I don't like teaser headlines, so here's a quick summary: when you co...

David Eppstein - 2014-10-04 18:53:19-0700 - Updated: 2014-10-08 14:43:42-0700

I don't like teaser headlines, so here's a quick summary: when you compare equally productive computer science researchers the women are less likely to be tenured than the men. (The same thing happens in sociology, too, and presumably in many other fields not tested by this study.) The article does not say why this happens but I'm sure we could all speculate. #Feminism #academia

Study raises questions about why women are less likely than men to earn tenure at research universities @insidehighered

Suresh Venkatasubramanian - 2014-10-04 20:10:00-0700

The comments are a little depressing.

Carlos Scheidegger - 2014-10-05 08:44:09-0700

"The comments on any article about feminism justify feminism", Lewis' law

Jeff Erickson - 2014-10-05 12:38:02-0700

In sociology, she found that the odds of a woman earning tenure were 51 percent lower than for men, when controlling for research productivity. In computer science, the figure was 55 percent. Those gaps are "highly significant," she said. — Yikes. That's putting it mildly.

Michael Nielsen - 2014-10-05 12:59:41-0700 - Updated: 2014-10-05 13:00:05-0700

+Carlos Scheidegger Nice. I was interested, so tracked down the source, in case anyone else is curious: https://twitter.com/helenlewis/status/233594800908169217

Chandra Chekuri - 2014-10-05 13:55:46-0700

I find the CS stat not so believable, at least, at universities that I am familiar with. It would be interesting to see the data and the methodology more closely.

Jeff Erickson - 2014-10-05 15:59:19-0700

I don't think the detailed methodology really matters. If it's even possible to slice the data so that women appear half as likely to get tenure as men with comparable research records, there is a serious problem.

That said, I am also looking forward to reading the paper.

Suresh Venkatasubramanian - 2014-10-05 17:22:56-0700

Given that an average observer at a random university might only observe one tenure case a year (if that), I don't think our individual viewpoints are statistically useful. But yes, seeing the paper would be ideal.

Erin Chambers - 2014-10-06 18:54:27-0700

I'd have to say that my anecdotal experiences make this seem completely believable, so I'll be interested to read the full paper as well.

Sorelle Friedler - 2014-10-07 09:06:50-0700

Yup, totally believable. And I feel no need to read the paper - any methodological quirks that brought that number from 55 to 50 or to 60 would make no effective difference to my experience of the results.