Harvard President Inadvertently Mobilizes Women in Science
Harvard University President Lawrence Summers told a gathering of academic diversity experts last January that he wanted to make "some attempts at provocation." He certainly pulled that off, delivering what may have been the most controversial speech of the year. He tried to explain why women are "significantly underrepresented" in science and engineering faculty positions by arguing, in part, that there are "systematic differences" between the sexes. "It does appear," he said, "that on many, many different human attributes—height, weight, propensity for criminality, overall IQ, mathematical ability, scientific ability . . . there is a difference in the standard deviation and variability of a male and a female population."
Summers's remarks touched off a firestorm of criticism. "There isn't any evidence of a genetic difference," says University of Wisconsin microbiologist Jo Handelsman, "and there's no difference in aptitude for successful science careers that can be measured." MIT biology professor Nancy Hopkins, who has researched and written about women in science for many years, said she walked out on the speech. "I just couldn't breathe," she told an interviewer, "because this kind of bias makes me physically ill." Within days the speech had been widely covered in the media. The words "Larry Summers" immediately became shorthand for "bias against women."
"I think when you are the president of Harvard University, you are a leader of American education," Hopkins told NBC. "Fifty percent of your students are women. And if the president doesn't think those women have the aptitude to get to the top, that's deeply concerning."
Over the months that followed, Summers faced a nonbinding vote of no confidence from the school's faculty and issued more than one apology. "I suppose I've done my part over the last several months to increase interest in these topics. I wish that interest in these topics had been increased in a somewhat different fashion," he said in April. "But I believe that with the focus that now exists on these topics, we have an opportunity to do some things at Harvard that are truly important."
