Of mice and men - gender equity in science

Interactive start: the group exercise (All pictures: Melitta Schubert, OVGU)

On 24^th of September the SFB 854 invited young scientists from DFG-funded research consortia to the Gesellschaftshaus Magdeburg. Topic of the meeting was "Raising awareness of gender issues in science and research".

Dr. Sandra Tiefel, the equal opportunities officer of the OVGU welcomed the attendees. Directly afterwards, everyone was confronted with and encouraged to reflect upon their own gender stereotypes during a group exercise. Walle Gairing and Michael Gümbel, both working for the "Sujet Organisationsberatung" guided everyone skilfuly through this excercise which quickly broke the ice and enabled lively and interesting discussions.

Dr. Sandra Tiefel welcomes the participants

Keywords collected during the introductory exercise

A highlight of the meeting was the following keynote lecture of Prof. Dr. Dr. Vera Regitz-Zagrosek on „Gender equality and gender dimension in medicine“. Prof. Zagrosek is a senior professor of the Charité Berlin and was head of the Berlin Institute for Gender in Medicine until 2019. She concentrates on cardiovascular diseases since decades, in particular focussing on the differences and similarities between men and women. She presented facts such as "stress-induced cardiomyopathy affects women in more than 90 % of cases, yet the animal model for this disease are male rats", which visibly impressed many of the early career researchers. During the detailed discussion it became clear that many scientists in the room made a mental note to address these issues in their own research in the future.

Prof. Dr. Dr. Vera Regitz-Zagrosek gives her keynote lecture „Gender equality and gender dimension in medicine“

Workshop "Leadership in the ivory tower" with Walle Gairing

Analysing the own career path during the workshop "Career development in science" with Michael Gümbel

In the afternoon the various aspects of the meeting were reinforced in three workshops. Michael Gümbel analysed the career trajectories of the participants in his workshop "Career development in science", and showed both obstacles and chances which can occur during individual careers. He demonstrated how male dominated cultures can make it hard for everyone - not only women - deviating from male stereotypes to obtain leading positions. But he also highlighted strategies to overcome these obstacles. Hereby it became clear that there are still many structural and systemic changes that are necessary. On the other hand each and everyone can positively influence their own career by challenging their own behavioural patterns.

A similar topic was dissected in Walle Gairings workshop "Leadership in the ivory tower", which in particular looked at the topic of leadership in the university context. She also included a lot of interaction and exercises. Striking questions such as "What is your motivation to aspire a leading position?" elicited interesting gender-specific differences - and equalities - and confronted many participants with the insight that they had never asked themselves this question before.

The participants during the concluding discussion

...elicited numerous laughs and prolonged applause

The third workshop was conducted by Prof. Dr. Dr. Vera Regitz-Zagrosek and concentrated on "Sex and gender in basic and translational research". She deepened the biological aspects of her keynote lecture, highlighting for example the problem, that many findings from animal experiments can not be reproduced in human beings, because the sex of the laboratory animals has not been considered adequately.

The interesting and stimulating day, which gave the participants many impulses for their own actions and their career was concluded on the patio of the Gesellschaftshaus. Poetry slammer Katja Hofmann provided the brilliant finale and everyone continued to discuss and laugh over a glass of wine and a barbecue. The organizers were particularly happy that, next to many members of the SFB 854, also early career researchers of the new SFB Transregio 287 from the engineering faculties participated in the meeting.

Text: Dr. Martina Beyrau