You may have noticed that we've been celebrating women at the Lab lately and
that's because March was Women's History Month. To round that all up for this
episode of "Inside the Lab," we wanted to take a look at what it's like to be a
female scientist at the Lab and how that's changed through the years. So
let's take a little trip back in time.
[Voice of Luisa Hanson] The Lab was, I would say if I would have
to just generalize, a male white place. The percentage of women was very very
low. I saw only men and no diversity. I am Luisa Hanson and I have been at the
Lab for almost 55 years. They told me that was one more woman but never I saw
it. Today we have 22% of women scientists at the Lab, 22, 23. Things have
changed in all in a positive way. Also we have a very diversified lab and
there are many points on need to improve yet, but overall is a big positive change.
The lab is actually a great place for women to work with benefits like
continuing education and generous maternity leave.
This means that women aren't discouraged for advancement because they don't have
to choose between careers and having families. Women can be students
scientists and mothers. Even though women in science have come a long way since
the 50s, there still exists a gender gap in some STEM fields. Women make up a
little more than half the world's population and these days we earn a
little more than half of the bachelor's degrees. Of those, women earn about 50% of
the bachelor's degrees in science and engineering fields, which is awesome, but
if you look a little closer and break it down by field, in 2012 women only earned
about 18% of the degrees in engineering computer science and physics.
The percentage of women holding degrees in these subjects decreases when you
look at master's degrees and PhDs and these numbers decrease overall for
minority women. This imbalance radiates up into most of the STEM workforce too.
Fields like geoscience and mechanical engineering only show about 30%
women in their ranks.
What I found is that when I work with people with
different backgrounds, we have more ideas at the table.
We have more people who are not locked into one way of thinking and
because of that, the creative output of what we do is so much stronger.
I'm Carol Woodward and I've been at Livermore National Laboratory for almost 20 years
and I'm a computational mathematician. Largely in this
environment, in CASC and computation at Livermore has been fantastic for women. I
work in what I consider a completely gender-neutral
workplace. I don't hear that from every part of the Lab. There are
challenges that people have. Often something called "unconscious bias" can
actually keep young girls from entering STEM fields or young professionals from
climbing the ladder. That's why we think it's important to talk openly about
these issues to recognize the problems and to make change so that everyone of
every background can feel comfortable, welcome and productive in their work
environment.
My best advice is don't give up. It's a really cool job. You want to do
it; you want to stay with it. Keep going because it's worth it. In a good way
you can say, I know so much, I can do this, I am able to do this I
would like to participate. Always take the initiative.
I'm Salustra Urban and
I'm a biomedical scientist.
I'm Monique Warren and I'm an environmental engineer.
I'm Maya Gokhale, I'm a computer scientist.
I'm Monica Moya and I'm a
biomedical engineer.
I'm Venessa and I'm a chemical engineer.
and I'm a research
engineer.
I'm a mechanical engineer.
I'm a material scientist.
I'm a software developer.
I'm a physicist.
I'm a hydrogeologist.
I'm a computer
scientist.
I'm a radioactive waste analyst.
Environmental engineer.
A materials engineer.
Nuclear engineer and plasma physicist.
A computer scientist.
Materials scientist.
So what will you be? Are you a woman in a STEM field or do
you aspire to be? What changes do you want to see happen in the future? Let us
know in the comments down below. Click here to see more of how the Lab promotes
women in STEM fields and click over here to watch our last video and don't forget
to subscribe to stay up to date with everything that's happening inside the
Lab.