Equity, Diversity and Inclusion

Collection

1. Equity, Diversity and Inclusion: Alternative strategies for closing the award gap between white and minority ethnic students

   Louise Cramer

   An analysis of the grades awarded to cell biology students at University College London suggests that exams may contribute more to the award gap than coursework in this subject.
2. 1. Medicine

   Equity, Diversity and Inclusion: Introducing the MAVEN Leadership Training Initiative to diversify the scientific workforce

   Y Claire Wang et al.

   The MAVEN Initiative has been designed to encourage mid-career women scientists, particularly women of color, to move into leadership positions in science.

3. Equity, Diversity and Inclusion: A call to eradicate non-inclusive terms from the life sciences

   Aziz Khan

   The number of articles containing non-inclusive terms such as "blacklist" and "whitelist" are increasing in the life sciences literature.

4. Equity, Diversity and Inclusion: Racial inequity in grant funding from the US National Institutes of Health

   Michael A Taffe, Nicholas W Gilpin

   Grant applications submitted to the NIH by African-American/Black PIs are less likely to be funded than applications from white PIs, and the NIH must find a solution that eliminates this racial disparity.

5. Research Communication: Ways to increase equity, diversity and inclusion

   Devang Mehta et al.

   ​​ The eLife Early-Career Advisory Group calls for radical changes at eLife and other journals to make science more diverse and inclusive.
6. 1. Medicine

   Meta-Research: COVID-19 medical papers have fewer women first authors than expected

   Jens Peter Andersen et al.

   Lockdowns in the United States caused by the COVID-19 pandemic appear related to a decrease in the number of women publishing research papers, especially as first authors.

7. Racism in Science: We need to act now

   Michael B Eisen

   eLife, like the rest of science, must tackle the many inequalities experienced by Black scientists.

8. Black Lives Matter: A commitment from eLife

   The communities of eLife are committed to using our voices, actions and resources to confront anti-Black racism and racial inequality in science, medicine and beyond.

9. Research Culture: Career choices of underrepresented and female postdocs in the biomedical sciences

   W Marcus Lambert et al.

   Mentorship, financial security and a positive sense of self-worth increase the likelihood that underrepresented minority and female postdocs will pursue a career in academia.

10. Meta-Research: Gender variations in citation distributions in medicine are very small and due to self-citation and journal prestige

    Jens Peter Andersen et al.

    In studies of gender disparities in academia, increased focus is required on within-group variability and between-group overlap of distributions when interpreting and reporting results.

11. Research Assessment: Reducing bias in the evaluation of researchers

    A workshop run by DORA identified a number of ways to reduce bias in hiring and funding decisions.

12. Workforce Diversity: Let’s talk about race

    A workshop convened by the Medical Research Council gave PhD students the opportunity to discuss how research careers could be made more inclusive for black, Asian and minority ethnic individuals.
13. 1. Microbiology and Infectious Disease

    Meta-Research: Gender inequalities among authors who contributed equally

    Nichole A Broderick, Arturo Casadevall

    An analysis of papers in which two or more authors shared first-author position found that male authors were more likely than female authors to appear first in the author list.

14. Gender Equity: Addressing recruitment at the departmental level

    We suggest five ways in which biology departments can improve their hiring processes in order to achieve gender equity in their workforce.

15. Workforce diversity: Strategies for cultivating inclusion in research

    The organizers of a recent symposium on diversity challenges in science, technology, engineering and math outline approaches to improve diversity and inclusion across all career stages.
16. 1. Medicine

    Research: Adequate statistical power in clinical trials is associated with the combination of a male first author and a female last author

    Willem M Otte et al.

    An analysis of 31,873 clinical trials shows that adequate statistical power was most often present in trials with a male first author and a female last author.

17. Research: Gender bias in scholarly peer review

    Markus Helmer et al.

    Gender-bias in peer reviewing might persist even when gender-equity is reached because both male and female editors operate with a same-gender preference whose characteristics differ by editor-gender.

18. Research: Decoupling of the minority PhD talent pool and assistant professor hiring in medical school basic science departments in the US

    Kenneth D Gibbs Jr et al.

    A systems-level analysis of the biomedical workforce in the US shows that current strategies to enhance faculty diversity are unlikely to have a significant impact, and that there is a need to increase the number of PhDs from underrepresented minority backgrounds who move on to postdoctoral positions.

19. Point of View: What does it take to recruit and retain senior women faculty?

    Fiona M Watt

    eLife deputy editor Fiona M Watt recounts some of her personal experiences as a senior female academic in a male-dominated environment.
20. 

    Equity, Diversity and Inclusion: Marcus Lambert

    Marcus Lambert, Assistant Dean of Diversity at Weill Cornell Medicine, describes how improving diversity in the scientific workforce is going to take more than attracting students from underrepresented groups.