News

In May 2024 our pod members got together for a weekend to catch up, meet new members and learn about mental health and wellbeing in academia. 

This open letter contains the collective response of AVETH and other ETH-affiliated organiza-tions (listed in the signatures) to the recent interview, first published in a news outlet on 06.05.2023, regarding the results of a study on the “causes of the leaky pipeline” in academia led by Prof. Margit Osterloh and Prof. Katja Rost at the University of Zurich (1,2). Notably, the authors shared the conclusions of their studies with a national media outlet before the work had been openly published or peer-reviewed, raising many questions from the academic com-munity about their research and publishing practices. The contents of their interview were sub-sequently published by additional journalists at other media outlets, a number of which posted provocative headlines and further misappropriated the unpublished results.

On March 23, 2023the Switzerland-wide Harassment Awareness Day, we teamed up with other associations (ETH Women Professors Forum, StrukturElle, WiNS, TWIST and SpeakUp! Academia  to send a letter to the State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation SERI, to continue our fight against gender inequality in research. The letter proposes the creation of an independent national reporting center to combat discrimination, sexism, bullying, and sexual harassment in academic institutions. The center would allow victims to report incidents anonymously, and reports from the center should be included in the accreditation process. 

We enjoyed two days together getting to know each other, hiking, cooking, and spending long nights talking and having fun. 

We are writing to express our concern at the highly publicized dismissals, demotions, and conflicts involving female Directors of Max Planck Institutes (MPI). These reports have appeared in prestigious and widely read outlets including Science (in 2021[1] and 2018[2]) and Nature (in 2018[3]), where issues of leadership and bullying have been highlighted.  Similar reports have also publicized cases involving women in top academic positions at the University of Copenhagen (in Nature in 2019[4]), ETH Zurich (in Science in 2018[5]), and the University of London (in Science in 2018[6]), indicating that these issues involving senior women extend well beyond the MPG.  

On June 14th, we decided to join the Frauenstreik by organizing a Women in Science flashmob.

On the 20th of May, we had our third outreach event. Despite being compelled to use an online format, we had enthusiatic participants from all around the world!

On the 17th of September, we had our second "500 Women Scientists in the Pub" Event. We had two inspiring talks about sustainable pharmaceutical production and livestock farming. 

On International Women in Science Day we successfully held our first Women Scientists in the Pub event at ONO. Our evening included two inspiring talks about Arsenic in Seafood and Socially Exchanged Fluids in Ants and pub quiz with prizes. Thank you to all who showed up for the event and to our volunteer speakers!