I was delighted to learn that my 2006 student delegation fellows Prudence Mutowo and Pardis Sabeti have been selected as “Rising Talents” for the 2007 Women’s Forum (see also these previous posts for more on the 07 RTs).

It is no surprise, though, as these 2 friendly young women are real brains and committed scientists in their countries: The American Pardis Sabeti is an Assistant Professor at Harvard in Systems Biology and Organismal and Evolutionary Biology, after shooting-star studies at MIT, Oxford University and at Harvard Medical School. Prudence Mutowo, from Zimbabwe, works as a doctoral researcher on micro-organism archea at the University of Nottingham.

Prudence and Pardis both received the 2006 “L’Oréal For Women Science Fellowship”, an L’Oréal-UNESCO award, given to young female scientists.

Catching up with Pardis, I was wondering why there were so few women involved in sciences. “We need a better science education, and more role models in sciences”, she says, and this is one of the key aspect of her job as an Assistant Professor: teaching scientists and teachers-to-be how to communicate about science. “Children should also be given the chance to see the people behind a project.” Project Runway, a reality show showing designers realizing their project, could be a good source of inspiration for something similar in sciences.

Nevertheless, she shows a great enthusiasm in attending the Women’s Forum for the second time, this time as part of the Rising Talents delegation. “It’s a great network, and there was a good balance between all generations coming together, and meetings for the Rising Talents Group, where we could discuss the issues applying to our stage of career.”

Today, representatives of seven major corporations and organizations signed the “Call from Deauville“, which reports on the position of women in science and engineering and describes the signatories’ commitment to encourage young women into careers in these fields. The Call was signed in the context of the SciTechGirls initiative, a special program of meetings and exchange between some 100 young women from high schools, prep schools, universities and science schools, and some of the most accomplished women attending the Women’s Forum. We will blog on SciTechGirls later today, as the program is still unfolding. Here is the full text of the “Call from Deauville”, signed by Orange, L’Oréal Corporate Foundation, Cisco, Ecole Normale Supérieure, Suez, Thales, and Total.

The figures are shocking and call for immediate action—the place of women in science remains dire, in both public and private initiatives, in fundamental and applied research, and even among engineers.

Numerous studies, reports and recommendations give ample proof, filling up filing cabinets and putting to sleep even those with good intentions. A bad situation is getting worse.

It is time to take action. Too few girls and young women are embarking on scientific careers, leading to the development of a large-scale vocational crisis.

• At the university level, girls make up only 27% of students in fundamental and applied sciences.
• Among those who scored “very well” on the Bac S (scientific baccalaureat), 75% of boys went on to scientific preparatory schools vs just 53% of girls.
• In the Grandes Ecoles and engineering schools, girls make up only 25% of the student body.

It is time to take action. Women are perilously under-represented in public and private research.

• Women make up only 27% of researchers worldwide and just 28% of researchers in France; of which 33% work in the public sector and 20% in private companies.
• Out of 516 Nobel Prize nominees in science and medicine between 1903 and 2006, only 12 women have won the Award, less than 2.4%.

It is time to take action. A “glass ceiling” is holding back the professional progress of women, and this is especially apparent in science.

• In Europe, women represent 50.4% of professionals working in scientific-related fields, but only 29% of engineers, 29% of researchers and 15% of university professors.
• In French universities, 38% of associate professors are women, but a mere 16% are full professors.
• Women engineers are paid far less than their male counterparts: 3% less at the start of their careers and a staggering 42% less for women between the ages of 55 and 59.

We know the facts and we can predict the consequences. The time for sitting back, making observations and expressing regret is over—women have so much to offer in terms of imagination, contributing to research and innovation.

Tomorrow’s world is built today, now is the time for action—we are here, let’s do it.

To encourage girls and women to choose a scientific career path, we pledge:

• To update the image of science by giving aspiring young women role models to emulate.
• To provide information and to build self-confidence through innovative communication campaigns targeting young girls and their parents, including campaigns on academic orientation, consciousness raising and teacher training from primary school onwards.
• To reward girls’ performance, encouraging their talent through prizes, scholarships and increasing the number of women with visible roles in conferences and exhibitions.

Some of these initiatives have already been put into place by those signing the Call from Deauville. Many other projects are also underway, each representing the signer’s specificity, priorities and means.

However, we cannot act alone, the role of women in science is everybody’s business—public institutions, for the role they can play in education and for their legitimacy with politicians and public interest campaigns; corporations, for their recruitment and promotional capacities and support of numerous initiatives; and the media, to explain, raise consciousness and contribute to the creation of a feminine ideal for future
researchers and engineers.

Society on the whole needs to work on giving girls the confidence they need—science can offer a stellar future!

New technologies. New advances in medicine. We hear about a new drug to cure this disease, a protein that has been discovered, a new technology that will improve that process. But, what does it really mean? Are we all understanding the same thing? Who controls what is being researched or how should human enhancement, genetic testing, etc be used?

All of these questions have no definite answer, but the different points of view of a panel on the topic today gave me a pretty good idea of how differently humans can think about one same issue. The one thing the panel really agreed on was that it has be to “ethical”. Nick Bostrom, Director of the Future of Humanity Institute at the University of Oxford, gave excellent examples of how humans have reacted negatively to advances in medicine throughout history, for example anesthesia (something that I take for granted, how could I go to the dentist without it?). How can science and society interphase? According to Nick, through public understanding (when scientists explain to the general public how things work, in my case, it could be the equivalent to learning a foreign language in 24 hours), public engagements where people would have the chance to ask questions (sounds better) and bringing the public in an earlier stage of the research process.

When asked about why people resist to technological and scientific change, he commented that before, people were born, lived and died without really experiencing these changes during their lifetime. About 300 to 400 years ago, changes began to happen, so people have not “evolved” biologically to resist change, it’s psychological. It takes time for people to differentiate between good and bad ideas. Well, that leaves me thinking: how do we all agree what is bad and what is good? Where do we draw the line?