Pauline Gagnon, Indiana University/CERN

Women in ATLAS:Are we there yet?

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Outline

Statistics from the ATLAS Collaboration

Global trends in physics in the world

What remains to be done?

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CERN

38 countries 170 institutions 1952 scientific authors:

• 389 women• 19.9% women• Was 15.6% in 2008

• CERN is an international particle physics laboratory (Geneva, Switzerland)

• CERN hires about 2800 people, mostly technical and administrative staff + 1000 fellows and students

• About 11,600 physicists from 69 different countries come to participate in the research

• ATLAS is 1 in 6 experiments on the Large Hadron Collider

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ATLAS CollaborationStatus as of October 2012

Age distribution for ATLAS authorsOctober 2012

below the age of 36: 50% of all women; 33% of all men

below the age of 50: 83% of all women; 70% of all men

of all ATLAS authors below 30: 30% are women

Many young women are joining ATLAS23 28 33 38 43 48 53 58 63 68 73 78

(bla

nk)

0.0%

1.0%

2.0%

3.0%

4.0%

5.0%

6.0%

7.0%

8.0%

9.0%

Column Labels Female

WomenMen

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Percentages of women in ATLAS by affiliation and nationality

Country % of ATLAS members – by affiliation

% of women by affiliation

% of women by nationality

Germany 13,9% 20,7% 15,2%

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% of ATLAS members – by affiliation 271 people hired by German institutes out of 1952 total: 13,9% This only gives an idea about statistical significance

% of women by affiliation: 56 women out of 271 people hired by German groups: 20,7%

% of women by nationality: 41 German women out of 269 Germans in ATLAS: 15,2%

% of women by affiliation and nationality

country of affiliation

% in ATLAS by affiliation

% of women by affiliation

% of women by nationality

USA 18,2% 16,1% 11,3%

Germany 13,9% 20,7% 15,2%

UK 10,1% 23,2% 18,1%

Italy 7,7% 25,8% 31,9%

France 7,0% 29,2% 23,6%

Russia 5,1% 5,1% 6,1%

Japan 4,1% 4,9% 7,5%

Canada 3,8% 20,0% 22,2%

Spain 2,9% 35,7% 35,6%

Czech 2,5% 6,3% 8,9%

Netherland 1,9% 27,0% 11,1%

Sweden 1,8% 25,7% 26,7%

country of affiliation

% in ATLAS by affiliation

% of women by affiliation

% of women by nationality

China 1,7% 5,9% 12,0%

Israel 1,6% 18,8% 19,2%

Switzerland 1,4% 25,9% 16,0%

Greece 1,3% 34,6% 40,5%

Poland 1,2% 30,4% 31,3%

Norway 0,9% 27,8% 28,6%

Portugal 0,9% 22,2% 20,8%

Romania 0,8% 46,7% 42,9%

Australia 0,7% 7,1% 0,0%

Turkey 0,7% 21,4% 26,3%

Denmark 0,6% 16,7% 9,1%

Brazil 0,5% 30,0% 23,1%

Germany (2008) 11,2% 14,3% 6

Women on ATLAS per country of affiliation above ATLAS average in 2012Country of affiliation # women % womenRomania 7 46,7%Spain 20 35,7%Greece 9 34,6%Poland 7 30,4%France 40 29,2%Norway 5 27,8%Netherland 10 27,0%Switzerland 7 25,9%Italy 39 25,8%Sweden 9 25,7%UK 46 23,2%Portugal 4 22,2%Germany 56 20,7%Canada 15 20,0%

Using only countries with > 14 people; these countries = 54% of ATLAS 7

Women on ATLAS per affiliation below ATLAS average in 2012

Country of affiliation # women % womenJapan 4 4,9%Russia 5 5,1%China 2 5,9%Czech 3 6,3%USA 57 16,1%Israel 6 18,8%

CERN 14 14.4%

Using only countries with > 14 people; these countries = 38% of ATLAS8

Analysis

Highest fractions of women per nationality: Romania, Greece, Spain, Italy, Poland, Sweden, Turkey, France

Lowest fractions of women per affiliation or nationality: Russia, Japan, Czech Republic, China, Austria

CERN is below the average with only 14.4% of women 14 women out of 99 physicists

Some countries hire more women than % from this country They are less successful at attracting women to physics: USA, Germany, UK, France, Nederlands, Switzerland

Others hire less women than the % from this country Italy, Japan, China, Greece, Canada

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What is behind these statistics?

High % of womenRomania, Greece, Turkey, UK, Spain, Poland, France, Italy Historically low or modest

salaries

Are women there less seen as “stealing good jobs” from men?

Better recruitment efforts both with young girls and at hiring?

Very low % of women

In Japan, Austria, CERN Was also the case for Germany

and Switzerland in 2008 salaries are higher

Also very low % of womenin Russia or Czech Republic but salaries are not high there so there are other factors contributing

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Appointed task in ATLAS 2008-12: 19.2% fraction of women in ATLAS = 19.9%

position% women2008-2012

# of tasks

top management (spokesperson, deputy, resource and technical coordinators) 21,7% 23

project coordinators 18,5% 27operation tasks (computing, data preparation, trigger, run coordinator) 7,8% 51

physics group conveners 13,6% 44performance group conveners 17,5% 40

committees 26,0% 127

Good representation given the age distribution of women;Average women usually don’t stay in the field 11

Responsibilities by gender in ATLAS (2000-12)% of women per cumulative person year

“Executive” tasks

top

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ors

oper

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phys

ics gr

oup

conv

ener

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perfor

man

ce g

roup

con

vene

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com

mitt

ees

0.0%

5.0%

10.0%

15.0%

20.0%

25.0%

30.0%

35.0%

40.0%

< 2008

2008-2012

“Physics” tasksWomen used to be appointed mostly as group conveners and on committees (administrative tasks)

Now women are also found in top management and project leaders positions

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What can be drawn on gender balance?

On the bright side: good representation Fraction of women is increasing in ATLAS:

was 15.6% in 2008, now at 19.9% many young women in the pipeline

Good representation of women now in all categories of appointed positions

concentrated in physics and committees up to 2008 now also in executive tasks (management, project leaders etc) Fabiola Gianotti, first female spokesperson of a major collaboration

Fabiola Gianotti,ATLAS

spokesperson

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So are we there yet?

Representation (i.e. fraction of women in the field) is only one aspect

Are women’s careers as good as men’s careers?

This is really where we still have a lot to gain

The following information was taken from a talk given by Rachel Ivie from the American Institute of Physics at IUPAP Women in

Physics 4th meeting held in April 2011 in South Africawww.aip.org/statistics/trends/highlite/women/

global.pdf14

Third Survey from American Institute of Physics

Purposes of Survey Ensure comparability

across countries

Show whether women physicists’ experiences are different from men’s

Third survey was translated into all official

UN languages German Japanese English French Russian Arabic Chinese Spanish

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Survey was widely distributed

Web survey Team leaders from Seoul

conference were asked to distribute to their contacts via e-mail

Survey itself contained instructions to forward to colleagues

American Physical Society and German Physical Society distributed it to their membership.

Open from Oct. 2009 to Oct.2010

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Respondents distribution

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Participation in various activities

Women are disfavored statistically significantly 18

Do you have enough resources?

On all accounts, women are significantly disadvantaged

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Has your career changed your personal life (marriage, children…)?

2010% more women said “yes” than men

Compared to your colleagues, how quickly have you progressed in your career?

Fathers are advantaged whilemothers answered “slower” twice as often

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Who is responsible for the majority of housework?

Women answered “me” twice as oftenMen answered “my spouse” 10 times more22

How did your work or career change because you are a parent?

Women are affected 2-4 times more often23

Did your employer assign to you lesschallenging work when you became a parent?

3 times more women said yes than men24

Should we conclude:More women but same old deal?

How are the women at CERN addressing this?

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Some activities of the CERN women

The ATLAS women’s group (with other women at CERN) Purpose: create a network of women, a place to meet

other women and exchange ideas, break isolation Activities:

Created a mailing list to exchange information Met once a week for lunch at the cafeteria (stopped 2 years ago) Identify and support women running for diverse positions Contributed to 2 workshops to draw young women to science Raised funds to bring 2 Iranian women to CERN Summer School Made a list of potential female lecturers for CERN Summer School Organized a lab-wide event for March 8, 2010

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CERN Summer School

269 students from 71 countries, 27% female students Lecturers during the Summer School

4 women out of 22 lecturers in 2009 2 women out of 22 lecturers in 2010 4 women out of 28 lecturers in 2011

Reason given to us when we questioned the situation: the scheduling committee could not think of any women…

We provided a list of 218 qualified women on 33 different topics after asking women for input: 7 women out of 31 lecturers in 2012

14% women

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International Women’s Day 2010 at CERN

March 8 event at CERNhttp://cern.ch/internationalwomensday/

We staffed the four large experiment and accelerator (LHC) control rooms with women

Did it for 2 shifts of 8 hours Had posters about women at CERN and testimonies on website

Purpose was to show how much progress has been made and that there are now lots of women at CERN

We wanted a positive celebration to get everybody on board Support from:

Director General Rolf Heuer CMS Spokesperson Guido Tonelli …but not from ATLAS Spokesperson Fabiola Gianotti

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Doomed if you do, doomed if you don’t

Women in high positions may not wish to speak or support women’s initiatives, to avoid alienating their base

Guido Tonelli could only look good as a white male supporting this initiative full fledge

Fabiola Gianotti did not want to appear as favoring a particular group (especially one she belonged to)

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What’s the best way to attract more women in physics?

Great study by Zahra Hazari, Philip Sadler, Gerhard Sonnert and Marie-Claire Shanahan from PRiSE studyhttp://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/2011/03/29/can-we-declare-victory-for-women-in-their-participation-in-science-not-yet/ Students who pursue studies in physics need a strong

“physics identity”: Student must feel good at it Students’ belief in their own abilities is extremely important. Get reinforcement from peers, teachers, family etc.

This is true for both male and female students, but female students tend to believe in themselves less, contributing to the difficulties they can encounter in physics. 31

What helps build a strong “physics identity”

Students liked Having opportunities for peer teaching Receiving encouragement from teachers Discussing in class about the benefits of being a scientist

Teachers should: Discuss current and cutting-edge physics topics Encourage student questions Set up labs addressing students’ beliefs about the world

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Common strategies to encourage female students

Providing positive female science role models Creating opportunities for collaborative group work Discussing the lives of female scientists.

The PriSE study revealed that none of the above had an effect on strengthening “physics identity”

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Only one classroom experience mattered

The explicit discussion of under-representation of women in science.

Talking directly about the fact that there are few women in physics

Female students who had experienced these discussions in their high school classes had significantly stronger physics identities

These discussions had no impact on male students.

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Conclusion The number of women in ATLAS has clearly increased since 2008

Was 15.6% in 2008; now 19.9% women This could reflect a general trend in physics in general

Discussing the poor representation of women in physics is the best way to attract more young women to the field

Women in ATLAS are in all positions

A worldwide study of 15000 physicists revealed a clear gender-based difference in access to opportunities

Our efforts are paying off but there is still plenty of room for feminist ideas in our field

“I will feel equality has arrived when we can elect to office women who are as incompetent as some of the men who are already there” (Maureen Reagan)

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