As a committee set up in 2001 continues to assess and monitor the climate for women in the physics department, University administrators have cited a need to increase the ranks of female researchers in science and engineering.
Currently, those ranks remain thin. There are only six full professors within biology, chemistry, physics, mathematics and the four engineering departments. Only a handful more have tenure in those fields.
"If I knew [how to bring more women into the sciences], I would be very happy," said Dan Gauthier, associate professor of physics and director of undergraduate studies. "It's not just physics, but true of all sciences. It's a trend that starts roughly in middle school. That's true for all math and sciences."
An ad-hoc committee was appointed in the summer of 2000 to look into allegations of sexual harassment and gender discrimination within the physics department.
Department chair Robert Behringer said in Europe, there are more women physicists; he pointed to Marie Curie as a role model.
Behringer added that he thinks the climate for women has improved over the past 10 years and that the physics department is committed to hiring more women and bettering the atmosphere.
Kathleen Smith, professor and chair of the biology department, said that the natural sciences attract slightly more women than the physical sciences do.
"I think that in our recent searches, about a quarter of the overall pools have been women and a quarter of the people we recruit are women," Smith said.
Smith said one reason many women are not in the sciences is because many women in academics--more so than men--have professional spouses and that makes it difficult for women to relocate for positions.
"At a place like Duke, the pressures of maintaining a high-level research program make it difficult to raise a family," Smith said. "That tends to be a problem. There are huge problems involving spouses and the last two women we offered jobs to didn't come due to spousal issues."
A National Council for Research on Women report last July suggested that women are still underrepresented in the sciences and in engineering. Although a quarter of doctorates in the sciences are awarded to women, less than 10 percent of those graduates become full professors.
Longer-term national statistics indicate the gender gap in sciences is closing.
The National Center for Educational Statistics reports that from 1966 to 1996, the proportion of bachelor's degrees in engineering for women increased from 0.3 percent to 12.3 percent. In the physical sciences, that number rose from 4.5 percent to 21.9 percent and in biological sciences, the figure rose from 12.0 percent to 39.9 percent.
But Smith said she has seen little change in culture.
"I came to Duke in 1980, so I've been here 22 years or so," she said. "They've increased, but there aren't very many full professors. In the 1980s we thought we were liberated, but really, there hasn't been that much of a change."
Duke's strategic plan expresses a need to recruit greater numbers of women in areas such as social science, natural science, engineering and business where women have been underrepresented in the past.
"We've made a stronger commitment to seeking out talented women," said William Chafe, dean of the faculty of arts and sciences. "There's an awareness of this issue in chemistry and biology as well. I think the overall answer is there is a core of concern about representation."
One place Duke may well look to as a model is the Pratt School of Engineering. Thirty percent of the school's incoming freshman class are women, compared to a national average of about 20 percent of entering classes.
Johnson said that in Pratt's long-term plan, there is a call to double the school's diversity, in gender, race and intellectualism. She said her experience as a woman in engineering offers a different perspective to current students. "I think the difference is a confidence of belonging that carries you through, [and I learned] guys were getting bumps in the road just like me," she said. "What I can tell women students is that it's not going to always be an easy road. When you hit that bump, you've got to believe in yourself."
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