9/29/2017 0 Comments Project 02: Individual ReflectionWhy is it challenging for women and minorities to break into STEM fields? What sort of obstacles do they face? Is this a problem that needs to be addressed or an inevitable reality we should accept?
It's challenging for women and minorities to break into STEM fields because of the adversity that they have to face the entire way through from as far back as primary education. Girls aren't seen as smart in STEM subjects as their male peers, and there's a greater percentage of minorities who are relatively poverty-stricken compared to their white counterparts, which generally is connected with a sub-optimal primary education experience. Applying to schools may be aided by affirmative action, but for women and minorities wishing to pursue STEM majors, they will have to be prepared to enter an atmosphere where they are a minority in both the classroom and the industry that follows. Once they're applying to jobs, they may be passed up for a similar or slightly less qualified candidate with a more obviously male or white name due to the stigma surrounding hiring women and minorities for certain roles or in certain fields. Once they have those jobs, they likely have obstacles to overcome in a white-male dominated environment and field, ranging from sexual harassment, racism, lesser pay, and more. As discussed in the "Squadcast", they have to be strong and possess extraordinary ability to perform in order to succeed. As I've expressed in an earlier blog post on diversity, more diverse teams are more successful teams. In my opinion, I think we need to look one step further and see that it should be a focus from a moral/ethical standpoint in addition to a results-driven one. Are role models important? Growing up, did you have any role models? Who has inspired you or motivated you to pursue your STEM field? Discuss whether or not the person you profiled inspires you and if the person's story resonates with you. I personally think that there is value in having role models, although I don't think it's completely necessary or should be a primary motivator for someone's personal journey. Growing up, I looked up to a couple of sports stars that seemed to embody qualities that I personally wished to emulate through my life. They were viewed as generally clean, upstanding individuals. They were respected by their teammates, not only for their skills, but for their character. They were captains of their teams, in which case the quality leadership they seemed to display were significantly more intriguing to me than the title of "captain". I loved looking at examples of outstanding, positive, well-rounded people. Even though I felt their life's circumstances and respective personalities were unique, they were tangible examples of people who held all of those qualities I valued from early on. I wasn't personally inspired to pursue a STEM degree by anyone other than myself, really. I found my way into CS because of its value in the job market and my personal interest coming into Notre Dame in wanting to be challenged by the discipline I'd choose to pursue. While I didn't have a role model that inspired me to pursue a CS degree, I can say that many of the role models I've held over the years have been similar in the sense that they had come from tough background and had to constantly overcome personal adversity through the course of their lives and to where they got to at the point that I was looking at them and being inspired. "Squadcast" Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfcOSEs0cUU&t
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AuthorNikolas Dean Brooks is a current Senior at Notre Dame. This blog is for the "Ethics and Professional Issues" course under Dr. Peter Bui. Archives |