In sparkling new classrooms at the Jerry R. Junkins ElectricalEngineering building and the Dedman Life Sciences Center, the oldstereotypes hold true — female professors are all butinvisible.
While there has been an increase in the number of femalestudents in the sciences, and particularly in engineering, thenumber of female professors has not kept pace.
Of the 109 faculty members employed in chemistry, geology,economics and the School of Engineering, only 17 professors —16 percent — are women. Almost one-third of the students inthese departments are female.
“That doesn’t surprise me at all,” said NathalieRaad, a junior mechanical engineering major. “I’ve hadtwo female engineering professors in my three years atSMU.”
Two of the engineering departments, electrical engineering andenvironmental and civil engineering, employ 27 faculty members butno women. Engineering as a whole has only five female professorsout of 51 faculty members. A little more than 30 percent ofengineering majors are female.
“It is rather unfortunate from the standpoint of nothaving strong female role models in this field,” said juniorelectrical engineering and physics major Anna Stelzenmuller. “I think [a female professor] would be a good motivator togetting more girls interested in the subject.”
Chemistry has the highest percentage of female students, with 31of the 46 declared majors being female. Three professors in thechemistry department, 30 percent of the faculty, are women.
Thirty percent is the highest rate of female faculty in any ofthe departments surveyed, and the three female professors aresecond to economics’ seven.
Women account for 10 percent of SMU’s engineering faculty.This number, though, is significantly less than the proportion offemale majors, which makes up 26 percent of the undergraduatestudent body.
The faculty percentages, however, are slightly better than thenational average.
A study by Dr. Donna Nelson of the University of Oklahoma foundthat slightly more than 8 percent of engineering faculty at the 50top research universities are female.
“Nationwide, only 20 percent of engineering students arefemale. Here at SMU, 30 percent of our engineering studentsare female,” said Dr. Betsy Willis, director of studentprograms and outreach for the School of Engineering. “We are the only university to set a goal of reaching 50percent.”
In 2001, the School of Engineering launched the Gender ParityInitiative, a program designed to increase female enrollment in thefive engineering programs. Dr. Willis is a spokesperson for theprogram. The initiative does not have specific provisions toincrease the number of female professors, but female students saythat they are being quietly encouraged to come back to SMU oncethey receive Ph.D.s in engineering.
“In speaking with my advisor, he had mentioned SMU’s greatdesire to hire female engineering faculty, and suggested…eventually coming back to the university setting toteach,” Stelzenmuller said. “He reported that SMUtries to attract female professors, except that all the otheruniversities are trying to do the same thing, so it’s difficult tobeat out the other offers.”
For the 2002-2003 academic year SMU employed 776 facultymembers; 251 of those, about 32 percent, were women. The universityhad an undergraduate student population of 6,210, about 54 percentof them female.
Even though the proportions are not equal, many studentsdon’t believe that SMU needs to consciously attempt to hirefor more female professors.
“I don’t think that SMU needs to be looking for justfemale professors to make the ratio look better,” saidMelissa Dempsey, a sophomore biology major with a chemistry minor.”I’d rather just have the most qualified professorsregardless of their gender.”
However, more and more of those candidates may be female. Dr.Nelson’s survey indicates that an increasing number of womenare graduating with Ph.D.s in the sciences. Many students believethat it will be these women who move into the academic world,unaffected by the traditional image of the male professor.
“I think that the diversity of the professors is areflection of the way things were,” said Dempsey, “andI think the classes now are a representation of where things areheaded.”
