PSU Magazine Fall 2013

By Nancy Porter When Professor Gert Rempfer was born in 1912, doctoral programs in the United States were just beginning to crack open their doors to women. In the 1920s women earned an estimated 14 percent of the doctorates in physical and biological science. But by the 1950s, when professors such as Carole Gatz and Mary Taylor were earning their Ph.D.s, these numbers were down by half. The enactment of Title IX legislation in 1972 saw the number of women Ph.D.s in all fields of science and engineering grow dramatically. However, many of these women chose not to go into the field . Women constituted 33 percent of science students in 1997, but only 20 percent of science and engineering professionals, according to an Association for Women in Science study. So who are the women who chose an academic career in science? How did they become interested? Who encouraged them, and what obstacles did they encounter? The women profiled here range in age from their early 30s to late 80s. Most remember early involvement and success with math and science, although physics professor Monica Halka recalls becoming interested later in her life when, as a charter pilot, she wanted to know exactly what principles kept her plane aloft. Most of these women academics came from homes that encouraged education. They were further inspired by teachers and mentors along the way. At some point in their careers almost all of the women encountered significant obsta– cles-from negative attitudes towards women in the sciences through the challenges presented by events in their personal lives to the impact of great historical movements. The stories they tell represent significant transformations in the landscape of higher education during the past 40 years. 6 PSU MAGAZINE FALL 200 1 Challenges were faced and encouragement was gladly accepted as these women rose through the ranks to become scientists. Gertrude Rempfer, professor emerita of physics, is a soft-spoken, brilliant physicist. She still spends her days in her campus lab conducting vital research on improving the optics of photoelectron microscopy-a tech– nology that may one day be used for miniaturizing integrated circuits and looking at biological cells. She remembers as a youngster being good at math and encountering the marvel of b tany with an inspiring teacher. "I wa an athletic, out-of– doors girl anyway and loved collecting the specimens. I also loved the organi– zation, the under randing of patterns in nature." After high schoo l Rempfer worked for a year and then enrolled in Forest Co llege at the University of Washing- ton. The school required its students to attend fo re try camp during the pring of the second year, but as the only women in the program, Rempfer was not allowed to go. Consequently, she switched her major to phys ics, graduated, and continued on for her doctorate while working part time. It was during the Depress ion that Rempfe r attended the University of Washington, urged on by her mother, who believed that education would help her and her three iblings survive the economy. Rernpfer's first academic position was at a prestigious East Coast women's college in 1939, where he replaced a female physics profes or on sabbatical leave. When a tenure- track pos ition opened up in the department, Gertrude Rempfer Pl IOTOS BY STEVEDIPOALA