“Les normaliennes de la rue d’Ulm: A Long Struggle for Gender Equality with an Unexpected Impact”

Anne-Sophie Godfroy (Université Paris Sorbonne & Université Paris Est Créteil)

The Ecole Normale Supérieure rue d’Ulm in Paris, is one of the most famous institutions in France. The school used to a boys’ school and had a girls’ counterpart, the Ecole Normale de Sèvres. The aim of this paper is to present the different periods of the struggle towards gender equality at ENS and to question the unexpected impact of the merging of Ulm and Sèvres in 1985. Between 1910 and 1939, 44 women students entered the male ENS, but they obtained the official status of student only in 1926. The reason for being allowed to enter the boys’ school was because curricula were not similar, but equal access to knowledge was acknowledged by the law. The second period opened in 1939. The female director of Sèvres, Eugénie Cotton, a feminist activist, a communist and a resistant had struggled to develop scientific laboratories and research in Sèvres. With similar curricula, there was no more reasons for girls to study at Ulm. Anyway, the merging of the two schools was considered as the next symbol of equality. A third period is opened in 1985 with the merging of Ulm and Sèvres. It was pushed by alumnae who became politicians and top civil servants and came to power during the first term of President Mitterrand. After merging, the number of female students and female professors declined dramatically, especially in science. This outcome had not been anticipated, but nobody would imagine going back to quotas or separate schools.

“Kinds of Activism by American Women Scientists”

Margaret Rossiter (Cornell University)

Before 1969 the only kind of activism used by American women scientists was for an individual to write a letter-to-the-editor of a newspaper or journal protesting inaccuracies or misconceptions in a recent article. They were more systematic at forming groups of their own, setting up prizes and fellowships, and striving to work individually to exceed expectations so that they might be seen as an “exceptions.” Yet even if successful for an individual this strategy would not change “the system.”

But in 1969 a small group of women from Yale University adopted a tactic from the civil rights movement – the somewhat confrontational “sit-in.” Led by Yale‘s Mary Clutter and Virginia Walbot several persons “sat in” at the council meeting of the AAAS, demanding an office for women. Eventually this was agreed to. Supported by outside funding and led by political scientist Janet Welsh Brown this new Office of Opportunities staged events, wrote reports, and compiled rosters, and built up a coalition that lobbied the U.S. Congress for funds for special programs for women. Eventually (1980) they got Congress to pass the Women in Science Bill that created several educational and training programs. They might have gotten even more had they made appropriate financial contributions to key members of Congress.

These were all a positive kind of ladylike protest – petitioning for support for nurturing, philanthropic, and constructive activities – rather than other more confrontational tactics.

“The Challenge of Exercising Power by Women Scientists in Power: University Presidents & Women Activists in the 2005 Debate on the Under-representation of Women in Science”

Pnina Abir-Am (Brandeis University)

The year long debate on the under-representation of women in science in 2005, (triggered by L. Summers' efforts to "explain" its causes by three “hypotheses” such as the women's innate lesser fitness for science, their presumed lack of interest in demanding jobs due to family issues, and socialization into immutable gender roles) provided many opportunities for leadership in a key aspect of gender inequality. However, the response of public figures, both women and men, was timid and limited. Following a brief historical example of Dorothy Hodgkin's leadership in creating an "empire of the dispossessed" in the 1940s-1970s; (i.e. a lab made of women, colonial, and refugee scientists with which she achieved a sole Nobel Prize) the talk examines the strategies of women scientists who played a key role in this debate. It focuses on how University Presidents Susan Hockfield of MIT and Shirley Tilghman of Princeton (both molecular biologists) built a coalition with Stanford President John Hennessy, (a computer scientist) yet limited their public pronouncements to a defense of junior women scientists only. The talk seeks to clarify how the prior experience of these women scientists in power (e.g. their own career trajectories, roles in policy making) both enabled and constrained their performance of sudden leadership on a public issue that long reverberated not only in the US but also world wide. The talk concludes with drawing lessons from their experience in better preparing women scientists of this generation for related challenges in the future.

“Processing an Upgrade: Grace Hopper and Beatrice Worsley’s Activism for Women in Computing, 1945-1972”

Jennifer Thivierge (University of Ottawa)

Grace Hopper is a well-known American computer scientist who began her long and distinguished career during the Second World War. Her advocacy work encouraged women to become involved in the new field of computing, one that was expected to be a ‘natural fit’ for them. Her story is a testament to the long legacy she built as a computer scientist in the United States. Considered as Hopper’s Canadian counterpart, Beatrice Worsley also paved a path toward the recognition of women in computer science. At the request of the Royal Commission on the Status of Women (1967-1970), Beatrice started to identify and collect the names of female computer scientists of her day. Her sudden death in 1972 put an end to this task, but this paper will discuss her previous efforts to bring women in computer science. Beatrice’s activism tended to focus on her status as the first Canadian female computer scientist, but she deserves to be recognized for her contribution to the history of Canadian computing. Comparing Worsley and Hopper will highlight the main features of their respective trajectories as well as the specific contexts in which they pursued their activism.

“’Looking Forward, Looking Back’: The Activism of Women Scientists and Engineers in Canada, 1989- 2010”

Ruby Heap (University of Ottawa)

The quote above is the title of a 1992 address by University of Toronto Professor Ursula Franklin, a reputed scientist and well-known Canadian feminist activist, on the impact of the murder of fourteen female engineering students at Montréal’s École Polytechnique, on December 6, 1989. Looking forward, she explained, the tragedy was a catalyst that led to an increased public awareness of the continuing problem of women’s under-representation in science and engineering, and to a new wave of mobilization within the community of women scientists and engineers in Canada. This paper will discuss the main features of this new phase of activism during the two decades following the Montreal Massacre. It will look back at its roots in the pioneering efforts of a first generation of activists who established several advocacy groups and organizations and campaigned for the equal participation of women and men in science and engineering. Their successors engaged for their part in a fertile period of institutional activism, which was supported by the state, the universities and the private sector. A new and broader leadership also emerged, which shaped agendas for change across the country. The period was also marked by the growth of francophone activism in Canada and the development of international collaborations. Finally, the paper will discuss the relationship between the women’s movement and this new phase of women’s activism in science and engineering.