Get QuoteDark Inspirational Quotes App

" All the societal pressures that make girls feel as if they're too smart, especially in the sciences - 'No one will date them. They won't be popular.' - don't apply to boys. The boys are being encouraged. "

Related Quotes:

" For the individual and for society, the more diversity you have in a field means more ways of solving a problem as well as more creativity and originality. "

Eileen Pollack

Diversity

Creativity

Society

" If you're a white male growing up in this society, you're constantly receiving encouragement to go on in science in the form of all the images that you're receiving. "

" To make computer science more attractive to women, we might help young women change how they think about themselves and what's expected of them. But we might also diversify the images of scientists they see in the media, along with the decor in the classrooms and offices in which they might want to study or work. "

" For women, even if she's nerdy enough to be Steve Jobs, she's undateable. "

" If a person's self-worth derives from being the only woman in the field, how much affection can she feel toward another woman who might challenge that claim to fame? "

" When I was growing up, I wanted passionately to be a physicist. "

Eileen Pollack

Growing

Wanted

" I miss my former teachers, John Hersey and James Alan McPherson. I would love to see either or both and ask what I could do to improve, to deepen my writing. "

" As a physics major at Yale in the 1970s, I developed crushes on nearly all my male professors. "

" The most powerful determinant of whether a woman goes on in science might be whether anyone encourages her to go on. "

" When you have different kinds of scientific and mathematical minds approaching problems, you will get more solutions. This leads to more innovation and more creative design. "

" In America, nobody's boyfriend wants them to be smarter than he is, and no one wants to admit it. "

" Many of my friends are scientists. "

" Writers find common ground not through the homelands they once inhabited but the thematic questions with which they grapple. "

" Wandering the book fair at AWP is a great way to get acquainted with a wide sampling of the diverse journals that are out there and the wide sampling of people who produce them. "

" I don't usually feel threatened by the militias. Most members are just indulging their fantasies of being warriors without having to sign up for the Army. They want to be heroes and save their neighbors from disaster. "

" If there's a stereotype that you're not supposed to be good at something, that still gets so badly in your way of concentrating. "

" Most applicants to creative writing programs submit stories about the angst of their suburban childhoods. "

" When parents ask why there are still so few girls in advanced science and math classes in high school, I tell them, because girls still need way more encouragement than boys to take those courses. "

" Given that many girls are indoctrinated to believe that they should be feminine and modest about their abilities, as well as brought up to assume that girls are not innately gifted at science or math, it is not surprising that so few can see themselves as successful computer scientists. "

" When I left Yale, it was so painful to me. I had worked so hard, gotten so far, and just walked away. "

Eileen Pollack

Left

Hard

" When I was in 7th grade, we were all given an exam. It was science and math, and the boys who did well were skipped ahead so that when they got to be juniors or seniors in high school they would be able to go to the local community college and take calculus and physics there. And I wasn't skipped ahead. "

Eileen Pollack

Community

Science

" The truth is, the less a subject had to do with the visible world, the more talented I was at solving problems. "

" Parents don't want their kids to be nerdy. "

" Figuring out why people who choose not to do something don't in fact do it is like attempting to interview the elves who live inside your refrigerator but come out only when the light is off. "

" We forget how recently astronomers figured out what the stars are made of, what makes them shine, how distant they are, how they are born, and whether they remain immutable or evolve and die. "

" If you're the only anything in the room, you're going to feel so self-conscious of your right to be there. "

" Knowing how to tactfully criticize someone's work is a mentor's job. "

" I think women need to hear more encouragement in any field, because I see it - I teach creative writing. And even though it's mostly women in the room, they're not often - or they didn't used to be the ones who went on to publish books. I know this sounds like a tautology, but encouragement is the key. "

" Science and math are hard for everybody, and it's usually not a matter or being born gifted at it or not. It's hard work, but it can be a lot of fun! "

" Success in math and the hard sciences, far from being a matter of gender, is almost entirely dependent on culture - a culture that teaches girls math isn't cool and no one will date them if they excel in physics. "