Although women have surpassed men in degree attainment in many fields, women’s numbers in coveted tenure positions and leadership posts still lag behind.
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He also signaled that her stellar performance didn’t really matter.“‘ We have never tenured a woman, and never will; [it’s] a bad investment,’” she recalls him saying.
Life for women in the academy is a different story now. Such explicit gender discrimination is uncommon these days. Today, women are 57 percent of undergraduates at U.S. colleges and they earn a majority of the doctorates awarded to U.S. citizens, according to a recent report by the Association of American Colleges and Universities.
However, women’s numbers in coveted tenure positions and leadership posts — while growing — still lag behind those of men. From the implementation of family-friendly policies to aggressive diversity initiatives, many universities are trying to change that. The American Association of University Professors reported in a 2006 study that women are being hired at higher numbers into nontenure- track positions where their prospects for promotion and salary hikes are limited. Women held just 31 percent of tenured faculty posts and 45 percent of tenure-track posts, according to the AAUP study.
