Naomi Ellemers, Professor of Social Psychology and currently at NIAS, has launched a website, Athena's Angels, to elucidate the specific challenges women have to overcome to realize their scientific ambitions, and where possible eliminate these.
Athena’s Angels
“Many people assume that men and women have equal opportunities to be successful in an academic career. Yet women continue to be approached and treated differently than men, in ways that impact on their scientific career prospects.” Naomi Ellemers and three of her female full professor colleagues have united under the name Athena’s Angels, to defend the interests of women academics. The mission of Athena’s Angels is to offer men and women truly equal opportunities to advance in their scientific career. On the website women and men can find facts on gender bias in the academic world, report maltreatment, and ask for advice.
“This is an important initiative”, says Paul Emmelkamp, Rector of NIAS. “The stories of gender inequality that one reads at the website are very revealing. They make me feel ashamed of being a man in academia.”
Athena’s Angels is set up by Naomi Ellemers together with Ineke Sluiter (Professor of Greek, and Fellow 2011/12), Eveline Crone (Professor of Developmental Psychology, and Fellow 2014/15), and Judi Mesman (Professor of Child and Family Studies), all from Leiden University.