NSF/Advance-Funded Research

Vital Variables, Feminist Consciousness, and Insider/Outsider Status in Social Action Research: Confessions from a Feminist Empiricist Project

Joyce McCarl Nielsen, Robyn Marschke, Elizabeth Sheff, Patricia Rankin,
University of Colorado

Published in Signs, the leading scholarly journal in women's studies. "Vital Variables, Feminist Consciousness, and Insider/Outsider Status in Social Action Research: Confessions from a Feminist Empiricist Project" underscores several tensions we discovered while conducting research on the status of women faculty. We discuss how "vital" variables like family-related characteristics never make their way into regression analyses of salary differences between men and women (and perhaps never should lest we reify women's association with the domestic), that climate indicators like feminist consciousness are difficult to operationalize and even more difficult to measure due to faculty resistance, and how our status as both insiders (access to administration) and outsiders (women in academe) posed dilemmas and opportunities in our research effort. All of these tensions are situated in the context of feminist methods, methodology, and epistemology as we strove to reconcile the tensions and find a home for our dynamic version of feminist empiricism.

Download Article as PDF

DRAFT
Faculty Climate Survey: Interpersonal Relations, Collegiality, Leadership, Mentoring, Diversity, and Institutional Support According to Research and Teaching Faculty in 2003

The Faculty Climate Survey Report documents findings from a 5-page climate survey sent to 700 teaching and research faculty in the Fall of 2003. It includes an executive summary as well as detailed findings from our data analyses. This report is not final (it is posted here as a draft). The survey will be conducted again towards the end of the LEAP project to assess whether faculty perceptions of the climate change and if such changes can be attributed to LEAP interventions.

Download Article as PDF

2004 NSF/ADVANCE Change Indicators
Robyn Marschke, Ph.D., University of Colorado, Boulder

The stipulations of our NSF grant include annual documentation of a variety of quantitative benchmarks such as the number of tenure-track women faculty in the science, math, engineering, and technology disciplines. Earlier reports are available for LEAP 2003 Activities and 2002 Activities. Stay tuned for yet another report comparing changes in these indicators throughout the past few years.

Download Article as PDF

Demographic Inertia
Robyn Marschke, Ph.D., University of Colorado, Boulder

(Research in progress)

We are currently writing a paper about "demographic inertia" and how long it will take before the percentage of women among the faculty is the same as the percentage of women among PhDs. We use differential equations to analyze PhD pools, retention, attrition, age groups, and tenure rates and how these factors combine to effect the pace of change toward gender equality. Hargens and Long (2002) predicted it would take 38 years; thus far, our models predict nearly twice as many years will pass before the gender compositions of the faculty and the PhD pool match--and nearly 100 years before the number of men and women faculty are equal.

Gender Pay Equity Among University Faculty: Testing Segregation, Human Capital, Discrimination, and Demographic Inertia

Robyn Marschke, Ph.D., University of Colorado, Boulder

Robyn Marschke (sociology) successfully defended her dissertation in May 2004."Gender Pay Equity Among University Faculty: Testing Segregation, Human Capital, Discrimination, and Demographic Inertia" is a discussion and analysis of five hypotheses. The highlights of the paper (according to Robyn) are (a) the sections regarding the measurement of pay discrimination based on the "Oaxaca" method and, (b) the demographic inertia findings.

Download Dissertion as PDF

Hidden Losses: Alternatives to Faculty Careers in the Sciences among Doctorally-Prepared Women

Liane Pedersen-Gallegos, Sandra Laursen, Anne-Barie Hunter, Kris DeWelde, Robyn Marschke, Elaine Seymour

members of
ETHNOGRAPHY & EVALUATION RESEARCH
Center to Advance Research and Teaching in the Social Sciences
University of Colorado at Boulder

Download Article as PDF

NETWORKING – Why You Need to Know People Who Know People

Patricia Rankin, Professor of Physics, University of Colorado, Boulder
Joyce Nielsen, Associate Dean for the Social Sciences, University of Colorado, Boulder.

Click to link to article

Download Article as PDF

Literature Review of Best Practices in College Physics and
Best Practices for Women in College Physics

Kristy Martinez and Margaret Eisenhart
January, 2004

Click to link to article

Download Article as PDF

Land of Plenty: Diversity as America's Competitive Edge in Science, Engineering and Technology

CAWMSET. (September 2000). Report of the Congressional Commission on the Advancement of Women and Minorities in Science, Engineering and Technology Development. Land of Plenty: Diversity as America's Competitive Edge in Science, Engineering and Technology. Access at www.nsf.gov/od/cawmset.

Biennial Report on Women, Minorities, and Persons with Disabilities in Science and Engineering

NSF, the Division of Science Resources Statistics (SRS). (2000). Biennial Report on Women, Minorities, and Persons with Disabilities in Science and Engineering. Access at www.nsf.gov/sbe/srs, under "Featured Publications." Also a good web site for general statistics on the science and engineering workforce.

Faculty Work-Life Study Report

University of Michigan. (November 1999). Faculty Work-Life Study Report. Conducted by Researchers from The Center for the Study of Higher and Postsecondary Education and The Center for the Education of Women. Access at www.umich.edu~cew/research.