Closing the gender gap at academic conferences: A tool for monitoring and assessing academic events

Abstract

The importance of participation in academic conferences is well known for members of the scientific community. It is not only for the feedback and the improvement of the work, it is also about career development, building networks and increasing visibility. Nevertheless, women continue to be under-represented in these academic events and even more so in the most visible positions such as speaking roles. This paper presents the development of a tool based on performance indicators, which will allow monitoring and evaluating gender roles and inequalities in academic conferences in order to tackle the underrepresentation of women. The study identifies relevant perspectives (participation, organizational structure and attitudes) and designs specific lists of performance indicators for each of them. The tool is based on a combination of two multicriteria techniques, Analytic Hierarchy Process and Analytic Hierarchy Process Sort, and a qualitative analysis based on in-depth interviews and information gathered from a focus group. The use of the AHP multi-criteria decision technique has allowed us to weight the indicators according to the opinion of several experts, and with them to be able to generate from these weightings composite indicators for each of the three dimensions. The most relevant indicators were for the participation dimension. Additionally, the tool developed has been applied to an academic conference which has been monitored in real time. The results are shown as a traffic light visualization approach, where red means bad performance, yellow average performance and green good performance, helping us to present the results for each indicator. Finally, proposals for improvement actions addressed to the red indicators are explained. The work carried out highlights the need to broaden the study of gender equality in academic conferences, not only regarding the participation but also the performance of different roles and functions.

Framework for advancing equity in academic medicine and science: Perspectives from early career female faculty during the COVID-19 pandemic

“…As we emerge from COVID-19 restrictions, temporary fixes like virtual conferences may offer long-term solutions for some of the current underrepresentation of women at professional meetings in addition to ongoing efforts to create gender balance in scientific representation ( Corona-Sobrino et al, 2020 ). Organizers must continue to prioritize and promote female, early career, and diverse faculty by inviting them for virtual (and in-person) presentations to bolster their visibility and curriculum vitae, both of which are important for promotion and tenure.…”

Towards diversity in science - a glance at gender disparity in the Brazilian Society of Neuroscience and Behavior (SBNeC)

“…As mentioned before, gender-based stereotype threat is even more pervasive in academic environments in which men typically predominate in prestigious positions. Men's prevalence in societies' boards and as speakers at societies' meetings, absence of childcare facilities, and additional costs when caregivers are needed create an even more hostile environment for women's engagement in higher status roles ( 22 , 26 , 32 ). This is an important issue inasmuch as recent studies have shown that the COVID-19 pandemic will increase the gender gap in science, especially for mothers of young children ( 33 ).…”

“…Recently, a paper by Corona-Sobrino et al ( 26 ) proposed a more comprehensive model to assess gender gap in academic events, broadening the approaches to compile data on organizational structure and women's participation and attitudes. Here, due to limited data availability, we focus on gender balance among speakers at the society's meetings and the composition of the directory boards.…”

Meiosis in Quarantine discussions lead to an action plan to increase diversity and inclusion within the genetics community

“…Conferences frequently lack diverse presenters [12][13][14][15]. We recommend that organizers examine their list of invited speakers with the express purpose of ensuring adequate representation and to determine if it is representative of the general population.…”

“…many efforts, several conferences struggle to foster diversity and inclusivity in both attendance and invited speakers [12][13][14][15]. This is particularly harmful to underrepresented scientists as failure to include underrepresented groups in invited speaker lists, or amongst plenary speakers, can further compound the lack of diversity by alienating the remaining diverse trainees [12,16].…”