The last two posts explored articles that showed how the landscape for women in STEM has been changing. This week we conclude this series on the science glass ceiling. Another article we can examine is from 2017. This article is Looking Through the Glass Ceiling: A Qualitative Study of STEM Women’s Career Narratives by Mary J. Amon. It provides a more current look at the science glass ceiling. The article centers on a study examining the personal narratives constructed by 46 women to describe the trajectories of their careers. The study shows that these women viewed general negative climate to be their biggest barriers. The narratives focused more on culture than on institutional policies. This article seems to show that women’s struggles in STEM have changed over the years. Biases against women persist but are no longer as strongly supported by institutions and policy. Instead, they exist as unconscious societal pressure. There are also now systems in place to help women overcome barriers they may be facing, such as anti-harassment policies.  

These articles speak to a society and field in flux. Women are entering STEM more than they have in the past, but still face many struggles when they try to advance. The glass ceiling remains, but as time passes, maybe more women will be able to break through. If any of our readers know of recent articles about the glass ceiling written from their own discipline’s perspective, we would love to hear about them. We encourage you to send these articles to Kyra Cook at kc878s@missouristate.edu, and we may feature them in a future post.

Read “Looking through the glass ceiling”