Mary Ann Mason
Friday Keynote #1, 9:10 am - 10:10 am
"Do Babies Matter? Women in Science"
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As Dean of the Graduate Division at UC Berkeley (2000-2007), Mary Ann Mason had responsibility for nearly 10,000 doctoral and professional graduate students. She has been in a unique position to evaluate the unprecedented admission of women, now nearing equal numbers, into advanced fields over the past thirty years. Her research on the impact of family on the lifetime careers of academic and professional women and men, and called the
Do Babies Matter project, has garnered attention from individuals and institutions nationwide. Her data-driven advocacy has fostered major new family friendly initiatives for faculty and graduate students in the 10-campus University of California system, and was recognized in 2006 by an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation achievement award. Mason's newest book expands on the ground-breaking
Do Babies Matter? research.
Mothers on the Fast Track: How the New Generation Can Balance Career and Family addresses the fundamental question faced by high achieving women: "Can women have it all?"
Mothers on the Fast Track takes a hard look at the career paths of the first and second generation of women who entered the fast-track professions of academia, law, medicine, business, and the media in large numbers in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. With data and interviews, the book reveals the impact of motherhood in each of these professions, explaining why and when women leave the fast track, and what allows some to succeed. Mason is a Professor in the Graduate School of Social Welfare at UC Berkeley. She received a B.A. cum laude from Vassar College, a Ph.D. in American History from the University of Rochester, and a J.D. from the University of San Francisco.
Shirley Malcom
Friday Keynote #2, 10:30 am - 11:00 am
"Having Your Science and Your Life Too: Institutional Responsibilities, Individual Strategies"
Shirley Malcom is Head of the Directorate for Education and Human Resources Programs of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). Dr. Malcom serves on several boards - including the Heinz Endowments and the H. John Heinz III Center for Science, Economics and the Environment - and is an honorary trustee of the American Museum of Natural History. In 2006 she was named as co-chair of the National Science Board Commission on 21st Century Education in STEM. She serves as a Regent of Morgan State University and as a trustee of Caltech. In addition, she has chaired a number of national committees addressing education reform and access to scientific and technical education, careers and literacy. Dr. Malcom is a former trustee of the Carnegie Corporation of New York. She is a fellow of the AAAS and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She served on the National Science Board, the policymaking body of the National Science Foundation, from 1994 to 1998, and from 1994-2001 served on the President's Committee of Advisors on Science and Technology. Dr. Malcom received her doctorate in ecology from Pennsylvania State University; master's degree in zoology from the University of California, Los Angeles; and bachelor's degree with distinction in zoology from the University of Washington.
Joan Williams
Friday Keynote #3, 8:15 pm - 9:00 pm
"Time Norms and Glass Ceilings: Exploring the Role of Gender Bias"
The 1066 Foundation Chair and Distinguished Professor at Hastings Law School, Joan C. Williams is the author of
Unbending Gender: Why Family and Work Conflict and What To Do About It (Oxford University Press, 2000), which won the 2000 Gustavus Myers Outstanding Book Award. She has authored or co-authored four books and over fifty law review articles; her work is reprinted in casebooks on six different subjects; she has given over two hundred speeches and presentations in North and Latin America to groups as diverse as the National Employment Lawyers' Association, the Denver Rotary Club, the American Philosophical Society, and the Modern Language Association, and leading U.S. universities. Founding Director of WorkLife Law (WLL), she is also Co-Director of the Project on Attorney Retention. She has played a leading role in documenting workplace bias against mothers. Her "Beyond the Maternal Wall: Relief for Family Caregivers Who Are Discriminated Against on the Job,"
Harvard Women's Law Review 2003, (co-authored with Nancy Segal), and was prominently cited in
Back v. Hastings on Hudson Union Free School District. She also has played a central role in organizing social scientists to document maternal wall bias, notably in a special issue of the
Journal of Social Issues (2004), which she co-edited with Monica Biernat and Faye Crosby. Her current work focuses on social psychology, and on how work/family conflict affects families across the social spectrum, with a particular focus on how caregiving issues arise in union arbitrations. Professor Williams earned her B.A. in history from Yale University, her Master's Degree in City Planning from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and her J.D. from Harvard Law School.
Laura Sherbin
Keynote #4, 10:15 am - 11:00 am
"The Athena Factor: Reversing the Brain Drain in Science, Engineering and Technology "
Laura Sherbin is a Vice President at the Center for Work-Life Policy where she heads up CWLP's survey research. She is currently leading two major research projects: Women in Tech in the Financial Sector and Bookend Generations: Leveraging Common Ground. Prior to joining CWLP Ms. Sherbin was a visiting fellow at Catalyst. She is a graduate of the University of Delaware and earned her PhD in economics from American University. Dr. Sherbin is a co-author of the Harvard Business Review Research Report; The Athena Factor: Reversing the Brain Drain in Science Engineering and Technology.
