Women scientists: Securing the future Last month, at a satellite session of the annual meeting of the American Society for Cell Biology (ASCB) in Washington, D.C., the groundwork was laid for new mechanisms that could help increase the number of women scientists in full professorships and other high-level positions in research institutions and academia. Women represent 50% of medical students and 45% of graduate students in the biological sciences, and they're getting faculty positions, noted Ruth L Kirschstein, acting director of the National Institutes of Health. "But when you look for outstanding, well-experienced, high-level cell biologists, biochemists, biophysicists, [or others] to serve on outstanding committees or advisory councils, as full professors or as deans, it's hard to find a sufficient number of women." Entitled "AXXS '99: Achieving XXcellence in Science," the meeting focused on ways to remedy that problem. Sponsored by ASCB, NIH's Office of Research on Women's Health, the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, and other NIH institutes and centers, it explored the roles of scientific societies in advancing science by building the careers of women in science. Daylong workshops addressed five topics: mentoring and networking, career development for mid- and seniorlevel women scientists, women's representation in scientific societies, model systems that work, and outreach and collaboration within and between societies and other organizations. The 130 or so people who attended were divided into groups for the workshops, where they devised "action plans" to deal with each issue. Among key recommendations were to create an umbrella consortium that establishes communications among member societies; to establish a "best practices" clearinghouse that provides information on the best approaches for increasing access, retention, and advancement of women in science, engineering, and math careers; to develop national mentoring and networking programs and a web-based database of women scientists; and to identify existing databases of women in specialized science or engineering fields as well as
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effective mentoring programs that already exist within societies. Women shared information on databases and model programs that are in effect or in the works. For example, Janet G. Osteryoung, director of the National Science Foundation's Division of Chemistry, described a mentoring program being developed with seed funding from the Camille & Henry Dreyfus Foundation. A 12-member committee of women chemists and chemical engineers—including Osteryoung—is working to devise a program that will provide networking opportunities and career-related workshops for senior women chemists and chemical engineers. A database of women chemists and chemical engineers in academia and a web site listing resources useful to them are under construction. "We need cross talk between societies to learn more about existing programs so we're not reinventing the wheel," Pamela A. Marino, a program director at the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, explained. As a first step in that direction, materials from the meeting and an annotated bibliography of pertinent resources that various societies provide will be posted on a web site developed by the major sponsors of the meetings, she said. ASCB will host the site on its server. It's good for the country to be represented by a full array of scientists, Kirschstein emphasized, and it's good to make sure that girls and young women "will want to do science" because they see how successful women can be. Mairin Brennan
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