Who are we? An introduction to WOMEESA

WOMEESA was officially launched on International Women's Day 2018. The aim of the organisation is to create a unified Australasian network of women working in Earth and Environmental Sciences in academia, government and industry. 

We currently have over 800 members from around the globe. As the organisation develops we are hoping to increase membership from countries around Australasia to create a representative group of women in earth and environmental science across the region. 

The purpose of this blog is to host entries on a wide variety of topics that will be relevant to our members, from academia to industry and students to seasoned professionals. We will have guest entries written by members of WOMEESA, as well as some written by the committee. Please get in touch (WOMEESA.network@gmail.com) if you are interested in contributing to the blog! 

As well as discussing the challenges that are faced by women in science, we also want to highlight the positives and provide a platform to showcase the awesome research being done by women across Australasia. One great way to do this is through our member spotlights, so please contact us if you would like to be featured here. 

In the next few months we are hoping to cover a range of topics in our blog posts, including:

  • Creating a work-life balance

  • Women in leadership roles

  • Unconscious bias

  • Sexism and harassment in science 

  • Juggling parenting and work

  • Imposter syndrome

  • The gender pay gap 

  • How to discuss issues in the media with non-scientists - e.g., climate change 

  • Dressing for success? 

  • Mentoring networks

Hopefully there will be something of interest to everyone, and if you have an idea for a blog post topic that you would like to see being discussed, please let us know!

These charts give a quick overview of our members so far - we've got a good range of experience levels covered. It would be great to have more members from non-academic roles as well so please encourage your colleagues to join!  

We've also taken the results of the WOMEESA survey and your comments (below) and used your responses to help build relevant blog pages.