The Graduate and Professional Student Council heard a presentation about the Women's Initiative and confirmed the selection of its basketball co-chairs at its meeting Monday evening.
Jacqueline Looney, associate dean for the Graduate School, outlined key points from the Women's Initiative report, which was released Sept. 23. She paid particular attention to the report's findings on mentoring and child care.
Looney said the Women's Initiative Steering Committee found that graduate and professional student mentoring issues resonated with men and women alike. "We got a lot of comments that pointed to a need for more mentoring, for better mentoring," she said.
She noted that the graduate school has established a Dean's Award for Excellence in Mentoring, which pulled in 98 nominations by its March 15 nomination deadline. The award is expected not only to reward faculty members who are effective mentors but also to generate dialogue about good mentoring practices.
Looney said the Office of the Provost has also been brainstorming ways to improve mentoring at the University and that she anticipates an initiative from that office soon.
Another issue the Women's Initiative report highlighted was the need for more accessible child care for graduate and professional students, Looney said. She noted that child care issues surfaced long before the Women's Initiative began, but that a number of improvements have been made since the initiative kicked off in May 2002.
"The Children's Campus has been expanded... and graduate and professional students have been allotted 30 spots," she said. "Every year we'll have those 30 spots available to us."
Looney said the University has also given $200,000 to 11 child care centers around Durham, thus further expanding graduate and professional students' options for child care. She added that an e-mail listserv has been established for graduate and professional students with children. The listserv currently has about 80 subscribers.
"Overall, Duke graduate and professional students feel pretty satisfied about being at Duke, but there are areas we need to improve and there are also areas where men and women differed," Looney said of the Women's Initiative findings.
She said one of the most surprising differences between men's and women's experiences as graduate and professional students at Duke was in the level of self-confidence students feel after the initial adjustment period that accompanies any transition to a new environment.
"Women tended to have more of a crisis in confidence levels," Looney said. Although both men and women said they experienced a drop in their confidence levels when they first came to Duke, men said they eventually regained their old confidence while women said they never quite achieved their old confidence again.
Looney said women also tended to worry more about having to balance family and work life. "Women thought it was nearly impossible to balance family and career, whereas men thought women could do it," she said.
IN OTHER BUSINESS:
GPSC confirmed the selection of Jeff Kovacs, a molecular cancer biology student, and Andy Baraniak, a microbiology student, as the 2004-2005 basketball co-chairs. Both Kovacs and Baraniak have been through four campouts. They said their biggest goals for the coming year are to run the campout as smoothly as it has been in recent years and to foster more interaction between graduate and professional schools. Although the dates for the campout have not yet been approved, Kovacs and Baraniak said it will most likely be held Sept. 10 to Sept. 12.
The council also approved the selection of Rachel Lovingood as GPSC attorney general. Lovingood will serve in her new post until the council's April 19 transition meeting.
The council's next meeting, the election meeting, has been moved from April 5 to April 12 because of March Madness.
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