Newsletter VOLUME 51, NO. 1 • JANUARY–FEBRUARY 2021 PRESIDENT’S REPORT By the time you read this it will be 2021, some of you will be vaccinated against COVID-19 and we’ll have or be about to have a new president (both the AWM and the US). The first ever virtual Joint Math Meetings is probably about The purpose of the Association for Women in Mathematics is to take place. I hope it will be informative and enjoyable for all. A list of AWM events appears later in this newsletter. It is also the last joint AMS-MAA meeting. • to encourage women and girls to Going forward the AWM will be playing a more major role in the Joint Meetings. study and to have active careers in the mathematical sciences, and As you may know, after 2021 the MAA is no longer an equal partner with AMS in • to promote equal opportunity and hosting the JMM. Instead AMS is the main organization, but many other organi- the equal treatment of women and zations have signed up for some level of commitment. The AWM has committed girls in the mathematical sciences. to be an “A” level organization, allowing us to provide more sessions with more visibility than we have previously. The COVID-19 pandemic drags on, though now vaccines for all seem an almost certainty within the next few months. Alas, the economic and social toll of this period will linger longer. Women have experienced a disproportionate number of job losses since the start of the pandemic. The Bureau of Labor Statistics figures for September 2020 showed four times the number of women dropping out of the labor market than men. While that was perhaps the worst month, women have been harder hit overall. This is different than most previous economic downturns, where men lost more jobs than women. “The fact that this recession is impacting men and women differently from past recessions could also have broader consequences for families and the trajectory of the economic recovery,” according to Econofact.1 IN THIS ISSUE A report by the American Progress Institute entitled “How COVID-19 Sent Wom- 3 Letter to the Editor en’s Workforce Progress Backward” states “The collapse of the child care sector and 4 Call for Suggestions drastic reductions in school supervision hours as a result of COVID-19 could drive millions of mothers out of the paid workforce. Inaction could cost billions, 5 AWM Fellows 2021 undermine family economic security, and set gender equity back a generation.”2 7 Presidents’ Reflections Women in math and science have also been disproportionately affected. An article 9 Student Chapter Corner in Nature reports:3 “female researchers, particularly those at early-career stages, are 13 Lynda Wiest Wins Hay Award the hardest hit. Submissions to preprint servers, such as arXiv, rose more quickly for male authors than for female authors….” The Nature article continues with some 14 Raegan Higgins Wins initial suggestions for how to respond, including altering evaluation criteria and Humphreys Award de-stigmatizing care-giving. The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and 15 Book Review continued on page 2 17 Media Column 1 https://econofact.org/impact-of-the-covid-19-crisis-on-womens-employment 18 Education Column 2 https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/women/reports/2020/10/30/492582/covid- 21 AWM at Virtual JMM 2021 19-sent-womens-workforce-progress-backward/ 3 The career cost of COVID-19 to female researchers, and how science should respond 27 Conflict of Interest Policy https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02183-x PRESIDENT’S REPORT continued from page 1 Medicine is undertaking a fast-track study focused on early indicators of the po- tential impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the careers of women in academic science, engineering, and medicine. Some of their initial findings are already avail- able through their website.4 Our sister organization, European Women in Math- ematics, has written an open letter about the challenges we face.5 The US math community is thinking about this too, and I hope the AWM will be weighing in with suggestions for new policy. Some of the same, but also additional, challenges face other underrepresent- ed groups in STEM. The title of another article in Nature sums it up: “ ‘It’s like AWM was founded in 1971 at the Joint we’re going back 30 years’: how the coronavirus is gutting diversity in science.” An Meetings in Atlantic City. article in the Chronicle of Higher Education6 predicts that “whatever form the The Newsletter is published bi-monthly. university takes post-pandemic, it will be more white, more male, more straight, Articles, letters to the editor, and announce- more monied, and less accessible to people with disabilities than it was before the ments are welcome. pandemic.” We have our work cut out for us. It’s time to strategize for ways to Opinions expressed in AWM Newsletter counteract the negative forces of the last few years. articles are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect opinions of the editors This year we are celebrating the 50th anniversary of the AWM. The biggest or policies of the Association for Women in-person celebrations have been postponed. There will be no cake at the Joint in Mathematics. Authors sign consent to Mathematics Meetings, and the next Research Symposium has been postponed un- publish forms. til summer 2022. But we hope there will still be local and national celebrations. Circulation: 3500. © 2021, AWM The virtual JMM this month features a panel discussion AWM Through the EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE Decades, with five past presidents. There are plans for a virtual AWM speaker President series to feature notable women representing the wide range of professional women Ruth Haas in mathematics. Watch your inbox for dates and access information. Many of you Department of Mathematics may already have purchased your deck of AWM Notable Women in Math Play- University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa ing Cards. A deck of EvenQuads has 64 cards. Each card features a profile and 2565 McCarthy Mall (Keller Hall 401A) Honolulu, Hawaii 96822 portrait of a notable woman in math on one side, and the other side has a styl- [email protected] ized logo of one of four different mathematical associations: AWM, Mathematical Association for America (MAA), National Association of Mathematicians (NAM), President-Elect Kathryn Leonard and Women and Mathematics Education (WME). The deck allows you to play Treasurer Mary Shepherd five different games. For more about all the work that went into creating this Clerk Janet Beery project (thanks to the team!) and how you can purchase a deck, visit the website: At-Large Members https://awm-math.org/publications/playing-cards/ Linda Chen Pamela Harris Carla Cotright- Kavita Ramanan I’d like to highlight some of the recent accomplishments of the Awards Williams Michelle Snider Portfolio. They have been hard at work examining all aspects of our awards with Donatella Danielli Farrah Jackson Ward Elena Fuchs an eye towards increasing inclusion. Among recent changes are the following. All members of awards selection committees now must participate in anti-bias Media Coordinator Denise Rangel Tracy, training. Awards selection committees pass their recommendations to the Awards [email protected] Committee, which together with the AWM President make final selection of all Meetings Coordinator awards to insure representation across categories. New processes for collecting Alina Bucur, [email protected] demographic information on nominees and award winners are in place. It will Newsletter Editor be useful for understanding and then improving our nomination and selection pro- Anne Leggett, [email protected] cesses so that we do a better job recognizing women from underrepresent- NEWSLETTER TEAM ed groups with our accolades. The Awards Committee has also created (and the Margaret Bayer, Book Review Jacqueline Dewar, Education Column 4 Sarah Greenwald, Associate Editor https://www.nationalacademies.org/our-work/investigating-the-potential-impact-of-covid- and Media Column 19-on-the-careers-of-women-in-academic-science-engineering-and-medicine 5 [email protected] https://www.europeanwomeninmaths.org/ewm-open-letter-on-the-covid-19-pandemic/ Alice Silverberg, Media Column 6 https://www.chronicle.com/article/the-university-were-losing 2 AWM Newsletter Volume 51, Number 1 • January–February 2021 Executive Committee approved) an awards revocation policy. While we hope never Membership Dues to have to use it, this is something one wants to have in advance of it being Membership runs from Oct. 1 to Sept. 30 warranted. Individual: $70 Contributing: $160 Family, new member, and reciprocal The Executive Committee welcomes Donatella Danielli as a new at-large (first two years):$35 member replacing Suzanne Weeks who has just become Executive Director of Affiliate, retired, part-time:$30 Student, unemployed: $20 SIAM. Thanks and good luck to Suzanne, and Outreach: $10 welcome Donatella! In this challenging time, the AWM is a 501(c)(3) organization. EC, AWM leadership, and all the committees con- Institutional Membership Levels tinue to strive to make AWM a supportive and Category 1: $325 inclusive organization that endeavors to make the Category 2: $325 Category 3: $200 entire mathematics community an exciting and See awm-math.org for details on free ads, welcoming environment for all. We recognize and free student memberships, and ad discounts. accept that includes a responsibility to criticize Executive Sponsorship Levels harmful actions, but hope we always do so while re- $5000+ specting individuals. As Ruth Bader Ginsberg said, $2500–$4999 $1000–$2499 “Fight for things you care about, but do it in a way that will lead others to join you.” Please join us! Print Subscriptions and Back Orders— Regular and contributing members living in the US As always, I look forward to hearing your may elect to receive a print version of the Newsletter.