Inside Stout
Inside Stout
Inside Stout Ep. 2 - Women in STEM
In this episode, we had an enlightening conversation with two female science faculty about the progress Stout has made over the years in empowering women in STEM fields.
Guests:
Dr. Laura McCullough
Dr. Jo Hopp
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Hello, everyone. Welcome to Inside Stout a UW-Stout podcast that focuses on the stories of students, faculty, staff, and others from our campus community. I'm Pam Powers.
Rachel:And I'm Rachel Hallgrimson and we are members of the Marketing Communications team here to share everything that makes UW-Stout unique. Pam, I think one thang that makes UW-Stout unique and I know there is a lot is that we have a very strong arts community and science community on campus.
Pam:I agree. One of my favorite things about working at UW-Stout is you have the Furlong Gallery. You get a chance to see student and faculty art. You, you, we have a fab lab, a campus fab lab where you can go create things. And historically, we're one of the first universities in the UW System to start being a laptop university, which proves just the tech that goes on at UW-Stout.
Rachel:That's definitely a priority.
Pam:Anyway, today we have Dr. Laura McCullough and Dr. Jo Hopp both professors in the department of chemistry and physics. Welcome. We're here to talk about women in stem, science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Please introduce yourselves and tell us a little bit about yourselves.
Laura:Well, I'm Laura McCullough and I've been teaching physics at Stout for 21 years, which is hard to believe, but I've always wanted to be a physics professor and I landed at Stout and loved it. I just loved it. I love my students. I love the classes I teach here. I also do research both in education research. So how do students best learn physics? But my primary research is women in science, gender, and science issues. And I've been doing that for more than 20 years, more than 25 years. And it's, it's a big passion for me. I really want to make science accessible and available to everybody who has an interest in it.
Jo:Okay. I'm Jo Hopp. And I've been teaching physics here for 15 years, which isn't as long as 21, but also I can't believe it's been that long. Um, similar to Laura, I always wanted to teach physics, but when I went to graduate school, I wasn't that interested in doing physics research. So I went into neuroscience and did my Ph. D. In a neuroscience discipline. And, but I couldn't get over the desire to teach physics and Stout being a service department in physics was just the perfect match for me. I could come, I could teach introductory physics, which I loved and I could do neuroscience. And so it was really, really highlights the diversity and the interdisciplinary culture here at Stout. So it was really a good match. I'm also the faculty athletic representative here at Stout, which has been the past nine years. And that has just turned into an incredible passion of mine. So I love to engage. And I often tell our student athletes how important physics is in what they do. So I get to even pop in the physics stuff with, with the athletic stuff. And then I'm the past director of the STEPS for girls program, which, u m, a t closed this past year, but I had a long history of 23 years of inspiring young women, sixth grade girls to really embrace the idea of STEM. And in the last three years, we had the opportunity to inspire high school, age and college age women to really break that glass ceiling and do some leadership opportunities in STEM. And so, u m, that passion of mine certainly has, has continued.
Rachel:Wow. So you wanted to teach physics and then you said, nah, I'm just going to neuroscience. So I want to hear a little bit more about your story, Jo, and then we, Laura, you can talk about how you got into STEM as well.
Jo:Well, getting into physics was really the fault of my eighth grade science teacher actually. So I, I was very fortunate and, I had a family that supported whatever we wanted to do and allowed us to really explore that, which doesn't happen everywhere. And i t's really one of the reasons I, I really e mbrace the STEPS program because I wanted to provide that opportunity even for just a week for young women to be told they can be anything and do anything. But I had the blessing of having a family that supported that. So I was interested in science as a kid and I was very bothersome in class. And so in eighth grade, I wanted to apply for a science camp. And one of the questions was, why do you want to go to, what's your favorite discipline in science? And why do you want to go to science camp? And I didn't know, because I liked them all. So I asked Mr. Snow, what do I like the best? When he said physics without hesitating physics? And I hadn't really heard about physics because it was only eighth grade. And so I said, well, why physics? And he goes, Kuski you always ask me why, why this, why that? And Jo physics will give you those answers. So I couldn't wait to take physics in high school, took it as soon as I can loved it. And I'm like, you know, I'm going to be a physics major in college. And I told my older brother and he said, girls can't do physics. And I was like, yes, they can. And he now credits himself for me being a physics professor because he said, of course I was going to say that I knew if I said that you would prove me wrong. And so, um, went to college to college to teach physics education. I was an education major and I got really irritated because I didn't get into the sophomore class f or education and it was g oing t o delay me a semester. And I said, well, forget it. I'm going to teach the teachers and I'm going to be a physics professor instead. And so I started doing research and I loved i t. I had a great mentor, really inspired me to want to teach others to explore and inspire, but it was magnetic multilayers and I'm sorry, Dr. P eckham, but it wasn't that exciting. And so I thought, well, what am I excited about? And it really realized it was neuroscience. And I had an opportunity to go to grad school in a program that was physiology and biophysics. So I snuck in on the biophysics side and I entered a lab looking at neuroplasticity. And again, just had an amazing mentor. I really have been lucky with support and mentorship through my research experience. Albert Fuchsout at the university of Washington and I just had a blast and he was very, he knew my goals, which were to teach physics. And so, u m, gave me opportunities, let me do opportunities t o, to get that experience. And then fortunately I had someone on the hiring c ommittees t hat i s next to me, recognized that passion and, u m, got t o, to really enter a field where, you know, the discipline is not traditional.
Rachel:Wow. Okay. And that got me very excited. Maybe I should go back to school for science
Jo:Physics. Rachel
Rachel:Yummy. Laura, tell us about your story
Laura:I was lucky enough to have parents who have the physics, the chemistry, the math teaching. So my dad's a PhD physicist. He worked for 3m for most of his career. And, uh, one of my mom's middle school, math teacher, another mom has a master's degree in chemistry, 3m scientist as well. And my grandparents, um, were high school teachers. And my dad took sabbaticals from 3m to, to teach college level. And so I just grew up with science and education and, I just, I loved it. I just have always loved it. Although I have to admit taking undergraduate quantum mechanics from my father was probably the most work I've ever put into any class ever because there was no way I was going to get less than an a with my dad, as the teacher, if I had to work my fingers to the bone. So yeah, I, I, when my husband met me, um, I was, I was 16 and I already said, I want to be a college physics professor. I already knew at that point. And so my path was pretty, pretty well set. I went to Hamlin University physics major, and luckily for me, there were two other women who were physics majors in my class. And they were both left-handed, uh, double majors in art, which made me feel like, whoa, look at you, go. And I didn't, I was just like, perfect. I loved my undergraduate physics degree and then went to physics grad school. Cause if you're going to teach college physics, you need a Ph. D. I went to physics grad school andI said, Hmm, this isn't helping me learn how to teach. So I actually ended up getting a master's degree in physics and then shifted my Ph..D over to education. And so my PhD is in science education, focusing in physics education. And then I was lucky enough to, to get the job at Stout. And again, just like Jo, I want, I love teaching the introductory physics classes. That's what I want to do. So stout was perfect for that. It was just, just what I want to do all the time. Love it. I love it. And I grew up in the neighborhood too. My grandparents lived 25 minutes from stout in Colfax. Cool facts.
Pam:Yes. Yeah.
Laura:So I had, I have good memories of Menominee. And it was, it was great to get here and I've just, I've loved teaching physics here. It's so awesome.
Pam:So Jo, you say your brother, his first reaction was, well, girls, women don't go into science.
Jo:He said, girls can't do physics.
Pam:Can't do physics. Okay. Sorry about that. But That myth is out there. Yeah. How, what, how do we, how do we break that myth? Because there are, I, I could read you statistics, but you both know them as well as I do. What 20% of women, 20% of physics graduates are women. And they make what,$15,000 less a year than the men when they do go out there. But how do we break this cycle? How do we convince young women girls that yes, you can go into science. You can go into technology. You can go into this, STEM.
Jo:Short of having a brother who, who inspires you. He's awesome. So just to be clear, it was intentional on his part. But short of that, um, you know, I realized that it was that foundation that really helped. And like I said earlier, not all young women have it. And so we really need to provide mentorship and, and examples and visual examples, not just, yes, we can do this, but we have to, we have to change our language. We have to talk about physicians. As, as women, we have to talk about scientists as women and really that there is this space and this, this team of, women who want other women to succeed. And that's not to say there are not, I mean, we have allies in, in men and people identify as men wanting women to succeed too. It's not that, but as a young woman, the STEPS program is a primary example of that. The, the age was very, very intentional. Sixth grade, you know, young kids are risk takers and they don't see a difference. They don't see, um, their inability to do anything. And that shifts in, in middle school. And so really providing and, and being that, that mentor and that vision
Pam:Talk about The science andin the culvert, or that you were doing this summer a little bit, which is the cul-de-sac, excuse me,
Jo:The casting in the cul de sac is an example of doing that. And so, Brian Finder and B renda Puck and myself started a little casting in this c ul-de-sac event. A nd it ended up as a result of, a young woman, actually, a S TEPS graduate had reached out to me and wanted me to come and talk to the women in science and health at, at Maple Grove middle school in, in M aple Grove, Minnesota. And I thought, what better thing to do then have these young women do something they have never done before? Except the step graduate she had done casting before and casting and foundry is, is very male dominated. Um, i t's a, it's a dirty discipline. I mean, yo u w o uld g et, you get dirty doing it. And so having Brenda who's amazing in the American Foundry Society and, a nd Brian fender who, like I mentioned, allies across the cro ss, t he genders, right. We have to have allies, um, across the gender continuum to come and share this. Well, we, we did this for the women in science and health class, which are high school kids. And then we thought, well, let's just open this up to, to the, to the neighborhoods. So we pulled up, we had a casting in the cul-de-sac event. We had, I mean, I had a five-year-old casting for the first time and she was so excited. And so to, to be able to say, look at what you just did. And she made this beautiful necklace that she wears. I see, she's my neighbor. So I see her all the time, um, and to say, look what you did and now, and you're not afraid this was hot metal. It was dirty. It was scary. It was new, but you can do it. And we had, uh, we had a five-year-old up to a 21 year old and the young woman who was 21, and this was open to boys and girls. Um, but the young woman who was 21 had that she was afraid to, and it was fun to say no heavy heat do it. It's going to be great. And she was so excited to just have that experience. So we really have to provide those experiences. So that, that courage builds. Yeah. I,
Rachel:They helped with the STEPS program in the past. And I did get to film Brian and the sixth grade girls do Foundry and pour metal. And it was really fun. I haven't got my own little, my little Wisconsin key chain that has my name on it.
Pam:I have alike a cup things that you put, you know, one of those things to keep for your cup from dripping. I have one of those from the Foundry. So from the older days,
Rachel:But, but I can see like what would make someone so like, even I was so excited and I think Brian asked if I wanted to do it at one point. And so I got to help do it, you know, with the big bins of sand. But I was thinking, um, as you were talking, Jo, and I want to ask this question to Laura, well, first I have a little story, but I work in marketing, right? So, and I'm a female. And I work in social media. Social media is generally, I don't know, staffed by women in the industry and marketing and all of that. However, heads of marketing are generally men, which, you know, I have wonderful leadership here, but I look at that and I have felt imposter syndrome before. And I, if I went into a STEM field and t ried to do that, I'm most certain that I would feel that because growing up, I was always an English kid, loved the arts classes, always got the lowest grades in stem classes. And I'm not afraid to admit that. I know I c ould h ave probably studied more, but whatever. So I want to ask you how, like, why does that happen? Like, why do women feel that way? Is it something that people are saying, or is it just something in our culture? What can you say to that?
Laura:It is absolutely a real phenomenon, this imposter syndrome or imposter phenomenon. And it really is all about our culture from, uh, from the time a child is born. They are hearing messages that STEM is for boys, for men. And it's from everywhere. You can imagine it's in television, it's in ads, it's in the boy toys. We get these messages. They're just bombarding us. And we don't notice because we live in this culture where we're the fish in the water, the fish doesn't know about the water it swims in. And so, because we see all these messages saying that science is for men. If you're a female and you're going into science, you think, well, okay, is, is this really me? Is this something I should be doing? Is this something I can be doing? When I went into grad school, I started the first day of physics grad school. And it was 24 guys in the room and me, and that was intimidating. That's what got me started on this research path because I didn't even realize it until 10 or 15 years later, but immediately subconsciously, I said, am I only here because they needed a female in this class? Or was I chosen because of my skills? And I was later reassured that it was, I was chosen because of my skills, but we don't even necessarily realize that we're giving ourselves these messages that it's like, no, am I do I belong here? And if you don't feel like you belong there, well, what am I doing there? I must be a fake. And so feeling like an imposter, like you, you don't belong somewhere. It's, it's really hard to counter act, but what we need to do for people like this is just keep repeating the message. You do belong here. You are awesome. You are doing a great job in physics, in whatever, you're working hard. You're succeeding at it. You belong here. And we also need to do the role models like STEPs. We tried to do with the STEPS for girls camps. We tried to have so many different role models of women in different fields. And that's, you can't see you can't be what you can't see is a phrase that's often used. If you've never seen a female, who's a physician or whatever, how would you even think that that could be a career for you? So there's a lot of different pieces that come to play, but it really comes down to culture. We get these cultural messages
Jo:And excuse me, Pam had asked earlier about the young and how do we, how do we inspire this young? And as Laura was talking about being that sole woman in the, in the graduate class and thinking about, at what age do we start to feel that that sort of imposter that do I belong here?I'm a minority in this experience brought me to, um, when I, when I first started here at Stout, my children were very young and I, I had one of my kids in class with me one day. She didn't have school. So she sat in the back and she was, she was four at the time. And I had one woman in my class. It was a construction management, heavy class. And out of the 48 students, only one was a girl. And she was incredibly active in the class. Very, very real, real successful young woman. But I wanted to point that out to my daughter, like how strong she was and how, how are, you know, how she can do it to inspire her. And I said, did you notice honey, that there was only one girl in the class? And she goes, now there wasn't mommy, you were a girl too. And so that imposter, I mean, that, that invisibility feeling like I didn't even see myself as that other woman for this young woman in my life totally changed my outlook and thinking about how I am presenting to her. And so, um, but my daughter was four. And so at that young age is when I really think is our opportunity to, to push that message of you can be anything.
Pam:You're talking pre-K
Jo:Yeah, she was four and said, well, you're, I mean, cause she saw it just as why does that matter? I mean, she didn't even view that as, and I thought I'm going to show her how girls c an do this. And she was just like, w ell, y ou're, y ou're a girl too. And I, y eah, I was just sort of a reminder that we put this in the culture, r ight? W e're the ones who are putting this on and it's yeah.
Pam:So is there anything specific we can do here at Stout? How Stout can make a difference to help encourage more young women to get into STEM?
Laura:One of the best things that we can do is to provide counter examples that is actually some of the research on implicit bias or unconscious bias in order to get rid of that bias that our society has, that science is male, is to provide counter examples. And so showing the women who are doing amazing things in these unexpected fields, showing that the women doing the Foundry, I was terrified the first time I did the STEPS Foundry class. And, you know, and then I'm like, I did this, you know, so showing everywhere we can, that there are successful women is a huge part of what we need to be doing to counter those messages that society is sending to, to our young children. And it really is young when these, these things start affecting the choices of our young children. It's late elementary school when boys and girls start diverging and their interests, their stated interest in science. And so getting them young is so important and showing them examples is powerful.
Rachel:So I think of when I'm at STEM arget and I'm in the kids' aisles and they have like educational kits and then they have like toys and, you know, balls and mitts and bats and stuff for sports. And I have a nine-year-old niece and for gifts, I don't just want to get her like boring stuff. I want to get her fun stuff. Right. And so I've noticed as a marketer that there are more STEM related if we want to keep it pretty broad, but you know, like one, I don't know, maybe a Christmas or two ago I bought her a, like a, a gem or like geode kit thing where you get to like grow geodes I don't know you could do that. I didn't, I don't know how that even, I don't know if they're real, but either way I've noticed so many more kits that are aimed towards girls that are science. I mean, that are, you are doing science when you work on these things. So I think that's encouraging. However, it's still not, it's still not enough because you know, not everyone has, you know, money, you know, 20 bucks to drop on a geode making kit..
Pam:It gets interesting. When I was growing up, I grew up with four brothers, just so everybody knows. So my influence was largely, you know, I played with GI Joe, because that's what we had trucks and dump trucks, all that thing. And there were, there were kits then that I can remember with my brothers where we were probably, they were not safe. By the way, I should n ote, they probably now would be gone because they're not safe where you, you made objects out of plastics and you were cooking them a nd you were, and those were really quite common. So in the other question I kind of have, is you had Rosie the Riveter from World War I I. What happened? Where did we kind of fall back from. You can do this t oo. Okay. I Where di the I can't do science, I don't do science. Where, w here did that disconnect happen from when women were very empowered?
Laura:Yeah. Post-war Um, the, the whole culture changed to men need to be the ones in the jobs and women need to go back home and raise the families. So the fifties that, you know, that fake idea of the perfect suburb house and things, that was absolutely about m en n eed to be the ones in power. And so we lost a lot there. And it's also about u s status. The field of computer science is a great example. All the first computers, the women who did computing they were women, computer science was women that everybody, u m, and, and so we see that now, when you think about a computer scientist, you have a very clear,. Yeah. Yeah. And so we went from almost all women to computer s cience i s the worst. They actually have the worst number of women in all of the STEM fields. Um, and that's as computer science became a higher status, higher prestige field, more and more men show up. And so that's a big part of, of the problem is the status of the profession as well. In my own background, my physics education research background, we notice in a physics department, traditional physics research you'll have 20% women physics education research it's closer to 40% because teaching is a lower status in the U. S. Teaching is lower status than research. So that's another piece of the whole puzzle is where, what is the prestige, the status of the field that you're in?
Pam:Are we making keen headway and how do we continue? You know? So how is it improving? Yeah. How do we keep that, that, that ball rolling?
Laura:Okay. I'll take it. I don't want to step on you when you have good things to say. The answer is definitely yes. Things are getting better. I often get asked because I've done 25 years of research in gender and science well, isn't it depressing that we're still salt trying to solve this problem? And don't you get, you know, worried. It's like, it's never going to get better. And I say, no, because just in the 25 years I've been doing research, I have seen so much growth, so much growth. Yes. The numbers in many areas, aren't that much better. Physics is a particularly bad one for that. We're pretty stagnant at 20%, but the whole idea of sexual harassment coming out, the me too movement, the fact that we do have well theoretically equal pay, um, um, just the things that happened to our parents' generation, aren't happening much at all to the generations coming up behind us. My mother-in-law wanted to be a physics major. Nope. She wasn't allowed to be a physics major, you know? So
Jo:She needed a brother who inspired her
Laura:Yes. Yeah. And who would go beat up the person who said, no, I won't have you in my class.
Jo:He also would do that.
Laura:Yeah. So I see that we have a lot of growth. It's just that as we make changes, you know, that's the new normal. And then we see, we get to see the new problems that come out. We have gone from overt discrimination and harassment to more covert stuff. The overt stuff being gone is great. Um, you know, we did get rid of that. The covert stuff is a lot harder to fight. And so we, we have different fights.
Pam:Now give us some examples of some of the covert. I kind of want to hear what you explain that a little bit more, please?
Laura:Uh, there's a good phrase that's been coming about. It's called microaggressions and the microaggressions don't need to be intentional, but a microaggression is just a saying something that is said or done that just reminds someone that they are other, they are not part of the group. Uh, my favorite example is from my graduate school days, I love wearing long flowy skirts, like full ankle length skirts, which means if you're going up a staircase, you'd better hold the front or you're going to trip. So I was going up the staircase in the physics building and a male faculty member just stopped dead as he was walking down and stared at me. I stopped. And I looked at him and he said, I've never seen that in this building. He didn't mean it to be intentionally other ring, but it did. It made me feel like, oh, I guess I don't belong here. And so the, the microaggressions are part of the smaller, more covert thing that we're, we're fighting now.
Jo:And, and I think I, I find myself saying them without, you know, without realizing, but even things like when I'm giving an example. And I, I said this earlier to say, oh, do you, you know, somebody says I have a doctor's appointment. And I find myself say, you know, thinking, well, what did he say? I, you know, just those little things that aren't intentional. Um, and, and, you know, you had asked earlier Pam about, you know, what can we do? And I, I try to be very intentional in my lectures to be cognizant of that, um, to explicitly put different examples, different cultures, different names, different, you know, all of the, all of those pieces on there. So, um, it's not always intentional sometimes, unfortunately it is. Um, but it, it does bear reminding that, you know, we, we do it and we have to check ourselves to even it's and it's not just with STEM, you know, it's, it's with, um, I recently had a conversation with a family member and they had said the, the man door in the garage and I was like the what? And, and they meant the person door. And I said, well, why did you go to man door? Isn't it a person door, you know? And there was this, it was an older generation, but it was this, even those things do make you think and pause, and what message are we sending? And the other thought that I had when you had asked about, are things getting better, or what are we doing and how do we inspire young women is bringing science into everything. Like it's, if you love fashion, you love science. If you love baking, you love science. Like those are all, all things we did. And in the final years of STEPS started other STEM in what class. And the one thing, what, like that's important. And we would have people, we had somebody who was very into curling and she came in and talked about, about how science is critical for curling. And we had, you know, our Dean, our interim Dean and the college of stem came in and talked about apparel design and how materials and, and that. So bringing science there, reminding in these what are traditionally female disciplines are actually science disciplines. Also, I tell my, my children and everyone, I talk to that physics of course, has everything everywhere, everything and everywhere. Um, and, and if we just keep that message, because, because, you know, it was like, you know, math, if you're cooking, you're doing math. If you're watching a car come toward you, you're doing calculus. I mean, it's just, it's just that constant reminder.
Rachel:So I do think about when I was in grade school or middle school, K through 12 entirely. And how, maybe this was a time where teachers weren't able to be as creative in those classes. I don't remember any of those messages happening. I remember it all being very standard. Like it just came right out of the textbook and the textbook was boring and I did not have very good like reading comprehension either. I mean, it was just, I had a hard time learning things that had a lot of equations and things I h ad to remember that were specific. But now that you're saying that I just, you know, made an d b aked like 60 monster cookies last night at my house, but I was doing science be cause o f all. Yeah. Because of how everything mixes together and the heat, and wh at i t does to bake it. And, you know, I think about that now. And I think I'm a scientist, I can do this. So it's the way that you frame it. And I think it's so important for both of you to be doing your jobs, I guess, for, for you to, to exist is so important to me now to hear, because I think of young, young women and also know, and, and boys too, to have teachers that growing up, whether it's K through 12 or college to have teachers like you, or you teaching their teachers later on, you know, to be able to frame it in a way that can be understood. And that's creative it's because that's where I come from. I come from creative problem solving where I was taught that you don't do that in science. Like that is, it's all very strict. And like 1, 2, 3 4,5
Pam:In the future. What do you two want to be remembered as?
Rachel:A good one.
Pam:Whoa, scary question.
Jo:Wow. Wow. I want to be remembered as somebody who stood behind and encouraged and empowered, whether it's young men, young women, my athletes, my children that I lead from behind that I allowed them to explore and engage and take risks. Um, but I was there to, to nudge and to, um, know that they could do it. And when asked to set the example. So, um, yeah, I want to be remembered as someone who empowered.
Laura:That's pretty good, Jo. I think for me, I would like to be remembered as someone who always worked to make a better world. All of my research, it's been very varied, but I, everything I do, whether it's teaching or research or service, everything I do I choose to do because I want it to make a difference. And so that's what I would choose if I could.
Rachel:Those are excellent answers. Oh, I'll have to think about that. What I would say later, cause I don't have a good answer right now, but those were very inspiring.
Laura:One of the other things that we can do to encourage women in the stem fields is to show how these things are used to help people, because there's a good bit of research that what women want to do with their degree is help, help people, help society, help animals, whatever. And so one important thing that physics is trying to do a very good job of a lot of fun posters and things. Here's how you can use your physics degree to make a difference in the world. And so along with what Jo was talking about, I think saying not only is science everywhere and everybody does it, but science helps the world and here's how it does.
Pam:Very good. Thank you. You both Jo and Laura, thanks for joining us.
Rachel:Yeah. Thank you so much. And we look forward to seeing what you both will do in the, in the world of STEM.
Jo:If you are lucky enough to have a big brother, give him a hug.
Rachel:Famous last words. So thank you all for listening to Inside Stout, a podcast devoted to the stories of our students, faculty, staff, and campus community. We want to thank Jo Hopp and Laura McCullough for visiting us today and talking about women in STEM, please subscribe to the podcast and don't forget to tune in next time when we share even more stories that go Inside Stout.