This report has been generated at the request of the President to review the current status of women at Caltech and make recommendations as to how that status can be improved. Information for this report came from formal interviews with faculty, both women and men, as well as from the heads of the following organizations that serve women at Caltech:
Current Climate:
There is general agreement internally that the climate at Caltech has improved tremendously for women over the past 10 years and that it is still evolving. Rather than being a hostile environment Caltech is now seen as a hard and challenging environment for many women as it is for many men. Despite this, some women have thrived. Unfortunately, the external perceptions of Caltech, based less on intimate knowledge, are that women are not as welcome here and that Caltech men do not take women as seriously as their stature and qualifications deserve. There is some truth here where some women report feeling ignored and excluded from decision making centers. More specifically, like some other major research universities Caltech would benefit by an increase in the percentage of women undergraduates, women faculty members, and top women administrators.
How Caltech Compares to Some Others:
To take tenure-track faculty at Caltech as an example, 10 years ago there was only 4% women; this figure hovers around 10% today. Taking into account specific disciplines it would be hard to defend Caltech's low percentages based on the lack of qualified women since the national pipeline of female Ph.D.'s has for sometime been 40-50% for the biological sciences, 25-30% for chemistry, and 10-15% in the physical sciences, engineering, and mathematics.
Pipelines aside, current comparisons of tenure-track faculty with other elite institutions are useful, although it should be noted that systematic data gathering was not attempted for this report. Overall M.I.T. has 15% women faculty, a number that is well over Caltech's 10%. MIT's School of Science has 12% women faculty, still larger than the 10% for the corresponding disciplines at Caltech. Caltech has 8% women engineers compared to 8% in the School of Engineering at Johns Hopkins University, which recently hired a female dean. Among the Divisions at Caltech Biology has the greatest percent of women faculty at 19%, which compares favorably to 17% women at Harvard Medical School, but not to 25% at Columbia Medical School and 31% at Johns Hopkins Medical School. Although more recent faculty hires at Caltech have included a greater percentage of women much hard work remains to be done to seek out, attract, and retain outstanding women.
Caltech Women:
Caltech women faculty are an impressive lot. It is surprising that they are not as nationally visible given their scientific reputations and their extraordinary self-confidence. This may be due to their small number and their focused intensity on their science. Also, it may well be that the institution has not claimed these faculty as their very own and has not felt comfortable promoting them internally and externally. There is the tendency among elite institutions of pointing to a few women faculty stars, especially when they are relatively young, but speaking poorly of the older ones, even when on closer inspection they would be considered perfectly respectable faculty members compared to many of the older male faculty at the same institution.
For the more senior women there is a particular problem at Caltech that needs to be addressed. Senior faculty women have had to be tough and may indeed have burnt some bridges. Several women have had to fight for their tenure, which has unfortunately led to lingering perceptions that are harmful to the culture at Caltech; these women no longer feel that they have much credibility with the administration and therefore, do not have as much of a stake in Caltech's success. Several faculty women felt that they have not been considered as consensus builders by fellow faculty members, although almost every single women faculty member whom I have met has evident leadership and managerial qualities. My observations indicate that some of their faculty peers, both male and female, still do not accept these tenured women as equals. Such views prevent faculty members from comfortably treating each other as scientific colleagues and prevent the administration from fully utilizing the talent among Caltech's faculty. Only very recently under new administrative leadership at Caltech one woman was promoted to a leadership position. Another perception among some women faculty members is that the tenure process at Caltech is unnecessarily secretive and may be biased against women, thereby forcing the women to be more combative during the process. Despite their relative isolation, many women faculty do know and support each other and share an informal luncheon group which meets monthly.
A curiosity at Caltech is the unexpectedly low percentage of women faculty in the Division of Humanities and Social Sciences. The national pool for economics contains 22% women doctorates and for political science 30% women doctorates. Social sciences at Caltech has one junior female tenure-track faculty member, this is in contrast to reasonable representation of women in the humanities. Because Caltech pursues a particular quantitative side of micro-economics and political science the pool of women working in these narrow areas may well be smaller than it is for the social sciences as a whole; however, it would be surprising if there were indeed so few acceptable women.
Dominant Accepted Culture for Students:
An unfortunate outcome of having so few women faculty is that women students fail to experience a variety of approaches to becoming a scientist. The successful women faculty are perceived to be those that fit into the dominant mode of operation at Caltech which is accepted by men and generally comfortable for most of them; therefore, some undergraduate and graduate women feel that there is only one way to be successful. Because this mode may be unfamiliar or unattractive to many women students, as well as some minorities, they do not see themselves fitting in and become easily discouraged. Rather than building self confidence, such students sense that they do not belong even though they have been selected to be equally capable. Unfortunately, this situation is made worse because all too often among faculty there is the belief that students who require a different approach do not belong and, therefore, any accommodations that makes the passage for these students easier are not adopted. Such gatekeeper mentalities are common among the nation's elite faculty. In order to insure the future health of science in the US leading educators stress the necessity for attracting and retaining the best and brightest irrespective of gender and race. Therefore, it is important to be aware of documentation that demonstrates the need for different motivational strategies to attract qualified minority and female students and to help them to become successful (see: Theodore J. Marchese, The New Conversations About Learning, http://www.aahe.org/members_only/TM-essay.htm; publications from the Women's Center, Wellesley College; publications from NACME; and Entwhistle, N. "Motivational Factors in Students' Approach to Learning," in Learning Strategies and Learning Styles, edited by R. Schmeck, New York, Plenum Press, 1996).
Institutional Organizations Supporting Women:
Caltech's documents on sexual harassment policy are well written, detailed, and thoughtful, providing coverage appropriate for students, faculty and staff. In 1993 there was an institutional-wide educational program to make everyone aware of these policies and to undergo training in understanding enlightened employment practices. Updating these documents and continued exposure of all faculty to these policies by mail is ongoing. In addition, administrative leadership should be exerted to encourage all Caltech supervisors, including faculty, to undergo sensitivity training by, preferably, outside consultants.
Noticeable improvement especially over the last 5 years, is evidenced by the trending down in sexual harassment complaints (contrary to the national trend) and public expressions of women's contentment with Caltech by letters to publications. This may well be due to the many places within Caltech where informal and formal complaints are heard and effective procedures are in place to help women in crisis. In particular, the Women's Center has developed effective strategies to deal with issues of victimization and self defense. The Women's Center was started only about 6 years ago. It was reported to me that the Center experienced some difficulties during the years immediately after its founding, which, I believe, may have been due to residual antagonism and to misunderstandings between the director of the Center and some at Caltech on the purpose for the Center. The director has impressive credentials in crisis intervention and a professional stake in national women's movements. Further integration of this Center into the existing structures at Caltech will provide support to the Center and help to bring its considerable resources to other organizations at Caltech. It remains to be decided whether the Women's Center should be for all women at Caltech or only focused on students. It is my view after talking to current undergraduates that few undergraduate women need the services of the Women's Center whereas graduate students and more mature women professionals are those who need career advice and help.
Other organizations within Caltech that serve women's needs are diverse. The Caltech Women's Club provides an active outlet for many faculty and JPL spouses and staff. Occasionally, faculty themselves and students take part in the Club's events, which are many and well organized. Unlike most auxiliary groups, the aim of this Club is not to raise money for Caltech, but to welcome newcomers, entertain, and develop camaraderie, all of which inevitably leads to loyalty to Caltech. Support for the Caltech Women's Club from the administration is repaid many fold by this well-run organization. In contrast, the Organization for Women on Campus, composed of staff, students and some faculty, has been a more activist group in the past, but less active recently, and directly concerned with improving the climate for women. Together with the Women's Center they have sponsored workshops and seminars that have had positive influences on the community. And finally, there is the Caltech ombudsperson who has also been a confidential resource for women at Caltech. It is a credit to these organizations and to senior administration that an effective team management style has been developed recently utilizing the combined expertise to handle crisis situations involving women. Further co-ordination and back-up during emergencies are to be encouraged among these Caltech offices.
Changes Needed:
However, there continue to be occasions, albeit few, of disturbing signs of inappropriate behavior of men to women at all levels as well as continued anonymous physical attacks on the Women's Center. This may be due to the fact that the Center has been used by some women as a refuge during the evenings and weekends. In the dorms the director of the Women's Center has, on occasion, been verbally attacked and put on the defensive. Without strong administrative support at Caltech for the Center and more public condemnation of such actions these activities/pranks are likely to persist. Also, foreign male students coming from very different cultural backgrounds may need special help and attention in acclimating to the current mores in the USA.
In summary, although Caltech has improved considerably in relation to women it is far from being able to rest on any laurels. The community needs to continue to improve the environment for women. Compared to other institutions, Caltech is not providing equal opportunity fast enough to women and needs to be more active pursuing the following recommendations:
Recommendations: