Another reason Xavier has such high graduation rates for African American women in science is that it has a critical mass of students of color doing science. The students have each other, they can talk to each other, and they look to each other and Xavier alums as role models in science. This can make all the difference in the world. The critical mass required for this type of group-wide support is absent in most non-HBCUs. The ADVANCE team aims to create similar environments for faculty to have a safe space where they can talk and address important issues with people who are like minded and share intersectional boundaries and thus be connected to a larger campus-wide faculty network.
I grew up in South Africa. While at university I tutored students from Soweto who were boycotting their apartheid education. Each Saturday they traveled more than two hours to learn math and science from a naive undergraduate, who was younger than most of them. This experience made me realize how important education is and the lengths some people go to get it. At Connecticut College I do a lot of chemistry outreach and get to see the different levels of preparation students receive. Based on 25 years of personal experience, I argue that the inequities (facilities, class size, and equipment) between the richer and poorer schools that I visit in the Northeast are growing worse. In 2007 I started, and today still direct, an undergraduate program that prepares students from underrepresented groups for a variety of science-related careers and provides a solid foundation for graduate study or medical school. Participants in the Science Leader program come from socioeconomically disadvantaged backgrounds, and priority is given to students of color, first-generation college students, students with disabilities, and women in mathematics, computer science, and physics. The program is based on cohort formation through a first-year seminar, an associated field trip, and research. As students go through the college acclimation experience together, they quickly become part of the larger Science Leader community. They learn from advanced students about what to expect in certain courses. Older students organize study groups, peer tutoring sessions, and social gatherings and assist with the orientation of incoming students. This creates a supportive network of science professionals and graduate and undergraduate students that grows and strengthens organically. Since 2007, 104 students have entered Connecticut College under the Science Leader program, an average of approximately 15 students per year. The six-year graduation rate for students in the Science Leader program is 97 percent. As of spring 2019, Science Leader students have obtained six medical degrees, one doctorate, and eight master’s degrees in STEM fields and six other graduate degrees. Twenty-four Science Leader alums are currently enrolled in graduate schools. The Science Leader program has been named a recipient of INSIGHT into Diversity magazine’s 2019 Inspiring Programs in STEM Award.
I wish we didn’t need this program, but it has become increasingly important and relevant. Most universities have been forced to introduce similar initiatives. The program is both one of the most rewarding and most depressing facets of my job.
Nobel Prizes
What Do They Say about Diversity?
As I write this we have just gone through another Nobel Prize season. The three Nobel Prizes in chemistry, physics, and medicine are the scientific equivalents of the Academy Awards. Just as for the Oscars, there is a pre-Nobel buzz; scientists are trying to predict who will be awarded the year’s prizes. In the days and weeks following the announcement of the awards, there is a thorough analysis of the winners and their research and sympathizing with those who, unjustly of course, didn’t get an award. It doesn’t take a very detailed investigation to discover that women and black scientists are not proportionally represented among the laureates, the United States does better than most countries, and China has surprisingly few science Nobel laureates.
In 1895, five Nobel Prizes were established according to Alfred Nobel’s will. The first prizes in chemistry, literature, physics, and medicine were awarded in 1901. Each prize can be awarded to no more than three people, and prizes may not be awarded posthumously.
The annual Nobel announcements occur in October, which is Black History Month in the United Kingdom. This is rather ironic, as no black scientist has ever won a Nobel Prize in science. Zero of the 617 STEM laureates! The reasons for this are the limited opportunities black (especially African) students have and the biases, hurdles, and lack of role models that they experience in science. Not enough young black students are choosing science, and there are not enough black full professors in the sciences at elite universities, where the networks and reputations required for winning a Nobel are made. Unfortunately, it is impossible to give Africa the same economic and political power as the global North. But “if we want more black scientists and eventually Nobel laureates, then similar direct strategic action (as has been used to increase the numbers of women in science) is urgently needed.”[17]
Immigrants to the United States
Thirty seven of the eighty-nine U.S. citizens awarded a Nobel Prize since 2000 were foreign born. Most notably, all six American winners of the 2016 Nobel Prize in economics and STEM fields were immigrants to the United States.
American universities consistently perform extremely well in all global rankings of academic institutions. Foreign graduate students flock to the United States. In 2015, more than half the computer science, engineering, mathematics, and statistics graduate students were international students. Most of these students return to the countries of their birth upon completing their graduate studies, but a significant number of the very best stay in the United States and become naturalized citizens. In a disturbing trend, the NSF reports that the number of international graduate students coming to the United States dropped by 22,000 (5.5 percent) in 2017.[18] Inside Higher Education reports that the high cost of US higher education, visa denials and delays, the political and social environment in the United States, and increasing competition from other countries are responsible for this decrease.[19] Had the proposed tax on graduate fellowships passed Congress (it barely failed in 2017), the decrease would surely have been greater than just 5.5 percent. In 2018, the number of international students dropped again, especially in universities in the central parts of the United States and at lesser ranked universities. The numbers of students coming from Canada and Mexico also declined.[20]
What will this drop in international STEM graduate students, often the best from their countries, mean to science research? This change in demographics does not bode well for science in the United States. We need to be careful we don’t lose touch with this very important talent pool. Not only do immigrants contribute to an inordinately high number of Nobel awards, but they also bring new ways of thinking to their research labs. They come from other cultures and have learned their science in different educational systems, which place different emphases on rote learning, historic understanding, and interdisciplinary research. They often bring an alternative and important perspective that a homogeneous scientific community cannot match.
Women in Science
Between 1901 and 2019, there were 213 Nobel awardees in physics, 184 in chemistry, and 219 in medicine. Over that period women were only awarded 3 Nobel Prizes in physics, 5 in chemistry, and 12 in medicine.
Donna Strickland was awarded the 2018 Nobel physics prize with her PhD mentor, Gérard Mourou. Strickland was the first woman to be awarded a physics prize in 55 years. At the University of Rochester, Strickland and Mourou together developed the most intense and shortest laser pulses ever produced in a laboratory. Mourou had the idea, and Strickland made it work. Besides being an impressive scientific advance, their technique has resulted in high-intensity lasers that have been used in millions of corrective eye surgeries.[21]