COMMITTEE ON THE STATUS OF MINORITIES IN ASTRONOMY J ANUARY 2004 SPECTRUM A report on underrepresented minorities in astronomy INSIDE THIS ISSUE: So… What About 1 So… What About Diversity? Diversity? by Marcel Agueros Professional Organi- 1 zations of Minorities Led by a team of graduate students, the University of in Physical Sciences Washington Astronomy Department has developed a The Accountability 4 departmental plan for more effectively engaging diver- Side of Diversity sity issues through enhanced coordination of effort and improved leveraging of available resources. What’s in a Name? 6 Marcel Agueros describes how they went about it and Astronomy Faculty 9 what they learned along the way. Diversity Survey: Preliminary Results A Small First Step 10 he meeting was over. For nearly an hour the graduate students and the graduate program ad- Ph.D. Productivity of 12 visor had intensively discussed a number of Historically Black T Colleges pressing departmental issues. We were wrapping up Marcel Agueros is a when a question was casually dropped on the table: 4th-year astronomy SASS: Cultivating the 14 “What about diversity?” graduate student at the Next Generation of University of Washing- Astronomers What seemed like a simple enough question to ask ton. His dissertation NASA Space Science 16 turned out to be a very difficult question to answer. That research is on X-ray Diversity Initiatives meeting took place about a year ago, and we are still selected stars from the working our way to a good answer. However, with the RASS and SDSS Sur- Meet Dara Norman at 17 help of some friends—the Graduate Opportunities and veys under the direc- CTIO Minority Achievement Program and ADVANCE here at tion of Scott Anderson. Meet Bryan Mendez 18 the UW, and the AAS Committee on the Status of Mi- at UC Berkeley Space norities in Astronomy (CSMA), in particular—we have taken some major steps. Sciences Lab After a year’s worth of collaborative effort, the fruit of our labors is a de- Meet Laura Lopez at 21 MIT partmental diversity plan, “To Feed, To Fix: Diversity and the Astronomy Pipe- line at the University of Washington.” (Continued on page 2) HIGHLIGHTS: · Learn about efforts at the Professional Organizations Serving University of Washington to articulate a depart- Minorities in the Physical Sciences mental diversity action by Laura Lopez, Undergraduate, Massachusetts Institute of Technology plan. n recent years, professional or- Americans, Hispanic-Americans, and · Adopt strategies for in- ganizations and committees have Native Americans in science. creasing accountability been established to serve histori- In conjunction with the CSMA in diversity outcomes at I colleges and universities. cally underrepresented minorities in Special Session “Professional Socie- the physical sciences. These groups ties of Minority Scientists”, this arti- · Learn about NASA’s have a common purpose: they aim to cle presents background on the initia- efforts to engage minority increase participation and to enhance colleges and universities. the experiences of African- (Continued on page 3) P AGE 2 J ANUARY 2004 So… What About Diversity? (cont’d) (Continued from page 1) in training graduate students—a topic at the heart of The plan outlines some of the ways in which another presentation, by Johnnella Butler, an Asso- our department can use existing resources to recruit ciate Dean and the Associate Vice Provost of the and to retain talented women and minority students UW’s Graduate School. Dean Butler focused on the into astronomy at the K-12, undergraduate, and distinction between advising and mentoring, and graduate levels, and we hope it will serve as a guide generally outlined methods for creating a depart- to departmental efforts in coming years. And, per- mental culture that benefits all students and faculty. haps just as importantly, struggling with the ques- Finally, with the support of the ADVANCE tion has made all of us aware of the role we can program, we were able to invite the CSMA’s play in opening our field to underrepresented scien- Keivan Stassun to the UW for a week to both give a tists. science colloquium and to work with us, through When the question was asked, the situation some intense brainstorming sessions, to outline within our department was not critical. In recent what eventually became “To Feed, To Fix.” years we have been extremely successful (in rela- These discussions also had some unforeseen tive terms) both at attracting and at graduating outcomes. One of the most remarkable was the de- women PhDs. We have also had several minority cision that the new graduate student orientation, graduate students pass through the department over held every September, should the years, more than many include a diversity training other comparable programs. workshop. In addition, many students “These discussions also had The ADVANCE program and faculty are involved in helped us once again, and we outreach activities, such as unforeseen outcomes. One was invited two professional media- Project AstroBio, that excite the decision that the graduate tors from the National Coali- K-12 students about science. tion Building Institute to host 2 In short, we have been “doing student orientation should two-hour group discussions. our part.” Feedback from the 20 or so The question was asked include a diversity training graduate students who partici- because we realized that too pated indicates that the work- often efforts within the de- workshop.” shops were a success (I, for partment to reach out to, say, one, thought they were incredi- young women, were depend- bly powerful), and we are exploring ways to make ent on one or two individuals and therefore waxed the workshops a regular feature of the orientation. and waned. There was clearly an absence of an So, today, “What about diversity?” As a depart- overall strategy to link together these different ef- ment, we are now working to complete the plan, in forts, and we felt it was time to articulate a depart- particular by adding a section about the recruitment mental approach. and retention of faculty. We have also pinpointed Soon after that meeting a year ago we initiated some actions we can take immediately. For exam- a series of informal discussions, sometimes inter- ple, we plan to attend the annual meeting of the nal, sometimes with outsiders, around the topic of National Society of Black Physicists this February diversity. and to begin connecting with faculty and students at One guest, Maresi Nerad of the UW’s Center Minority Serving Institutions. There is still obvi- for Research and Innovation in Graduate Educa- ously much to be done, but I think we’re all much tion, presented statistics that highlighted the still clearer about how we’re going to go about it. small numbers of PhDs awarded to women and mi- norities in the sciences, and discussed some of the For a copy of “To Feed, To Fix: Diversity and the reasons for this problem. She also showed results Astronomy Pipeline at the University of Washing- from her research, based on interviews with PhD ton,” visit the CSMA website at: recipients, on what makes departments successful www.vanderbilt.edu/csma SPECTRUM P AGE 3 Professional Organizations Serving Minorities (cont’d) (Continued from page 1) NSBP undertakes many initiatives to encourage tives and programs of organizations serving minori- and support African-American students. These ac- ties in physics, astronomy, and the space sciences. tivities include an undergraduate scholarship pro- gram funded through the Lawrence Livermore Na- National Society of Black Physicists tional Laboratory and an annual outstanding gradu- The National Society of Black Physicists (NSBP) is ate student dissertation award. Additionally, the the largest organization devoted to the promotion NSBP began the successful Science Ambassador and professional enhancement of African-American Program. This initiative brings black professionals physicists. Founded in 1977 at Morgan State Uni- to local schools to give technical lectures as a versity, NSBP is a strong force that increases the means to encourage pursuit of careers in science, opportunities, representation, and visibility of black technology, and engineering. physics students and professional physicists. Pending the approval of the AAS Council, NSBP and AAS will, beginning this year, jointly offer a new undergraduate scholarship program for students interested in astronomy, astrophysics, and SPECTRUM space science. The largest annual event of the NSBP is the Edited by Keivan G. Stassun national conference. This meeting provides a Vanderbilt University mechanism for African-American physicists to net- [email protected] work, to discuss current scientific developments, and to support undergraduate and graduate stu- Published by dents. The meeting includes scientific sessions in The American Astronomical Society all areas of physics as well as professional develop- 2000 Florida Avenue, NW, Suite 400 ment presentations to guide students. Washington, DC 20009 This year, the NSBP annual conference will be © 2004 AAS All rights reserved. held jointly with the National Society of Hispanic Physicists in Washington, D.C. This meeting will SPECTRUM is produced at bring together over 500 African-American and His- Vanderbilt University panic-American students and professionals. In addi- Department of Physics & Astronomy tion to the usual sessions, the NSBP will convene a VU Station B 1807 symposium on the future of the scientific work- Nashville, TN 37235 force. Invited speakers include representatives from government, academia, advocacy groups, and pri- Copyrights for contributed or reproduced material vate corporations. Topics discussed will span a may rest with the author. These articles reflect the wide range of issues, from hiring and career selec- opinions of the authors, which are not necessarily tion behavior to reliance on foreign scientists in the those of the editor, Vanderbilt University, or the AAS. SPECTRUM is published for the personal use American science and engineering workforce.