Press Release

WHAT:

Congressional briefing for members of Congress and their staffs with Nobel Prize-winning scientist Carol Greider and AAUW research associate Christianne Corbett, co-author of a comprehensive report on the hot-button issue of why there are not more women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.

The AAUW report, Why So Few? Women in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics, has received extensive media coverage and continues to generate significant public debate. Drawing on a large and diverse body of research, Why So Few? provides compelling evidence about the environmental and social barriers that continue to limit women’s participation in the science and math fields.

WHEN:

Tuesday, May 4, 2010, 10:30 a.m.–noon

WHERE:

Senate Capitol Visitor Center, Room 200–201

WHO:

Carol Greider is a molecular biologist at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. She won the most recent Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine along with two of her colleagues, Elizabeth Blackburn and Jack Szostak, for discovering that telomeres are made up of simple, repeating blocks of DNA and are found in all organisms. Understanding this biological process has paved the way to a deeper knowledge of cancer and cellular aging.

Christianne Corbett, co-author of the new report, also co-wrote AAUW's ground-breaking report, Where the Girls Are: The Facts About Gender Equity in Education (2008). Before joining AAUW, she worked as a legislative fellow on Capitol Hill and as a mechanical design engineer in the aerospace industry. She also taught high school math and science in Ghana as a Peace Corps volunteer.