How Do Cultural Ideologies within STEM Lead to Inequality?

Newswise — Erin Cech, University of Michigan, will report on several NSF-funded surveys and interview-based studies as the plenary speaker at Diversity in the Minerals, Metals, and Materials Professions 3 (DMMM3) later this month. 

Her presentation, "Professional Cultures and Inequality in STEM," will look at how the professional cultures of STEM, which give each discipline its particular "feel," have built within them disadvantages for women and other under-represented groups in STEM. Cech will discuss the role of three particular cultural ideologies—schemas of scientific excellence, depoliticization, and the meritocratic ideology—in producing these disadvantages.  

Cech is the Principal Investigator of the STEM Inclusion Study—an NSF-funded nationwide study that partners with STEM-related professional organizations to better understand the interpersonal and professional factors that reproduce inequality along multiple and intersecting axes of identity and experience.    

Learn about programming plans and meet additional speakers scheduled for DMMM3, which will take place July 23–24 in Santa Barbara, California, USA. 

Register by July 9 to receive the discounted early registration rate.