Women represent less than 30% of the world’s research personnel. In Spain, they occupy only 25% of the female professorships. At CREAF, only 21% of the principal investigators are women.
The week of February 11 (Day of girls and women in science) begins. CREAF social networks turn violet to promote an inclusive science, with a scientific environment full of women references that inspire girls and boys to be like them, and with an academic system without limitations, allowing women to reach high and stable positions within science community. The Matilda effect, the impostor syndrome, the glass ceiling, the leaky pipeline, or micromachism are some of the difficulties that girls and women face to become scientists.
At CREAF we are committed to diversity. We know that diversity makes a system more resilient, that we need scientific excellence and scientific creativity to have a more sustainable world, but that we will only achieve this if everyone has a voice and participates along the way. We know that CREAF, like many research centers, has an undesirable starting point, with few women in decision-making positions and in the most advanced stages of scientific careers. For this reason, this year we wanted to focus the campaign on the internal drive for change.
We know that diversity makes a system more resilient, that we need scientific excellence and scientific creativity to have a more sustainable world, but that we will only achieve this if everyone has a voice and participates along the way.
We present the campaign #EMCOMPROMETO (I commit myself in catalan), an initiative that wants to make public our personal commitments in favor of equality between men and women in the scientific world. The people who work at CREAF want to make visible and inspire individual actions for positive change, each one different and adjusted to our experience and possibilities.
All these commitments are aligned to CREAF’s general commitment, which is already included in its Equal Opportunities Plan, and together we will make it a reality in the coming years.
If you like the idea, we invite you to make your personal commitment and share it on social networks using the hashtag #emcomprometo y el oficial #11F2021.
VERÓNICA COUTO, communication technician at CREAF.
