Submitted by auerbach on
Several years ago I wrote an essay about gender diversity in chemistry, which was published in the wildly popular "Chemical and Engineering News," the trade magazine for all chemical scientists in the USA. The occasion was the 125th anniversary of the American Chemical Society, the largest professional organization in the world. Here is the first paragraph:
"I will never forget the moment I introduced my first female graduate student to my formerly all-male research group. There was a brief, yet tangible silence during which the new student wondered, 'Do I really belong here?' The answers that students develop to such questions contribute to their 'hidden curriculum,' which generally comprises all the lessons they learn over and above what we plan to teach them."[1]
Although that was written more than 10 years ago, I realize more than ever that the hidden curriculum remains alive and well in all corners of the university. For example, consider a hypothetical discussion session, during which students ask questions to a guest instructor with special expertise in a relevant topic. Suppose that 40 students are present, but fewer than 10 students ask questions, and only one of them is female. Despite the demographics, the students' questions are good, the expert's answers are intriguing, and the hour goes quickly.
Question: was this an academic success?
Obviously on some levels the answer is "yes," but on others the answer must be "no." If the course instructors were to say nothing about the demographics -- in particular, the fact that only one female student asked a question -- students in the class would likely receive the lesson in the hidden curriculum that such behavior is OK. This raises two important questions:
* Why is diversity so important in the university?
* How should the instructors raise this point, and the confidence of all their students?
Diversity: The fundamental job of the university community is to examine old thoughts and to produce new ones that exert greater positive impact on society. The preferred mechanism for creation and criticism of new thoughts is open discussion. If too few perspectives contribute to this, then the scope of creativity and the rigor of criticism will surely suffer.
Bottom line: we need every single idea, and every single criticism, that every single student can muster to move forward on solving the biggest problems faced by society. Nothing less will do. For example, for the last 222 years, the USA has been led by a male president. Just imagine how different history might be (and how much better off the world might be) if we had had a mix of male and female presidents? Another example: Pythagoras suggested around 550 BC that the Earth may be spherical. It took 300 years for that idea to take hold. Why? Not enough diversity of perspectives criticizing conventional wisdom.
Confidence: In her 1994 book "Schoolgirls"[2], Peggy Orenstein told of several middle-school girls who lost confidence in math and science despite their excellent grades. Indeed, Orenstein suggested that girls at that age tend to know more than they think, and that boys at the same age tend to know less than they think. The result: most questions raised by middle-school math and science teachers are met with boys' hands held high, while the right answers were often locked in the girls' heads. The ripple effect of this appears to be long lasting, well into college years.
I close this blog entry with a quote from my scientific great-grandfather, Linus Pauling: "The best way to have a good idea is to have a lot of ideas."[3] I hope that all students gain the confidence to voice their ideas, because we'll need them all to solve our problems.
[1] Scott M. Auerbach, "Changing Chemistry's Hidden Curriculum," Chemical & Engineering News, March 26, 2001, p. 214 (http://samson.chem.umass.edu/~auerbach/pub_pdf/pap37.pdf).
[2] Peggy Orenstein, "Schoolgirls: Young Women, Self-Esteem and the Confidence Gap," 1994 Doubleday/Anchor (http://peggyorenstein.com/books/schoolgirls.html).
[3] http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/l/linus_pauling.html
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