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livLots of fun posts celebrating Ada Lovelace day (yesterday, but I was busy writing a grant and planning a communal Passover celebration). I particularly enjoyed helenic's piece on confidence and how it affects women who write about tech in public.
Alsormc28 asked for women in science and technology to represent, so I thought I might have a go. Among other things it will serve as an introduction to my professional side for all the new people who just subscribed.
My official title is Lecturer in Bioscience, at a small but research-driven English university. What I actually do is spend half my time teaching life sciences to the undergraduate medical students, and half my time setting up a cancer research group. Well, eventually it will be set up and then I'll be spending half my time doing actual research.
In more detail, my subject is cancer cell biology. I'm interested in how cells make the "decision" to grow and divide or remain static or die, how cancer can result when those decision processes go wrong, and how to use that information to develop better cancer drugs. I spend some of my time developing systems for trying out thousands of compounds on cancer cells to pick the ones that are best at making the cancer cells die but doing minimal harm to normal cells. And some of my time trying to figure out exactly what's going on when cells start growing, and how their natural defence mechanisms work to prevent inappropriate growth and cancer. (One of those natural defence mechanisms is a protein called p53, which is pictured in my icon.)
What I love about my work is the balance between teaching and research. The teaching gives me human contact and immediate gratification. I've always loved teaching, and it's fantastic to be working with these bright, motivated students who find my subject nearly as fascinating as I do. Having that in my life makes it much more possible for me to do the research part, which I love because it's endlessly interesting and an intense intellectual challenge; there's no ceiling on how well I can do it. But at the same time it can be quite isolating and sometimes frustrating, because it may take weeks, months or even years before I see whether my effort has yielded any useful progress.
I am a little uncomfortable with the concept of Ada Lovelace day, to be honest. I think it can make a difference to see visible women doing STEM subjects. It's just that when I was a kid I found it really frustrating that I was always expected to have female role models, I was pushed into fangirling Rosalind Franklin when I wanted to fangirl Francis Crick, assumed because of my gender to be more interested in Dorothy Hodgkin than Max Perutz and so on. In some ways the message I want to send out to girls and young women is that they can do anything they want and gender doesn't matter, not that we can manage to find one or two female names in the list of influential scientists in your field, so that makes it ok for girls to have science ambitions.
But then, I did have one very important female role model growing up: my grandmother, who qualified as a doctor around the start of WW2 and devoted her whole life (literally, she died in the middle of a consultation with a patient) to women's and children's health, especially in deprived parts of the country. She also worked closely with Isabella Forshall, a surgeon born in 1902 who pretty much invented paediatric surgery.
helenic's piece on confidence and how it affects women who write about tech in public. Also
rmc28 asked for women in science and technology to represent, so I thought I might have a go. Among other things it will serve as an introduction to my professional side for all the new people who just subscribed.My official title is Lecturer in Bioscience, at a small but research-driven English university. What I actually do is spend half my time teaching life sciences to the undergraduate medical students, and half my time setting up a cancer research group. Well, eventually it will be set up and then I'll be spending half my time doing actual research.
In more detail, my subject is cancer cell biology. I'm interested in how cells make the "decision" to grow and divide or remain static or die, how cancer can result when those decision processes go wrong, and how to use that information to develop better cancer drugs. I spend some of my time developing systems for trying out thousands of compounds on cancer cells to pick the ones that are best at making the cancer cells die but doing minimal harm to normal cells. And some of my time trying to figure out exactly what's going on when cells start growing, and how their natural defence mechanisms work to prevent inappropriate growth and cancer. (One of those natural defence mechanisms is a protein called p53, which is pictured in my icon.)
What I love about my work is the balance between teaching and research. The teaching gives me human contact and immediate gratification. I've always loved teaching, and it's fantastic to be working with these bright, motivated students who find my subject nearly as fascinating as I do. Having that in my life makes it much more possible for me to do the research part, which I love because it's endlessly interesting and an intense intellectual challenge; there's no ceiling on how well I can do it. But at the same time it can be quite isolating and sometimes frustrating, because it may take weeks, months or even years before I see whether my effort has yielded any useful progress.
I am a little uncomfortable with the concept of Ada Lovelace day, to be honest. I think it can make a difference to see visible women doing STEM subjects. It's just that when I was a kid I found it really frustrating that I was always expected to have female role models, I was pushed into fangirling Rosalind Franklin when I wanted to fangirl Francis Crick, assumed because of my gender to be more interested in Dorothy Hodgkin than Max Perutz and so on. In some ways the message I want to send out to girls and young women is that they can do anything they want and gender doesn't matter, not that we can manage to find one or two female names in the list of influential scientists in your field, so that makes it ok for girls to have science ambitions.
But then, I did have one very important female role model growing up: my grandmother, who qualified as a doctor around the start of WW2 and devoted her whole life (literally, she died in the middle of a consultation with a patient) to women's and children's health, especially in deprived parts of the country. She also worked closely with Isabella Forshall, a surgeon born in 1902 who pretty much invented paediatric surgery.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-03-28 10:11 pm (UTC)Though I am not anymore, I was one of those women in a science and technology related field. I wasn't going 'deep,' though I did toy with possibly going into computer engineering for a while, I was taking an intense two-year post-secondary program to do something rather specific (broadcast electronics.) But in the two times I attempted the program I was either the only or one of two or three women in it. And the specific field is very male-dominated.
I mean, it's not only a lot to do with electronics and digital science, it's an end career as some sort of technician (as opposed to an engineer, etc.)
I grew up very interested in and surrounded by electronics, computers, and technology in general thanks to my father. I'm terrible at arithmetic (numbers do not stick in my head) but great at mathematics so long as I keep track. Algebra in Jr. High got me hooked, up until that point I was all about English and Social Studies and Art and Music.
The road wasn't all bad, but wasn't all great. I had some wonderful support, and some wonderful role-models (many of them men.) I am fortunate that when I look back on my life I can see that I had many strong women role models of various types, but also had no real problems identifying with men as role models either (and indeed, found it easier to socialize with boys for most of my childhood.)
Some women friends of mine though received some terrible treatment and attitudes throughout their schooling with regard to their math and/or science abilities which I find very sad. Encouragement is necessary. And I while I do wish there were more examples of women in science and technology fields for us to point to, and it can be worthwhile to look at the ones who are there, I also agree with how uncomfortable I get when I feel as if I'm being told to like something "because it's meant to appeal to women." It's like pink laptops being sold with the attitude of "finally, there is a laptop women will actually like/use!" except more subtle.
In more rambles, I eventually had to drop out of my college schooling twice in a row despite an ability to ace almost any test they gave me. I did not know it at the time, not for years later, but now I finally understand it was connected to my undiagnosed ADHD (and related problems.) I find myself more drawn to artistic careers rather than anything science or math related, though I hope to keep electronics and computers and technology in general as a very active hobby (keep building my own computers, fun little electronic projects, etc.) It's been difficult though, I find I am filled with a lot of guilt over leaving such a field behind. It's like I have this image of myself (perhaps others around me have it as well, but I am not sure) as one way and it's been difficult to integrate with the other -- I've always had art as my hobby in the past. (I realize that "fine art" has long been an institution of men, with a few wonderful exceptions, but I'm not even interested in "fine art." I'm interested in textiles, which in my mind is definitely fine art. But that's a whole 'nother kettle of fish. :) And there seems to be a competing attitude that I grew up surrounded by, of art and even fine art as being something "girly.")