The gender balance among associate professors and professors is (still) a challenge at Aarhus University. While about half of the university’s PhD students are women, they only account for 37 per cent of associate professors and 21 per cent of professors. To address this imbalance, the university is now focusing intensively on creating a more equal gender balance in these two job categories.

2019.03.08 | Anders Hylander

Today on 8 March, International Women’s Day, over 300 members of academic staff and management are participating in an internal conference to explore what steps the university needs to take to achieve a more equal gender balance. 

For a number of years now, Aarhus University has been working to achieve a more equal gender balance among associate professors and professors. And the development is moving in the right direction – but too slowly. So the university is now making an extra effort to accelerate the pace of change. 

“We aren’t exploiting our talent pool well enough today. We have to get many more of the highly qualified female researchers into associate professor and professor positions, and in this regard, we in the management have a major role to play in terms of motivating and inspiring these talents. We owe this to the researchers, the university and not least society,” says Rector Brian Bech Nielsen. 

In 2016, Aarhus University’s senior management team adopted an action plan for more women in research to improve the gender balance in a variety of areas, including recruitment, researcher talent development and the university’s culture. The action plan will expire in 2020, and of the goals of today’s conference is consider what will replace it. 

“The action plan for more women in research has produced a number of exciting initiatives in the individual research and teaching programmes. For example, the Department of Physics and Astronomy has established a gender equality committee which is working to increase focus on gender balance in teaching and in the cultural conventions in the work and study environment,” says Rector Bech Nelson. 

“At the conference, I’m looking forward to discussing how we – on the background of good examples from the entire university and what we know about gender balance – can develop our tools and discover new ways of addressing the problem,” he concludes. 

Speakers at the conference will include Rector Bech Nielsen, former rector of Copenhagen Business School Per Holten Andersen and Lyn Roseberry, an international gender balance consultant. Journalist Lone Frank will serve as moderator. 

FACTS:

Development in gender balance in selected job categories at AU:

MORE INFORMATION:

• Read more about the conference  ”How do we improve gender balance at AU”
• Read more about gender balance at Aarhus University

Contact:

• Anders Hylander, Communications Officer: tel. +45 9350 8569 85 69 / ahylander@au.dk