California Academics for Equity (CAFE),
a statewide organization of UC faculty formed October 2001
to promote diversity in UC´s faculty and end discrimination
against women. It is dedicated to continuing the visibility,
momentum and commitment achieved by recent activities in faculty hiring.
To be on the e-mail list for information,
contact Gyongy Laky (
gslaky@ucdavis.edu).
Potential Agreement at Labs
A draft agreement at Lawrence Livermore, Los Alamos,
and Sandia National Laboratories for
"increasing the promotion opportunities for Asian-American scientists
and . . . addressing disparities in research opportunities that
discriminate against minorities" is under review at the
National Nuclear Security Administration, which oversees the labs.
UCB professor Ling-chi Wang, who was involved with talks concerning the
agreement, said that he insisted that the agreement apply to all
minority groups at the labs, including women.
(Source: New York Times, 3/26/02)
State Senator
Jackie Speier
will be our featured speaker at the WAGE Spring Meeting on May 11th in
Berkeley. Senator Speier, who chairs the Senate Committee on Government
Oversight, has taken a particular interest in gender issues related to
hiring practices at the University of California. She has held legislative
hearings to collect input from UC faculty (including WAGE members) concerning
gender disparity in current hiring practices.
(See page 2 for more about the 2001 hearing.) Don´t miss the opportunity
to hear directly from Senator Speier at the Spring Meeting and to express
support for the continuation of these investigations.
On a personal note I would like to point out what an important function
WAGE serves as a support system for women involved in discrimination cases
against the University of California and other academic institutions.
There is a wealth of historical information and experience represented by
members who have been active in WAGE since it was formed as a systemwide
organization in 1993 by groups that originated for cases at UCI and UCB.
Collectively, our knowledge and experience of tenure and other discrimination
cases dates from at least 1987. Having supporters who are both sympathetic
and knowledgeable about the process is all-important to those of us involved
in litigation with UC and other universities.
WAGE is vitally concerned with changing the entrenched system of hiring and
promotion which discriminates against women and other groups in academe.
At the same time it focuses on helping individuals find legal representation
and moral support to fight their individual cases. This is what makes WAGE unique.
It is truly a grassroots organization that retains the individual lessons of
past cases while it supports efforts to change the system for future generations.
Your support is important and your feedback is vital.
Web Sites of Interest
www.laboratorygenderequity.homestead.com/youbethejudge1.html
has updated salary data for women and men at Lawrence Berkeley
National Laboratory.
The bottom line, according to Matt Kotowski, Steward,
UPTE Berkeley Lab Local 184:
The facts presented here speak for themselves. You have been subjected
to gender discrimination in demonstrable, systematic fashion for years,
and if you are awarded all you are asking for, you still will not have
been made whole. I am confident that you have a strong case, and I
am prepared to exercise all my skills to represent you in this process.
www.phds.org/Reading/TenureChase/index.htm
has an account of how a male mathematician was denied tenure at
Kenyon College, vindicated‹and denied again. His reflections on
strategies for gaining tenure might be useful to those beginning
a tenure-track job.
http://chronicle.merit.edu/free/v48/i07/07b00701.htm
is an essay, "Men Were the Only Models I Had," by Carolyn Heilbrun,
Avalon Professor in the Humanities Emerita, who taught at Columbia
University for 33 years and writes mysteries under the name of Amanda Cross.
The essay is a reflection on her career in the academy.
It begins with a quotation from Virginia Woolf:
The critic of the opposite sex will be genuinely puzzled and surprised
by an attempt to alter the current scale of values,
and will see in it not merely a difference of view, but a view that is weak,
or trivial, or sentimental, because it differs from their own.