Prop. 209 may widen faculty gender gap

Friday, February 12, 1999

Prop. 209 may widen faculty gender gap

EQUITY: Female professors hope that gains by women

at UCLA not diminished

By Barbara Ortutay

Daily Bruin Staff

In the next few years, the slowly closing gender gap among
professors may actually increase as the impact of Proposition 209
reaches the level of university faculty.

Currently, women make up 23 percent of all UCLA professors,
according to statistics released by the Academic Personnel
Office.

"It’s too soon to see the impact of (Proposition 209) on the
faculty, but there is reason to worry that the gains of women and
minorities may begin diminishing," said Ruth Bloch, chair of UCLA’s
women’s studies department.

"The irony is that Proposition 209 disadvantages us because we
are a public university – many private universities, as well as
state universities outside of California, still have affirmative
action programs."

Proposition 209’s repeal of affirmative action no longer allows
the university to take gender and race into consideration when
hiring new faculty.

Raymund Paredes, associate vice chancellor of academic
development, said that the university recognizes the low presence
of women in the faculty as a problem.

"It’s a problem, but it’s something we are attending to," he
said.

Despite Proposition 209’s ban on using affirmative action in
hiring, UCLA still recruits women and minorities, according to
Paredes.

"We still have obligations as a federal contractor," he said.
"We actively recruit women and minority applicants, although we are
barred from taking race and gender into consideration when
hiring."

Affirmative action, however, has not been the only factor in
increasing the presence of women and minority professors.
Historically, white male professors have dominated all fields of
academia and according to Paredes, as the years pass and professors
retire, the university’s faculty will become more diverse.

"As older white males retire, the number of women and minority
faculty will increase," he said.

This is the reason, according to Paredes, why the gender gap
becomes greater as one climbs up the tenure ladder.

"Fifteen years ago, women made up 10 percent of the faculty.
Since then, men and women have been tenured at about the same
rate," he said.

For many female professors, however, the slowly closing gender
gap may be closing a little too slowly.

"Of course, 23 percent is far from ideal and I suspect the
percentage (of women) is not only lower at the tenure level, but
increasingly lower as one climbs up the ladder to full professor
and professor step VI," Bloch said.

Professors are divided into three categories – assistant,
associate and full professor – and there are several different
levels of pay in each of those categories.

Step VIII professors receive the highest salaries among faculty,
reaching $128,000, according to Academic Personnel statistics.

Academic Personnel officers could not say, however, how many
professors there were at each level, nor could they indicate the
gender breakdown of professors at various levels. This is because
such information changes every day.

Bloch added that the presence of female faculty also varies by
field. There are considerably fewer women professors in the
sciences. Only nine of the 126 faculty members in the School of
Engineering and Applied Science are women.

In the School of Nursing, on the other hand, there are no male
professors among the 23 faculty members.

"We understand that women are underrepresented in the sciences,"
Paredes said. "Women get more Ph.D.s in the humanities and while we
encourage women to go into sciences, we are restricted by
Proposition 209."

Laura Miller, an assistant professor in the sociology
department, was hired three years ago as an ethnography and gender
specialist.

Since she was hired, Miller said there has been "no specific
drive to hire female faculty" in her department.

"Students appreciate role models," she said. "People are
encouraged to see someone like them in high positions, so having a
diverse faculty is always helpful."

In the past, the chancellor’s advisory committee on the status
of women has addressed gender issues on campus, including hiring
and promoting female faculty. That committee is now defunct.

Currently, another committee, called the chancellor’s advisory
committee on diversity, is attempting to address broader issues of
diversity on campus, according to Carol Petersen, special assistant
in the Office of Academic Development.

But according to administrators, there is no quick fix that will
close the gender gap and the limits of Proposition 209 may slow
down the process even more.

"The highest numbers of women are found among graduate students
and among temporary faculty," Bloch said.

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