Martha Muñoz, one of our biology alums, is interviewed in Scientific Journals Commit to Diversity but Lack the Data, in the New York Times. She received her bachelor’s degree in Biology at Boston University and worked in the Schneider lab.
This New York Times article pointed out that many prominent academic publishers in the life sciences were unable to provide data on the racial and ethnic diversity of researchers publishing on their platforms because they never keep track of it. Data from the few publishers that have data on its authors, the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the Royal Society, indicates that about 10 percent to 20 percent of authors are Black or other minority groups.
It states that “scientists who hail from across spectra of gender, race, ethnicity, disability, sexuality and more are also uniquely equipped to collaborate with communities that have been ignored, silenced or even exploited and abused by the discriminatory practices of Western scientists.”
Martha Muñoz, who is now an evolutionary biologist at Yale University, said “better science is accomplished with more diverse perspectives.” Then, she questioned: “How many discoveries are we missing out on?”
According to the article, even though studies continue to reaffirm that diversity — on a multitude of axes — boosts performance and the quality of work across disciplines, the barriers raised to people of color in academia — often referred to as an ivory tower — arise early and often.
“There is this false narrative that to achieve diversity, we have to compromise on excellence,” Dr. Muñoz said.
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