关注社会:让年轻女性热爱科学
Getting girls to groove on science
At Fortune's Most Powerful Women Summit last week I facilitated a conversation called "Making Science Cool." Specifically, we gathered to talk about making science cool for girls and young women as they contemplate areas of study and potential careers.
The discussion was led by Marissa Mayer, vice president search products and user experience for Google (GOOG), and Maria Siemionow, director, plastic surgery research at Cleveland Clinic. (Dr. Siemionow is perhaps best known for leading the surgical team that performed the first face transplant.)
For an hour more than a dozen women, including some pretty impressive scientists and engineers, shared their thoughts on how to make the sciences more appealing to girls.
It turns out girls, young ones at least, rather like science. Sally Ride, the first American woman to fly in space, weighed in with some interesting statistics. Ride noted that in fourth grade 68% of boys and 66% of girls report that they "like" science. (Many of the stats used by Ride, and citations, can also be found in this handbook, produced by Ride's company, Sally Ride Science.)
Yet by eighth grade, twice as many boys as girls show an interest in science careers.
The reason, Ride and the other participants agreed, has nothing to do with aptitude — and everything to do with society's attitudes. Girls get the subtle message that science is for boys, and that certain careers are more appropriate for girls.
Where are the role models in popular culture?
More than one woman suggested the lack of role models in media and entertainment didn't help. Where, one asked, were the women scientists on television and in movies? If Disney's Hannah Montana had a secret life as a physicist — or if Zac Efron's character in the "High School Musical" movies had a crush on a girl in a lab coat — quipped another speaker, girls' interest in the sciences would go through the roof.
What's the big deal if science doesn't appeal to girls? It means fewer adult women in science fields, of course. (I'm not a scientist, but I understand cause and effect.) According to Ride's handbook, women make up 49% of the college-degreed workforce, but only 25% of the science and engineering workforce. Google's Mayer said that as she prepared for the science discussion, she started taking notice of the number of work meetings she attended at which she was the only woman in the room. The answer? A lot.
The roundtable participants moved into solutions mode, offering examples of educational programs and mentorships aimed at helping girls and underprivileged kids get exposure to sciences and scientists. Ride's company offers science camps just for tween girls. Exxon Mobil (XOM) hosts an annual Girls in Engineering Festival in Houston at which girls meet women scientists and participate in team- and skill-building exercises.
Some of the freshest ideas were more grassroots. Laurie Yoler, managing director of GrowthPoint Technology Partners, says she hired a scientist from a local science museum to teach a class and do experiments with her kids and their friends. Every weekend her garage becomes a lab, with 8 to 12 kids participating, she says. ("The kids in my garage ended up designing, testing and then building a huge trebuchet and launching watermelons in a nearby park," Yoler tells me in a recent correspondence. How's that for cool?)
After the roundtable discussion, Yoler confided to me that her son much prefers to hang out with the girls who come to the labs than, say, those who aren't as serious about science. Sounds like a potential plot for the next installment of "High School Musical."
在上周财富杂志举办的最具权势的商界女性峰会上，我提议讨论“让科学魅力四射”。确切地说，我们是在讨论如何让科学变得对少女和年轻女性更有吸引力，让她们考虑学习科学并将之作为潜在事业。
谷歌（Google）负责搜索产品和用户体体验的副总裁玛丽莎•梅耶尔(Marissa Mayer)和克里夫兰市医院整形外科研究主任玛丽亚•西姆诺维(Maria Siemionow)主持了此次讨论。其中西姆诺维医生可能因带领其团队实施了第一次换脸手术而广为人知。
在一个小时内，十几名女性包括一些漂亮、引人注意的科学家和工程师，就如何使科学对女孩更具吸引力的问题进行了讨论。
其实年轻女孩对科学并不抵触。美国第一个进入太空的女性萨莉•莱德（Sally Ride）就提出了几组有趣的数字。莱德的报告显示，四年级的学生中有68%的男生和66%的女生都选择“喜欢”科学。（莱德引用的统计材料基本收入在她的公司——萨莉•莱德科学公司的宣传册里。）
而到八年级的时候，希望未来在科学界发展的男生要比女生高出一倍。
莱德和其他参会人员一致同意，造成这一结果并非男女天赋上的差距，而是社会对科学的态度。女孩们总是有这种感觉，认为男孩更适合做科学家，而其它一些职业则更适合女孩。
在流行文化中，我们的榜样在哪里？
一些与会者表示，媒体和娱乐界缺乏对科学精英的关注也是原因之一。一位女性提出，在电视和电影中几乎看不到女科学家的身影。如果迪士尼电影中的汉娜•蒙塔娜（Hannah Montana）的另外一种生活不是歌手而是科学家，如果《歌舞青春》中扎克•埃夫隆(Zac Efron)饰演的角色是在实验室里撞到一个女孩，那么女孩们对科学的兴趣恐怕要超出我们的想象了。
如果科学对女孩失去吸引力，后果会怎样？当然，女科学家的数量会越来越少。（我不是科学家，但这样简单的因果关系我还是很清楚的。）根据莱德的那本小册子，在拥有大学学位的劳动力中，女性占49%，而从事科学和工程的总人数中，女性仅占25%。谷歌的梅耶尔说，自从她开始准备这次讨论，她就一直留意在她参加的工作会议中，有多少次会议只有她一个女性。答案是，很多。
之后，与会者开始讨论解决方法，列举了一些能够帮助女孩和弱势孩子们了解科学的教学项目和教师指导方案。莱德的公司还为年轻女生举行科学夏令营。埃克森美孚（Exxon Mobil）每年都在休斯敦举办“女孩的工程节”，在庆典中，女孩可以和女性科学家进行面对面交流并且参加团队和技能培训。
一些最新鲜的想法来自民间。GrowthPoint Technology Partners公司董事总经理劳里•约勒（Laurie Yoler）就表示，她曾经从当地的科学博物馆里雇了一名科学家，专门办了一个班，教她的孩子和朋友的孩子做实验。每个周末，约勒家的车库就成了8到12个小孩的实验室。（约勒在最近的一次采访中对我说：“这些孩子们在我的车库里设计、测试并制造了一个小天平装置，可以把西瓜抛到旁边的公园，很酷吧。”）
讨论结束后，约勒私下里告诉我，她的儿子就喜欢和那些经常去实验室的女孩子一起玩。听上去下一部《歌舞青春》的故事素材已经有了。
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appeal[ə'pi:l]想一想再看
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ap一再，peal＝pull拉－一再拉－吸引
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联想记忆X单词popular联想记忆：popul人民+ar…的→流行的 subtle['sʌtl]
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adj. 微妙的，敏感的，精细的，狡诈的，不明显的
plastic['plæstik, plɑ:stik]想一想再看
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