Last week National Academies Press released findings from a new research study on the status of women in science and engineering that signals some great progress. It was commissioned to look at how the numbers change when women apply for tenure-track positions as well as their advancement on campus from assistant professor to fully tenured professor.

The key thing to remember is that the report is a snapshot report for the years 2004-2005. But the snapshot taken is one of change:

If women applied for positions at RI institutions, they had a better chance of being interviewed and receiving offers than male job candidates had. Many departments at Research I institutions, both public and private, have made an effort to increase the numbers and proportions of female faculty in the sciences, engineering and mathematics. Having women play a visible role in the hiring process, for example, has clearly made a difference. [PDF]

Since 2001, the National Science Foundation through its ADVANCE program has invested over $130 million towards finding solutions to the problem of underrepresentation of women faculty members in science and engineering and that includes the hiring and promotion process. Very simply put, ADVANCE teams around the country have come to the conclusion that unconscious bias towards women from men and women has hindered the hiring and promotion of women faculty in STEM fields. This means that gendered expectations come into play. Is there evidence of children in a candidate’s life? Bonus points for the man, negative for the woman. Look at the support letters: Are women described with weak words and men with strong ones?

One very simple trick to increasing women in an applicant pool (any applicant pool, I tell conference and panel organizers this too) is when you are speaking with a contact about potential job candidates to ask specifically, especially if none are named, for women and people of color. I continue to be amazed at stories from members of search committees who have been on the phone with a friend who still names only white men, but then remembers that there are women and people of color in the larger department.

Interesting though is the finding that the mere presence of a woman chairing the search committee will mean that women will apply for that position. We don’t have enough women to chair each search committee out there, so we need to do a better job asking women to apply.

An increase in women in the pool, getting interviews and offers, and doing just as well as men in terms of promotion should be a reason to celebrate. A lot of hard work has gone into getting to this point (which is not an end point, by the way), so why are some grumbling about discrimination?

The Chronicle noted the findings and a polite discussion about meritocracy and advantages that women receive, to the detriment of men, is happening. Seriously? Let’s look at the numbers from the study:
• Women account for about 17 percent of applications for both tenure-track and tenured positions in the departments surveyed;
• …there were no female applicants (only men applied) for 32 (6 percent) of the available tenure-track positions and 16 (16.5 percent) of the tenured positions.

Women applying for academic positions are in a very small pool, thus the higher proportion of them being hired is a sign of progress. In biology, where 60-65% of undergraduates are women and 45% of PhDs go to women, men still receive 66% of the academic position offers at Research I institutions.
I know that it can seem threatening that the shift is happening, but the shift is happening towards balance, towards equity. And even with these shifts happening, I still hear people describe the Latina hired in Chemistry as “Outstanding!” meaning she didn’t get this because she’s Latina, we just took the time and rolled up our sleeves to find that outstanding Latina with an amazing research plan. When we can get to the day when we report that of the last 10 hires at Your University we had 5 women, 4 people of color and leave it at that, then we’ll really be getting somewhere.