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NEWS RELEASE

10-1-02

Contacts:
Jill Bystydzienski, Women's Studies, (515) 294-9733
Dave Gieseke, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, (515) 294-7742
Kevin Brown, News Service, (515) 294-8986

RETAINING WOMEN IN EARLY ACADEMIC SCIENCE, MATH,
ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY CAREERS CONFERENCE
TO BE AT IOWA STATE UNIVERSITY OCT. 17-20

AMES, Iowa -- "Retaining Women in Early Academic Science, Math, Engineering and Technology (SMET) Careers" conference will be at the Gateway Center, Ames, Oct. 17-20. The women's studies program at Iowa State University will host the conference.

The conference provides an exchange of research findings on barriers to graduate and early faculty women's full participation in SMET fields. It is funded in part by a grant from the National Science Foundation's Gender Equity Program,

"The conference will not just focus on problems, but also will provide team participants of mainly Midwestern, land-grant universities, the opportunity to develop strategies and action plans aimed at retaining women in these fields," said Jill Bystydzienski, director of ISU's women's studies program and professor of women's studies and sociology. "The conference will bring together science and women's studies faculty and students to work on retention projects that they will implement on their campuses."

Keynote speakers are: Sue Rosser, professor of history, technology and society, at Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, who studies the problems of women and science and women's health; Josephine Beoku-Betts, associate professor of women's studies and sociology at Florida Atlantic University, Boca Raton, who studies science issues, social origins and family influences on women in the developing world; Virginia Valian, author of the book, "Why So Slow? The Advancement of Women in Academia;" Sally Gregory Kohlstedt, professor of history in the science and technology program at the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, who studies women in 20th century science; Amy Bix, associate professor of history at Iowa State, who studies the history of American women's engineering education; and Carla Fehr, assistant professor of philosophy at Iowa State, who will discuss the feminist scientific method.

Registration forms and more information are available at www.iastate.edu/~wsprogram/smet/homepage.html, or phone (515) 294-9733.

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