The Gender Gap in Science:PAC Special Topics Issue

doi:10.1515/ci-2021-0422

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The Gender Gap in Science:PAC Special Topics Issue

Published/Copyright: October 15, 2021

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From the journal Chemistry International Volume 43 Issue 4

Mark Cesa and Mei-Hung Chiu, co-editors

Pure and Applied Chemistry, 2021

Volume 93, Issue 8, pp. 829-961

In a recent article in Chemistry International (Chiu and Cesa, Chem. Int. 2020, 42(3), 16-21; https://doi.org/10.1515/ci-2020-0306) we reported on the results of the Gender Gap Project. The project, entitled, “A Global Approach to the Gender Gap in Mathematical, Computing, and Natural Sciences: How to Measure It, How to Reduce It?” (https://gender-gap-in-science.org/), was funded by the International Science Council (ISC, formerly ICSU) and was co-led by IUPAC and the International Mathematical Union, IMU. The results of the project clearly showed that women continue to have less positive experiences than men in education and employment across scientific disciplines, geographic regions, and levels of economic development (https://gender-gap-in-science.org/2020/06/25/gender-gap-in-science-book/). At the final project conference at the International Center for Theoretical Physics, ICTP, in Trieste, Italy, a series of recommendations for improving gender awareness for scientific unions, local organizations, and instructors and parents was prepared and disseminated (https://gender-gap-in-science.org/project-book-booklet/).

The project partners and participants at the final conference contributed a range of approaches to reducing the gender gap in science and improving gender equity in their fields. To raise awareness among chemists about these perspectives, we invited sixteen persons from a range of scientific, mathematical and computing disciplines to prepare articles for a special topics issue of Pure and Applied Chemistry. This issue explores the results of the Global Survey; describes initiatives to reduce the gender gap in astronomy, biology, chemistry, computing machinery, mathematics, ocean science, and physics; includes regional approaches to reducing the gender gap, particularly in the developing world; and proposes new and innovative approaches that include networking initiatives and collections of good practices around the world for encouraging girls and young women to pursue careers in science.

Work in IUPAC on the reducing the gender gap in science continues. In 2020 the Standing Committee for Gender Equality in Science, SCGES (https://gender-equality-in-science.org/), was instituted, with IUPAC is a founding member along with fifteen other international partners. A current IUPAC project (https://iupac.org/project/2020-016-3-020) includes analysis of the Gender Gap project survey data specific to the chemical science, a compilation of good practices in reducing the gender gap, and participating in an initiative by several scientific publishers to examine gender trends.

Online erschienen: 2021-10-15

Erschienen im Druck: 2021-10-01

©2021 IUPAC & De Gruyter. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. For more information, please visit: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

Articles in the same Issue

https://doi.org/10.1515/ci-2021-0422