Science is awesome. For so many reasons. Studying science and doing science is awesome for at least as many reasons. Yet, science is very often (unwittingly) presented as something that only men do. Especially white men.
If you've paged through science textbook1, there tend to be a lot of white dudes. Just think about the history of atomic theory as often covered by textbooks:
- Democritus (Greek white dude)
- John Dalton (English white dude)
- J.J. Thomson (English white dude)
- Ernest Rutherford (Kiwi white dude)
- James Chadwick (English white dude)
Wow. I bet that's really inspiring for all the women and people of color in the world.
I struggle with how to best address this systemic problem. As a white dude myself, I'm certainly not the best spokesperson for greater diversity in scientific and technical fields. That said, I'm not happy with the status quo (especially as the future father of a daughter).
Where I need your help
I'm not planning on solving a systemic problem, but I'd like, at the very least, to expose students to the large number of women and people of color that are actively working in scientific and technical fields.
So, here's what I'm asking:
If you're a woman or person of color working in a scientific, engineering, computer science, or other such field, please:
- Take a picture of yourself. Pick any picture you'd like. It doesn't need to be serious. 🙂
- Download the PowerPoint or Keynote template file (via Dropbox).
- Add your picture and a brief description of what you do and who you are.
- Feel free to rearrange things on the template.
- For that matter, feel free to not use the template at all if you're not inclined to do so.
- Send me an email with your awesome file (that'd be: ben [dot] wildeboer [at] gmail.com.
- If you're okay with me sharing your profile on this site or via twitter, let me know in the email. I promise to not share anyone's profile online unless you explicitly consent to that in your email.
- Share this with your science-y, engineering-y, or technical-y friends.
Once I receive 10 or so profiles I'll post them up on my bulletin boards. It'd be awesome if they ended up filling both bulletin boards and then spill over to the walls as well. That'd be a whole lot of awesome.
Thanks!
(Yes, this is pretty much a rip off of the This Is What A Scientist Looks Like tumblr. Hey, it's a great idea.)
- I don't really recommend doing this as a method to learn anything about science, by the way. [↩]
Help, please: I’m like to expose Ss to scientists, engiee’rs, etc. who are women &/or ppl of color. Can you help? http://t.co/o1kSuS12ZF
Your help needed: Changing student perceptions of who scientists are via @willyb http://t.co/ZIt8RpJVfu
LRT: My bro's showing his students engineers/scientists/etc who look like them. Check it out? http://t.co/wGSUgoWFh0 @WillyB
Help needed: Changing student perceptions of who scientists are: http://t.co/o1kSuS12ZF #computerscience #SciAm #SciChat #AAAS #phdchat TIA!
The submissions are starting to roll in! Very thankful to all who've given time: Change stu perceptions of scientists http://t.co/o1kSuS12ZF
Interested in helping change my Stu's perceptions of scientists? Here's a quick thing you could do: http://t.co/o1kSuS12ZF cc: #BLACKandSTEM
So far I’ve received 9 submissions for my classroom’s wall of science-y women & PoC peeps. That’s pretty exciting. http://t.co/o1kSuS12ZF
[…] Your help needed: Changing student perceptions of who scientists are […]
Hello,
We are interested in your website.
We (EPCA-European Petrochemical Association) are similarly dedicated to encouraging talented youth to learn about STEM. We work in partnership with UNESCO, European Schoolnet and inGenious.
You may be interested to learn about our XperiLAB.be® project, which aims to raise young people’s awareness of science. It takes place on 4-8 October, 2014 in Vienna (Austria).
Discover our actions on www.facebook.com/epcanetwork !