Monthly Archives: December 2014

College Students Demonstrate Gender Bias in Rating Their Professors

By Roberta Attanasio, IEAM Blog Editor

Back in 1999, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) acknowledged that female professors suffered from pervasive, albeit unintentional, discrimination. Charles M. Vest, MIT President at the time, said in the : “I have always believed that contemporary gender discrimination within universities is part reality and part perception. True, but I now understand that reality is by far the greater part of the balance.” The statement introduced an accompanying study unveiling the MIT pattern of discrimination — or, under a more current perspective, gender bias. Continue reading

Jellification: A Sequel to the Disappearance of Water Fleas from Canadian Lakes

By Roberta Attanasio, IEAM Blog Editor

The plenitude of environmental changes currently underway is leading scientists to devise new catchwords for communicating novel, unexpected findings. Think of plastiglomerates, a new type of stone made up of melted plastic and other materials that will likely become part of the rock record. Now, we have “jellification” — very recently conceived to describe the process causing goo balls to wash up on the shores of Canadian lakes. Continue reading