Today is Women’s Equality Day, which seems like an appropriate occasion to mention some numbers I’ve been considering on the baccalaureate origins of physics PhDs from the Survey of Earned Doctorates. Carleton College ranks 5th among liberal arts colleges (behind four Seven Sisters colleges) and 12th among all institutions (liberal arts colleges and research universities) for the number of female physics PhD recipients between 1966 and 2009. How many female physics PhDs from Carleton were there during that 44 year period? 25. This number doesn’t include astronomy or engineering PhDs, and many of our majors go into those closely-related fields. Nevertheless, it’s a reminder that when it comes to women in physics, we’re still talking small numbers.
