Paul Walton, an internationally reknown inorganic chemist from the University of York will give a public lecture titled: Gender Equality in STEM. It will take place at 4:15 in Sinclair Auditorium.
Abtract:
Over nearly all scientific organisations, across every country and across time one finds that the progression of women in research/academia is significantly hindered when compared to men. Such a universal truth represents an enormous loss of talent, including in our very own bioinorganic community. Recent years have seen some progress in understanding the principal factors behind this phenomenon and there has been some progress in new schemes which are designed to address the lack of women in senior scientific positions. These schemes have also met with some resistance which, in itself, has been revealing of the reasons why there is such a difference in the progression rates of men and women in science. This presentation discusses some of those resistances: why they arise; what they reveal about gender (in)equality in our universities, laboratories, groups; and—most importantly—what can be done about them.
About Professor Walton: Between 2004 and 2010 Professor Walton was chair of the department. His main research area is bioinorganic chemistry, in which he has made contributions to the understanding of copper oxidases, including the discovery of the histidine brace. He is the recipient of multiple awards: the Royal Society of Chemistry's Higher Education Teaching Award, the RSC's 2016 Joseph Chatt Award for outstanding multidisciplinary research, the IChemE's Global Award for energy research, and the Royal Society's inaugural Athena Prize for gender equality work (runner up). He has also been the editor of Dalton Transactions (2004-2008), chair of Heads of Chemistry UK, chair of the Royal Society of Chemistry's Diversity Committee and is one the RSC's 175 Faces of Chemistry. Paul is an internationally-known advocate of equality in sciences and lectures widely on the subject.
