State of Gender Parity in Soil Science.

As stated by Maryanne Holmes in an interview about gender parity in the geosciences, “Parity begins when the proportion of women in faculty and professional positions more or less matches the proportion that majored in geoscience.” Should this be a goal in soil science as well? What is the gender distribution in soil science? Does this vary by discipline? By career-level? We seek to highlight the current state of gender parity in soil science by examining distribution as a function of discipline and career-level. Discipline preference will be assessed using data collected by the Soil Science Society of America Division membership distribution (i.e. is there a greater percentage of women in the Soil Biology and Biochemistry Division than the Soil Physics and Hydrology Division?). Data collected on student enrollment in soil science courses and soil judging teams at representative universities across the US will be used to measure the influence of career-level on gender distribution in soil science. In addition, faculty gender will be assessed to examine any potential influence of mentors as well as career-level distribution. Upon the delivery and synthesis of these data, questions will remain including: Should we strive for gender parity in soil science? What does parity look like? Why is gender diversity important within all soil science disciplines? How can we better attract women to the field of soil science? This study will provide a venue for discussion about the issue of gender parity in soil science.