President L. Rafael Reif speaks with Fortune’s Erika Fry about Lubna Olayan, CEO and deputy chairperson of Olayan Financing Co., who was named to Fortune’s list of Most Powerful Women. Reif says that Olayan’s mental nimbleness is “an asset and a gift that few people have."
Prof. Thomas Levenson writes for The Boston Globe about sexism in science. “Sadly and infuriatingly, the habits of mind that once almost entirely barred women from the lab remain, less potent, perhaps, but still at work,” writes Levenson.
Stephanie McFeeters writes for The Boston Globe about the social media campaign #ILookLikeAnEngineer, highlighting the MIT students, faculty and alumni who participated in the trend by posting their photos. The campaign stemmed from the negative response one female engineer received after appearing in an ad campaign for her IT company.
Last weekend Institute Professor Mildred Dresselhaus became the first woman to receive the IEEE Medal of Honor for her pioneering work with carbon materials, reports Melissa Lott for Scientific American. Lotts writes that Dresselhaus is known “for her work with buckminsterfullerenes (buckyballs), nanotubes and graphene as well as her dedicated work ethic and caring nature.”
Boston Globe reporter Katherine Landergan writes that during MIT’s 2015 Commencement, U.S. CTO Megan Smith ’86, SM ’88 urged graduates to “be kind, be inclusive, be open.” President L. Rafael Reif asked graduates to have a “bold willingness to disrupt the status quo, to make the world a better place.”
Institute Professor Mildred Dresselhaus has been named the recipient of the 2015 IEEE Medal of Honor “for her leadership and contributions across many fields of science and engineering,” reports Melissa Lott for Scientific American. Dresselhaus is the first woman to receive the award, the IEEE’s highest honor.
Alumna Noramay Cadena writes for WBUR about encouraging Latinas to pursue STEM careers, sharing how an MIT student inspired her. “Here was a successful person who looked like me, who sounded like me, and who truly understood my life experience, telling me I had what it took to go to MIT.”
In a piece for The Huffington Post, Zeynep Ilyaz explains how Prof. Sangeeta Bhatia serves as an inspiration to her, citing her research advances in biotech and medicine, and her mentorship of women pursuing careers in STEM fields. “Dr. Bhatia is constantly looking for the next groundbreaking discovery in health, which makes her an excellent role model for girls and women,” Ilyaz writes.
Molly Reynolds writes for The Huffington Post about an MIT study that found the most successful teams contain a higher percentage of women. “Extremely interesting was the successful teams' ability to detect the emotion of their teammates' written words when they worked online.”
Derek Thompson of The Atlantic writes about a series of MIT studies that suggest that higher social sensitivity displayed by women makes them more valuable than men in groups working on collaborative problem-solving. Thompson predicts that factors such as these will result in an eventual inversion of the gender wage gap.
Julie Hirschfeld writes for The New York Times about MIT alumna and U.S. Chief Technology Officer (CTO) Megan Smith. Smith has “a tinkerer’s enthusiasm for finding problems and looking for ways to solve them," says former CTO Aneesh Chopra.
CSAIL PhD students Elena Glassman, Neha Narula and Jean Yang write for Wired about their recent Reddit Ask Me Anything session and gender disparities in STEM. “By raising awareness and generating discussion, we hope to help women and other minorities feel more supported pursuing careers in STEM,” write Glassman, Narula and Yang.
Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient Prof. Mildred Dresselhaus speaks with Julianna Goldman of CBS Evening News about her career at MIT and what continues to inspire her to come to work seven days a week. "Every year there's something new that comes along that's too exciting to quit," says Dresselhaus.
Caroline Fairchild of Fortune speaks with Professor Cynthia Brazeal about women and entrepreneurship. “The world would certainly be a better place if we had more women entrepreneurs,” says Breazeal. “Women are going to bring a different angle to startups.”
In a letter to The New York Times, Professor Emerita Nancy Hopkins and graduate student Jason Sheltzer write that while there has been “remarkable progress” for female faculty members in STEM, barriers still exist. “Maintaining progress will require sustained effort, while making further progress will require addressing the pitifully small pipeline in many STEM fields,” they write.