very damning statistics from a
current analysis done by the University of Oregon, then I read
you from a professor of computer sciences, not somebody with a
political ax to grind, who said why, and then you said those
would be problems if they were occurring. Do you dispute that
these problems are occurring?
Mr. Jones. Senator, I am just unwilling to generalize from
the specific to the general based upon one particular area. I
am also not willing to generalize that personal selection, that
personal desires about what opportunities one wants to
undertake are also a relevant issue.
The majority of people who run donut shops in California
happen to be Cambodians, half of the dry cleaners in Los
Angeles are Korean, the majority of the people who run tugboats
in the New York harbors are of Scandinavian origin, but does
this constitute a form of discrimination, or is it a form of
self-selection? It is possibly both, but I do not have the
information to say.
By the same token, the fact that 1 percent of women were in
1971 graduating from computer science programs clearly probably
indicated there was some level of discrimination going on
around this country. To what extent does 17 percent today
constitute that, I cannot say, and it is that balance and blend
upon which I have to have more information to make a
generalized conclusion.
Senator Wyden. I guess I find your analogy with donut shops
a little troubling. They are not under Title IX criteria. There
are Federal laws that say people have equal opportunity to
enter those fields, and the question is whether the
administration thinks that is what Title IX is all about when
it applies to math and science, and that is what we are going
to ascertain in the days ahead, I can assure you of that.
Let me just move on to one last point, if I might. Mr.
Jones, Ms. Greenberger said that she was concerned that sexual
harassment guidelines are under review in your office, and
obviously this goes right to the heart of the environment that
Dr. Brown is talking about that encourages people to have an
opportunity for these disciplines. Is that correct? Are these
sexual harassment guidelines under review in your office, and
if so, what areas are you reviewing, and what are the issues
under consideration?
Mr. Jones. I am glad you asked me that question, Senator,
because that has been a question that is raised to us in public
forums regularly. Let me set the record straight. Those
documents are not currently under review. By the same token,
the documents are no longer the state-of-the-art, just as in
the same way a computer from 1998 is no longer something that
most folks would accept, or the absence of their Blackberry.
Those sexual harassment guidances have, in fact, become
dated not the least of which because the law has changed. Not
only has No Child Left Behind been passed, but an important
Supreme Court decision has come down the pipe, and after
reviewing the sexual harassment guidance it was the view of the
Assistant Secretary that it would be important to look at where
we should allocate resources to revise various documents that
have become out of date.
The document itself is still available online, but in the
same way that athletics guidance from the early eighties is no
longer relevant because of Brown and its progeny of athletics
Title IX decisions, that guidance we have viewed as no longer
the state-of-the-art, and while it is still available, it is
not something that is widely pushed for distribution.
Senator Wyden. Well, it still looks to me from your answer
that the issue of sexual harassment is being reviewed as we
speak by the administration.
Mr. Jones. No, absolutely not, Senator----
Senator Wyden. Then correct me if I am wrong, you just said
that the state-of-the-art had changed and you mentioned several
statutes. That suggests to me that you are now looking at
sexual harassment again because, to use your words, the state-
of-the-art has changed. Are you or are you not looking at
sexual harassment changes?
Mr. Jones. No, we are not looking at changes to the law. We
are not looking to change the booklet that was published a few
years ago in part because that booklet has become outdated, and
we are continuing to enforce civil rights complaints related to
sexual harassment. I can say that first hand. I have reviewed
the complaints, and I have reviewed the cases where we are
working on that.
Senator Wyden. So what needs to be reviewed as a result of
the changes in these laws? Maybe that would be helpful. You
have said that the laws have changed and, as a result, the
administration is going to look at it again, but you are also
saying that you are bringing these actions, so why don't we
just get a sense from you what is it at this point that you
think needs to be done, given these new laws that are on the
books?
Mr. Jones. Well, right now, and again this is part of the
planning process we have been engaged in for the last 2 months
since the Assistant Secretary's team was completed, we are
looking at all of the publications we put out. We have
approximately 35 staff here in Washington to develop our
publications. We just put out a publication on disability
access for students in higher education, and we are reviewing
where does the public need guidance, do we need guidance on
retaliation? Do we need guidance on racial discrimination in
high schools? Do we need guidance on age discrimination? All of
these are statutes we enforce. We are looking at where should
we be putting out new books, new pamphlets.
If, after that process, we decide sexual harassment is
where we need a new pamphlet, that is where we will put our
effort and publish one. If we decide what we need is how to
understand 504 rights in high school related to transition
services, that is where we will put out a publication, and that
is under review right now.
Senator Wyden. So in your view, with respect to sexual
harassment rules, the administration is talking about updating
its pamphlets?
Mr. Jones. We have looked at that among others. We have
looked at that among other topics of issuing new pamphlets, but
right now there is a sexual harassment pamphlet, and we are not
in the process of changing that pamphlet or writing a new one
because we have not decided where to focus our priorities.
Senator Wyden. What else is the administration and your
office doing on the sexual harassment issue, other than redoing
the pamphlets?
Mr. Jones. We are continuing to enforce sexual harassment
complaints as they come in the door, and we are doing so in an
aggressive manner.
Senator Wyden. And nothing else is being changed?
Mr. Jones. No.
Senator Wyden. All right. Let us move on to some of our
other panel members, and Coach Murphy, you sort of have been
left out of this, and we are going to bring you back in.
Ms. Murphy. Ask away.
Senator Wyden. I would ask first if you think progress in
sports would have been made if there had not been real Title IX
enforcement?
Ms. Murphy. Absolutely not, and I think that it goes to
show that in 1995 that is when women's sports really started to
take off, after the Brown lawsuit, and I have been at Brown
since 1987, so I have experienced it in so many ways, and I can
feel the pain of the scientists, because just imagine being on
an all-boys team and having them being able to actually take
shots at you and check, and so it is a little different in the
physical environment.
But I do not think if Title IX legislation or challenges to
the Title IX legal aspect--there is no way, there is just no
way without Title IX we would even be close to where we are
today, and I will tell you right now, from what I still
experience, it is way still existing, and that is why I kind of
said to him, you have got to keep enforcing it, because the
only thing right now that schools pay attention to is when the
NCAA comes in and they do an audit you know where you are on
Title IX. That is when the schools--I know Brown does, because
Brown is like, oh my God, we have got to make sure that we are
in compliance, but other schools really take notice when that
happens, so absolutely not.
Senator Wyden. So you see the barriers that Dr. Brown and
Dr. Richmond have described, and it sounds like we passed this
way before.
Ms. Murphy. Oh, God, yes, and I am not sure of the actual
stats, because I am a coach, I am not a statistician, but I
think it is only 35 percent are still in compliance with Title
IX of most athletic institutions, and that is a shame. To start
Title IX in 1972 and to not have anything happen of substance
until 1995 is real shameful, and so I feel the pain of the
engineers and the scientists, and I can only hope that when my
7-year-old girl grows up, that they are going to be one of
these guys, because I would encourage them to do that.
Senator Wyden. Dr. Brown and Dr. Richmond, we have received
a letter from about 30 distinguished professors around the
country talking about how serious these problems are with
respect to the under-representation of women in science and
engineering and technology. In fact, they actually use a higher
number of women in engineering than we have been discussing
today, and they are still extremely alarmed. Is this something
of growing concern to professors on campus, women in
particular? Dr. Brown? Dr. Richmond?
Dr. Brown. Yes, absolutely, and I think that there has been
sort of a gradual grassroots and then growing public
recognition through these reports like the MIT report that the
problems that one believed to be possibly only close to home,
or in your own environment, or issues that were hard to talk
about, are, in fact, common problems that can be addressed, and
so I think there is a recognition on campuses and that on a
positive note, from many leaders, that improving diversity is
good for everyone. That improves the research outcomes and the
education as well, and so absolutely.
Senator Wyden. Dr. Richmond.
Dr. Richmond. It is a very serious concern. It is hard for
me to even articulate all the different stories that come in
from women faculty, and particularly when it is your students
that have gone on and faced discrimination in their jobs after
they have left your institution it is particularly hard to
listen to.
COACh conducts workshops, at national professional meetings
to help women develop strategies to cope with the difficulties
that they face in their departments. Listening to their stories
before, and later their stories after our coaching, you just
are amazed that such little things that we can teach them can
have such a huge difference in their lives. They go on to
spread the word to their colleagues.
But I think what is really important to understand in this
hearing is again the fact that the scientific enterprise is
terribly important in this country. We must make certain that
women are participants in that scientific enterprise. Whatever
solution or ideas we have that will give women the opportunity
to be equal players in this field will enable them to do the
excellent science that this country needs.
That is what women scientists in this country want. We want
a level playing field. We do not want to be given special
circumstances. We do not want to have any standards changed. We
want to be able to have the opportunity to do our best science
for ourselves, our children, and our country.
Senator Wyden. Ms. Greenberger, what kind of facts are
needed to bring a Title IX case in this area?
Ms. Greenberger. Well, let me just say one thing about
bringing a Title IX case first, because there was some
discussion about lawsuits. There have actually been very few,
relatively speaking, Title IX cases in any area, including
athletics, over the last 30 years, although those that have
been brought have gotten often a lot of publicity, and people
have paid attention to them.
And it is because it take so many resources, often by the
time a case is resolved the student has moved on. Nobody wants
to take on the school. It is an expensive thing to do, and that
is where Government enforcement is so important, where doing
those compliance reviews is so essential, and that is why I
think it is so important that you are focusing on Government
enforcement rather than the case per se.
But what it takes to show a violation of Title IX, whether
it is in the form of a lawsuit or the Government, showing that
there is a violation of Title IX obviously depends upon the
facts and circumstances, but if there is, for example, biased
counseling, where the school is steering young women out of
areas of math and science or computers, that is a violation of
Title IX.
If, in particular classes, these are for the computer geek
nerds, guys, and the message to the students that goes out is
that the guys go to these programs and classes, that is a
violation of Title IX.
If faculty mentor male students and not female students,
and that is allowed to continue, that is a violation of Title
IX.
If research dollars in the universities are being steered,
as I think the MIT study documented, to help male faculty and
not female faculty, that is a violation of Title IX.
If women faculty end up with smaller offices, fewer
research assistants, lower pay, less benefits, again documented
in the study, that is a violation of Title IX.
If there is a sense of where the Committee assignments and
faculties go, and what are the better and worse Committee
assignments for advancing a career, and those preferable
Committee assignments go to male faculty over female faculty,
or in the hiring process, there are people on the recruiting or
the hiring decision chain who say, women do not belong here
because they have got their conflicts with family and they do
not have time in order to put in everything that is necessary,
that is a violation of Title IX.
Senator Wyden. Let us do this. There is an important
procedural vote on the Iraq resolution on the floor now. Do all
of you have the time to stay? I think I would probably be gone
about 15 minutes, and if you do, let us take a break for 15
minutes and then we will come back.
Ms. Murphy. I am supposed to catch a plane at 6:05.
Senator Wyden. Let us figure out how to get you out the
door. Can the rest of you stay another 15 minutes? Then we will
stand in recess for 15 minutes.
[Recess.]
Senator Wyden. Let us come back to order. Thank you all for
your patience, and we will just have a couple of additional
questions.
Senator Bayh, are you satisfied with the progress the law
has made in the science and engineering area? You were trying
to solve these problems three decades ago, and made the point
then that the intent and legislative history was to focus on
academics. We are all pleased about the tremendous progress in
sports, but you have correctly said that the focus was
academics. Are you satisfied with the law's progress?
Senator Bayh. No, and I say that not to blame someone, but
to point out reality, and I think having said that I think it
is important for us to accept your criticisms and the
observations of at least other Members of the panel. I am sure
that Mr. Jones will take the message back.
I am so heartened by what we have done in athletics. I am
not totally satisfied there, but I think if we apply that same
degree of enforcement, and you cannot enforce unless you do
enough reviews to find out if anything is wrong, perhaps more
attention and resources could go into that.
Change never comes easily, never has. We had to fight a
bloody civil war to get rid of slavery, and then it was 100
years later before we passed the 1964 Civil Rights Act, and
still we have not been totally successful in wiping out
discrimination--in fact, we have fallen short of the mark of
providing equal opportunity for our minority citizens.
We made great progress in athletics, but we stepped on some
toes in the process, but that is the price of progress. I would
hope that this commission that is studying Title IX problem
would be given free rein to really study it and come up with a
true assessment of what the members feel individually, or a
minority and majority.
I am going strictly on hearsay, but as a person who has had
a little something to do with this act originally, I think we
ought to be charging out there full bore to try to do even
better because we know how.
I think we have some very credible individuals on that
commission, but if I understand correctly, they have received
instructions from the Secretary as to what kind of report they
should come up with--that they were told they should not reach
a conclusion, that they should just consider the pluses and the
minuses of the various points, and that it had to be a
unanimous report.
Now, if I am wrong, I would be very glad. I hope I am, but
if that is true, I think it is keeping that commission from
doing its job. Forgive me, I guess that is not exactly the
question you asked.
Senator Wyden. It makes a pretty important point. It makes
an important point.
Senator Bayh. If I am wrong, I am hoping Mr. Jones will
tell me.
Senator Wyden. Mr. Jones has chimed in throughout the
afternoon. He is welcome to chime in again.
Mr. Jones. Senator, I have not been participating in the
Title IX commission activities, but I can speak to the issue of
direction of the commission and the issue of consensus. I do
know that there is no direction to the outcome of the
commission, the kinds of findings and the kinds of conclusions
or recommendations to be made.
I do know that they are a fact-finding and recommendations
commission. I can say the Secretary, prefers consensus, and I
can reflect back to my work with the Special Education
Commission. Up until the summer I was executive director, and
the President wanted to see a consensus, because when you can
get to consensus there is greater power in the voice, and I do
know the Secretary is interested in seeing consensus around the
work of his Commission on Title IX Athletics.
Senator Bayh. We operated in this body, as I recall, and I
think you still try to, to the best of your ability to operate
by consensus, so consensus is not new to me. But if, indeed,
instructions have been given to members of the commission as to
how they reach that consensus and what they consider and what
they should not consider, then that worries me.
Senator Wyden. I think you summed it up, Senator Bayh. I
sort of majored in consensus. Senator Allen and I tried to be
bipartisan before it was cool. That is why I listed some of the
long list of measures we have worked on together for this year
and a half, but you have got to fight injustice. That is the
point of the Title IX statute, and I will tell you, Mr. Jones,
I leave very troubled about the administration's approach on
this. I want to be very specific about it.
It seems to me the office was basically shut down for a
year and a half while everybody was waiting for somebody to
come on in. You told us what is going on today as you were
talking about allocating resources for various kinds of
functions, and it looks to me like problems such as this
question of the computer science graduates has gotten worse.
And it does not seem to me that any of this is going to get
investigated aggressively by your office.
I hope I am wrong, and time will tell, but I regard this as
a very critical aspect of this Subcommittee's work, and we have
worked very closely with a whole host of administration offices
in the science and technology area, John Marburger, Sean
O'Keefe, a whole host of officials that worked very
cooperatively with us. Senator Allen has met me more than
halfway on these issues, but I am not going to look the other
way if there is stonewalling on this question of investigating
and following up the evidence. The environment that Dr. Brown
was talking about, and looking at the numbers that we have
heard about today, it looks to me like a very serious set of
problems that Title IX is designed to address.
So I think it is only fair that I give you an opportunity
to have the last word on this, but I leave very concerned about
how the administration is approaching this on the basis of what
I have heard today.
Ms. Greenberger. Senator Wyden, I know you wanted to give
Mr. Jones the last word, and I just wanted to insert something
because I respect that, the importance of that.
You had asked a series of questions about the status of the
sexual harassment policies, and since that was something that I
brought up, I did not quite follow some of Mr. Jones' answers
to your questions, and in particular, I understand his talking
about pamphlets being updated, but a pamphlet is, of course,
different than guidance and policy. And my understanding about
the testimony of Mr. Reynolds during his confirmation hearings
was specifically directed to the guidance and policy, not
pamphlets, where he said that it was something that he would
not commit would not be subject to review, and given the fact
that it was put on the table, there obviously had been the
kinds of concerns that were discussed.
But when Mr. Jones talked about these policies or
pamphlets, I am not sure which, not being state-of-the-art, the
sexual harassment guidance was issued in January 2001, so we
are not talking about policies or guidance from the Seventies
or the Eighties, we are talking about guidance and policies
based on the most recent Supreme Court decisions issued in
January 2001. I simply wanted to insert that, because state-of-
the-art, that is pretty recent state-of-the-art policy
guidance, and it is not the issue of pamphlets that I think is
the subject of concern.
Senator Wyden. Mr. Jones, you have been patient in terms of
sticking around here for over 2 hours, so let us let you have
the last word, and this will give you an opportunity to comment
on the matter of the sexual harassment issue and the comments I
just finished with respect to the administration's overall
approach, and please proceed.
Mr. Jones. You have been very kind, Mr. Chairman, to allow
me this opportunity at the end of the hearing.
Let me first get to the issue of whether the administration
shut down OCR during the first months of this administration. I
was appointed in June of 2001 as Deputy Assistant for that
period, and I can say absolutely, unequivocally, that the
administration continued to aggressively enforce civil rights
laws and continued to conduct compliance reviews that were
begun in the years before I arrived.
I had the honor of signing the last higher education system
desegregation plan under the Fordice decision with the State of
Virginia, which has been widely lauded, as well as overseeing
the resolution of the Maryland universities complaint. We still
have ongoing resource allocation compliance reviews that were
started during the late Nineties that we are continuing.
Senator Wyden. The point that was made, though, and let us
clarify it, the point was that there were no compliance reviews
with respect to science and math, those two areas, essentially
for a year and a half, initiated by the administration. Is that
correct or not?
Mr. Jones. That is correct, Senator. I will absolutely
agree with that, but I wanted to assure you that the 6,000-plus
complaints a year, we actually increased our timeliness on
returns on those, and we did well with the compliance reviews
underway.
Regarding the sexual harassment guidance and pamphlet, and
I am sorry if I miscommunicationed, but there are three items
involved here. There is the 1997 guidance, there is a 1998
pamphlet, or 1999 pamphlet, and a 2001, quote, ``guidance,''
close quote.
The problem with the 2001 guidance is a matter of our
obligations under administrative procedures. Any policy adopted
by our office has to be out for public comment for 90 days. It
was published on January 19, 2001, but had not been out for 90
days, and my career lawyers in my office and the career lawyers
in the Office of the General Counsel said we simply cannot
enforce under that policy the new interpretation in the 2001
guidance.
It very closely aligns with 1997. We still continue to
enforce that guidance, and we enforce sexual harassment under
the new Supreme Court decision, but it is the guidance itself
that did not meet the requirements of law. It is like abiding
by a treaty that does not have Senate consent. It has not
reached the status of law.
This administration is continuing to look at that. It is
one of the things that we are considering as areas in need of
guidance, in addition to things like retaliation, in addition
to disabilities, which are half of our complaints. And with the
resource comparability. There are many areas we are weighing,
and shortly we are going to have a plan of what we are
instituting, new policy guidance in those areas, so sexual
harassment is on the table.
I will also say our office has continued to provide regular
technical assistance in the area of sexual harassment. In fact,
and you can ask the Ranking Member, we have actually in the
last year forged an innovative sexual harassment standard
policy in collaboration with the Virginia School Boards
Association, which can be used in any school district in
Virginia, and the School Boards Association is encouraging its
use. We are offering other States this as a model for their
activities, so we are out there on the technical assistance
front as well.
And lastly, as to whether these are serious issues. I want
to agree with you, Senator, that we take enforcement very
seriously. When we see these kinds of things pointed out to our
office, we take them seriously. Ms. Greenberger's organization,
in fact, filed with our 12 offices requests for compliance
reviews. Those are nearing, the 2 months that we have been
looking at them, a response to which will be going to her
organization shortly. But I can say we take these kind of
things very seriously and, given this disparity in computer
science graduates and the progress followed by decline, if that
turns out to be the case, I am going to take that back to
Assistant Secretary Reynolds and review it.
Senator Wyden. Well, thank you all very much for your
patience. This is not the last time we are going to discuss
this in the Subcommittee, and we are adjourned.
Thank you.
[Whereupon, at 5:10 p.m., the Subcommittee adjourned.]
A P P E N D I X
Prepared Statement of the American Association of Engineering Societies
The American Association of Engineering Societies (AAES), and its
member societies want to thank the Committee for holding this important
hearing on Title IX and the Sciences, and for allowing the following
testimony to be submitted for the record. AAES applauds this committee
for its work to increase the presence and retention of women and
minorities in science and engineering professions, and would like to
offer our services to this Committee to achieve that goal.
AAES is a multidisciplinary organization dedicated to advancing the
knowledge, understanding, and practice of engineering in the public
interest. Our members represent U.S. engineering-with over one million
engineers in industry, government and education. Through its councils,
commissions, committees, and task forces, AAES addresses questions
relating to the U.S. engineering profession.
One of the primary goals of AAES is to improve diversity in the
U.S. engineering profession. In order for the U.S. to remain
technologically competitive, the engineering profession must better
engage the knowledge and talents of our diverse population.
Accordingly, it is imperative that all individuals--without prejudice--
are provided with equality of opportunity to pursue and advance in
engineering careers.
AAES strongly supports increasing the strength of the engineering
workforce by enhancing diversity. By bringing more women and
underrepresented minorities into the profession, engineering in the
United States will be better able to solve the problems of the future
and compete in the global marketplace. Promoting greater diversity in
the profession requires a consistent, long-term effort focused on the
education, recruitment, retention, and advancement of all groups, and
particularly those who historically have been underrepresented. Such an
approach will require the combined participation of businesses,
government, professional societies, and the education community.
As the demographics of the United States continue to change, it is
very apparent that the numbers of women and minorities in engineering
at all levels, is not changing with the population. No where is this
more apparent than in the data from the 2000 Census which shows
underrepresented minorities now comprise over 25 percent of the U.S.
population. This proportion is projected to continue upward, primarily
because of the growth of the Hispanic population. From over one forth
of the total population, underrepresented minorities comprise nearly 16
percent of undergraduates in engineering and 12 percent of the
baccalaureates awarded in engineering in 2000, about half of their
representation in the total population. Additionally, in engineering,
women earned 9.7 percent of the bachelor's degrees in engineering in
1980 and only broke the 20 percent barrier in the year 2000. There are
some disturbing indications in the undergraduate enrollments of women
in 2000--their proportion of the total enrollment has declined.
In an effort to change existing trends, AAES works with other key
stakeholders to advocate for strengthened math and science education at
the kindergarten through 12th grade level; works to increase public
awareness of the engineering profession; and provides information on
the supply and demand for engineers.
To ensure a technologically literate society and a high-quality
workforce, including top-quality engineers, the nation must ensure the
best possible education and training (including continuing education)
for people at all levels.
AAES supports public and private programs that improve the science
and mathematics achievement of the nation's pre-college students and
motivates them--with special attention to women and minorities--to
pursue engineering and scientific careers. Challenging young children
with high quality math and science education will excite them about
learning and provide the opportunity to pursue high-wage engineering,
science and technical careers.
To ensure a high-quality workforce, there must be appropriate
public policies and sufficient funding to continue to improve
undergraduate engineering education programs, to ensure access to
engineering education for all segments of the population, and to
increase the attractiveness of engineering graduate study and faculty
careers for U.S. students.
AAES encourages the interaction of engineering colleges, industry
and federal agencies, including the National Science Foundation and
national laboratories, to improve engineering education and to increase
the participation of women and minorities, and is committed to policies
that treat continuing education as an investment, not a fringe benefit.
For example, the NSF has been proactive in its goal to support more
women scientists and engineers through specific programs. One such
program, ADVANCE, supports not only individual women, but activities
that lead to institutional change.
In an effort to raise the public's awareness of the engineering
profession and the specific roles that women and minorities play in it,
AAES, along with support from the United Engineering Foundation and
NASA, has established the Voices of Innovation (VOI) Radio Program.
Each weekday, VOI provides its listeners with a two-minute sound
portrait of engineering, providing a window into the lives of people
who transform imagination and ingenuity into technological wonders.
This daily program keys into the passion, excitement, and genius that
inspires the men and women who make technological miracles a part of
our everyday experience. VOI broadcasts began in September of this year
and are currently heard on more than 40 public and commercial radio
stations around the nation as well as Voice of America and the Armed
Forces Radio Network. The initial response to VOI has been encouraging
and AAES is enthusiastic about its future.
In order to fully identify and track the issues relating to
diversity, AAES works with its Engineering Workforce Commission (EWC)
to collect, store, and disseminate, timely and accurate information
pertaining to students enrolled in and graduating from accredited
engineering programs at colleges and universities nationwide. Data on
the participation of women and minorities are tracked and reported in
detail to assist policy makers in understanding the trends. The EWC
annually surveys the U.S. engineering industry, and produces objective
salary information on engineering professionals and educators.
Additionally, the EWC produces analysis on the data collected.
Providing information on the state of the engineering profession, the
EWC's annual surveys are the most timely, thorough, and accurate data
available.
As the Committee tackles the issue of diversity in the sciences, we
respectfully ask that the following options be considered.
1. Establishment of public-private partnerships to ensure
equality of opportunity and diversity in the sciences at all
levels. The partnerships would involve government, industry,
relevant associations and individuals who have the common goal
of creating a more diverse workforce. The BEST (Building
Engineering and Science Talent) Initiative is a prime example
of this type of partnership.
2. Allow federal funding to support single-sex charter schools
or single-sex math and science classes. Studies and present day
experience have shown that school-aged males and females learn
differently, and a single-sex educational environment,
particularly in the areas of science and mathematics, has
proven to be invaluable to young females. Although their mere
existence has been hotly contested, all female charter schools
can be found in New York and Illinois and have proven quite
successful.
3. Increased funding of the Math and Science Partnerships
Initiative. The Partnerships bring local school districts,
university departments of math and science, engineering schools
and other interested parties together. The focus of the
Partnerships is on both the teachers and students, and due to
that, students from a young age are encouraged to pursue their
interests in science and mathematics.
4. Increased institutional graduate support for women at
colleges and universities. Successful recruitment and retention
of women at the graduate level helps to create the new faculty
that we need to attract more women at the undergraduate level
to science and engineering. Additionally, college and
university leaders must be accountable for the work environment
they lead. They must be held accountable under Title IX's
provision of continuous improvement of the environment for
women, and there are many approaches for doing that for both
students and faculty members. For faculty, these include better
work-family policies, including tenure clock extensions. For
students, these include supporting mentoring opportunities,
such as Women in Engineering programs.
In conclusion, AAES would like to thank the Committee for holding
this very important hearing on Title IX and the Sciences. Title IX
states that, ``No person in the United States shall, on the basis of
sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or
be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity
receiving Federal financial assistance (20 U.S.C. 38, Section 1681).''
As a federation of engineering societies, representing over one million
individual engineers, AAES completely supports the intent and goals of
Title IX, and we look forward to working very closely with the
Committee during its deliberations on this issue.
______
Prepared Statement of WEPAN--Women in Engineering Program and Advocates
Network
Statement of Organization and Mission
WEPAN is a not-for-profit, 501(c)(3) organization founded in 1990.
WEPAN is dedicated to catalyzing change to enhance the success of women
of all ethnicities in the engineering profession.
Statement of Position
Demographic trends indicate that by the year 2005, women will
represent 62 percent of new entrants into the United States' labor
force and under represented minorities will represent 51 percent (Judy
and D'Amico, 1997). In addition, employment opportunities for SMET jobs
during 1998-2008 are expected to increase by about 51 percent or about
1.9 million jobs. It is WEPAN's position that policies must recognize
these demographic shifts and must address systemic changes to meet the
national need for engineers. Without addressing the lack of women
studying engineering and the under representation of women in the
engineering workforce, the gap between the national need and the supply
of engineers will not change. In essence, we put the nation as risk.
A principal effect of these population changes based upon recent
trends and projections for coming decades, is that engineering's
traditional talent pool of Caucasian men is rapidly becoming
insufficient to meet future demands in both industry and academia. It
is therefore imperative that greater emphasis be placed upon preparing
the women and minorities who will be a majority of the available
workforce to enter these fields--and whose representation within
engineering has grown steadily, if slowly, in recent decades.
Women remain severely under represented at all levels in the U.S.:
representing 9 percent of the engineering workforce; 20.5 percent
baccalaureate degree recipients, 22 percent master's degree recipients,
and 14.7 percent of doctoral degree recipients. (Engineering Workforce
Commission of the American Association of Engineering Societies, Inc.,
2001)
The response by policy-makers must, therefore, be viewed as a
national priority. Policies must go beyond simple encouragement, which
thus far has proven inadequate in bringing women to the engineering
classrooms, laboratories and workforce. Beyond numbers, women represent
a vital source of intellectual talent that cannot go untapped any
longer.
Recommendations for Policy
WEPAN recommends the adoption of national, state and local policies
that serve significantly to enhance science and mathematics education
at all grade levels, while aggressively implementing initiatives that
will increase enrollment and retention of women in engineering at the
college level. We need to increase the public awareness of the role and
mission of engineers so that ``being an engineer'' means something
tangible to the general public. To encourage girls and women to
consider and pursue careers in engineering, WEPAN believes that
policies must address the two broad areas:
The popular understanding of what engineering is, who
engineers are, and how they contribute to society.
The ``culture'' in which engineering is taught at the
university level.
Popular Understanding of Engineering and Precollege Outreach
Only 8 percent of ALL students taking the SAT intend to major in
engineering. Of this group, 19 percent are girls of all races and
ethnicities. Girls are taking the necessary math and science classes in
secondary school to major in engineering. Over 40 percent of high
school physics and calculus students are girls (NSF, 1999; American
College Testing, 1998). Girls are prepared for engineering majors. They
are just not interested. Engineering is currently failing to interest
students, male or female in becoming engaged in the profession. This
general lack of interest may be attributed to a lack of awareness. In a
1998 Harris Poll, 61 percent of Americans described themselves as ``not
very well informed'' or ``not at all informed'' about engineering and
engineers. Among women, the percentage increased to 78 percent
respectively; among college graduates, 53 percent.
Addressing problems of how engineers and engineering are understood
and perceived could be addressed, at least partly, through simple
interaction (by students and their teachers alike) with representatives
from within the field. Another avenue is reaching out to media- and
tech-savvy youth of the early 21st century in ways they can understand.
Depictions of science, engineering and technology in movies and
television are more present than ever before in medical and crime
shows. Sept. 11, 2001, has been accompanied by heightened visibility
and increased public discussion and debate, both of which create
opportunities for expanded understanding of the role of science and
engineering in our daily lives. Educators and practitioners should
capitalize on these opportunities that are relevant to young people.
Programs that supplement the science and math curricula in lower
grades, provide mentoring at all levels, enlighten students about the
importance of science and technology to society, and educate students
about the broad range of career opportunities in engineering, need to
continue to increase the representation of women in engineering.
However, outreach alone is not sufficient to affect meaningful change.
After-school programs or summer camps, while a valuable component, are
not going to increase participation in numbers adequate to address the
problem on a national scale.
What is called for, instead, is a systemic shift toward engagement
with teachers, schools and entire school systems. Educators from
kindergarten through graduate school must join with professional
engineers in developing an innovative approach that is dynamic,
systemic and synergistic. For example, Massachusetts has taken the lead
by incorporating engineering principles as part of the states'
educational standards, a first in the US. Texas has also taken a step
in this direction by accepting an engineering based course as a science
credit at the high school level.
University Culture
Addressing issues of the engineering ``culture'' in the university
environment is imperative to ensure the long-term success of women who
enter the field. The difficulties women students experience in
attempting to retain their intrinsic interest in science and
engineering in environments that undercut their confidence, motivation,
and sense of belonging in the field, pose formidable obstacles to their
completion of academic training and/or satisfactory performance in
engineering careers.
Research strongly suggests that factors unrelated to academic
performance are largely to blame for a disproportionate drop out rate
among women engineering students:
According to the 1998 report, Women and Men of the
Engineering Path, women and men earn similar grades in
engineering courses, and women who leave engineering have
higher grades than men who leave. It is not, therefore, poor
academic performance that drives women out of engineering, but
higher levels of dissatisfaction.
The persistence rates for women in math, science and
engineering programs range from 30 to 46 percent, depending on
the type of institution--far below the 39- to 61 percent rate
for their male counterparts (Adelman, 1998).
A 1998 national pilot climate study by WEPAN found that, although
male and female students responded similarly in many cases, perceptions
of their college experience differed widely. Women, for example,
generally rated their experience lower in areas relating to feelings of
self-confidence, such as comfort level with lab equipment, the sense
that engineering is the ``right'' major, and participation in classroom
discussion. Many institutions participating in the pilot study have
recommended changes at their institutions based on its results
(Brainard, et.al., 1999).
The recently released Goodman Research Group's (GRG) final report
on the Women's Experiences in College Engineering (WECE) Project (2002)
provides comprehensive quantitative evidence that women's assessments
of (1) their self-confidence in their academic abilities, (2) the
engineering department environment, and (3) the engineering classroom
environment are vital factors in their persistence in engineering
majors. The study also demonstrates that women who participate more
frequently in engineering support activities, particularly those
combining social and academic interaction, are less likely to leave
engineering majors. As both Adelman (1998) and Goodman (2002) have
documented, women students are not leaving engineering because they
cannot make the grade or find the curriculum too challenging. Instead,
it is the lack of social interaction and sense of community within the
field of inquiry, and the divorce of curriculum from real work
application (Goodman, 2002).
Margolis and Fisher's 2001 book, Unlocking the Clubhouse, asserts
that confidence issues for women in computer science require and
deserve institutional responses of attention, intervention, and
remediation. In their well-structured longitudinal study, Margolis and
Fisher explore multiple dimensions of this issue in careful detail.
Their findings also counter casual myths (e.g., about the so-called
``natural'' distribution of interest and aptitude) that have inhibited
or misdirected earlier remedial efforts. Further, their model of
undergraduate recruitment and retention raises the enrollment of women
in undergraduate computer science from 7 percent in 1995 to 42 percent
in 2000. And Fisher's work at Carnegie Mellon University provides a
host of recommendations on how institutions can change the quality of
the student experience to further promote gender equity in STEM
(science, technology, engineering, mathematics) education.
Identifying recommendations and policies that can affect the
culture within universities is no small task. WEPAN proposes the
following:
Link research funds to first- and second-year retention of
engineering students in the researcher's home institution.
Require that universities collect and publish data that is
disaggregated by race and gender. A standard definition of
first-and second-year retention would need to be defined and
observed;
Evaluation criteria for research grants should include
status or improvement in enrollment, retention and graduation
rates of undergraduate and graduate women and under represented
minorities
Performance evaluation for department heads within
universities should include status or progress of recruitment,
retention, and promotion of women faculty.
Funding agencies should review guidelines and expand
criteria to include the replication of tested programs and
initiatives, not just a focus on new and original ideas.
WEPAN's final recommendation bridges public awareness, pre-college
outreach, and university culture of engineering. At this time, the
focus continues to be the pipeline. How do we get more kindergarten
students to develop and sustain their interest in engineering. Most
students do not have an opportunity to fully explore engineering until
they reach college. All students, but girls in particular are not ready
to narrow their choices and select a major such as engineering that
precludes study in other areas. When students are asked to declare a
major, given the stereotypes, lack of awareness, and male dominated
environment, the choice to major in engineering loses far too often,
particularly among women and people of color. It is time to develop
alternate pathways and frameworks at the college level that can engage
students in engineering beyond the first or even second year of
college. Given the rigorous curriculum, this is a challenge. But
engineers always meet challenges and we implore them to do so. Too many
creative minds are being lost in the current process.
Since 1990, WEPAN has taken the lead in promoting change to
increase the number and success of women in engineering. Our impact has
been significant; yet, the systemic change now needed will require
collaborative efforts and, more importantly, policy changes that have
the real power to positively impact the demographics of tomorrow's
engineering and science workforce.
References
Adelman, C. (1998). Women and Men of the Engineering Path: A Model
for Analyses of Undergraduate Careers, Washington, DC: U.S. Department
of Education and The National Institute for Science Education.
American College Testing. (1998). Are America's students taking
more science and mathematics coursework? ACT Research Report Series
98.2 Available on line at: http://www.act.org/research/briefs/98.2.html
Brainard, S., Gilmore, G., Metz, S. (1999, June). National WEPAN
Pilot Climate Survey: Exploring the Environment for Undergraduate
Engineering Students. WEPAN National Conference Proceedings, San
Antonio, Texas.
Engineering Workforce Commission of the American Association of
Engineering Societies, Inc. (2001). Washington, DC, 2001.
Goodman, et. al. (2002) Women's Experiences in College Engineering
(WECE) Project 2002, http://www.grginc.com/WECE_FINAL_REPORT.pdf
Judy, R. and D'Amico, C. (1997). Workforce 2020: Work and Workers
in the 21st Century. Hudson Institute: Indianapolis, IN.
Margolis, J. and Fisher, A. (2002). Unlocking the Clubhouse-Women
in Computing, Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press.
National Science Foundation. (1999). Women and minorities and
people with disabilities in science and engineering, 1998. Arlington,
VA.
Strenta, C. (1993). Choosing and Leaving Science in Highly
Selective Institutions: General Factors and the Questions of Gender.
New York, NY: Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.