 |
|
Female Faculty Network Twente (FFNT) Board Members for 2008: (left to right) Genie Stoffels, Wilma Dierkes, Liudvika Leišytė, Marieke Snijder(foreground), Annemarie Braakman-Jansen, Sanja Damjanovi, Laura Franco, Angelike Mader (missing: Marolein Rietman) |
Founded a little over three years ago, in the fall of 2004, the Female Faculty Network Twente (FFNT) began with a mere handful of determined women and today has grown to approximately an 180 membership organization, including professors, UHDs, UDs, post-docs, and PhD canidates.
The central aim of the FFNT is `to support the professional development of women in academia and to provide a network for sharing and exchanging experiences.' In addition, according to Dierkes, `The central goal is to create an awareness on gender habits; to train women to recognize these habits in their own environment, and to give them the tools to follow their career paths in spite of obstacles, and in such a manner to contribute to society with their full potential and talent.'
Dierkes says that stimulating women in their academic careers and professional developments offers one step in the right direction. Creating a dynamic social network for women is only the centerpiece of the organization's many functions . Making steps towards creating equal opportunities for women—through small-scale activities— opens the way for much needed changes.
Despite the current situation in academia, where the top positions are filled predominately by males, Dierkes says, `The FFNT hopes to be able to invite newly hired female faculty members to hold talks every second month. This female `mentor' will serve as a `role model' for our current members.'
In a recent meeting the chairman of the UT, Dr. Anne Flierman, stated specific target goals for the year 2010 that will aim towards hiring females for top positions. Target numbers project that for the following positions at the UT: 15% of the professors, 25% of the UHDs and 35% of the UDs will in the future be filled by qualified females. Dierkes says, `We fully agree with these goals and the timing.' She finds that: `It's good to have an ambitious goal and to go for the best possible solutions.'
`Many positive initiatives are created by the Ambassador's Network about gender-training for the top levels, and the targets definded by the CvB (Executive Board of the UT),' says Dierkes.
The Ambassador's Network, whose goal is to help promote women to top positions, supports a unique initiative, the UT Stimuleringsfonds, which is designed to accelerate women in their career. The current budget of € 225,000 will afford the possiblity for early appointments of female professors, budgets for external experiences, refunding of special cost that are made for recruitment, and temporary funding to enable adequate time for publications.
But how does the FFNT benefit women? Apart from helping shape policy decisions, the FFNT organizes workshops, lectures and activities to educate on issues such as gender diversity, the central theme of their 2007 conference.
Another example, on April 24, Karel Luyben (Dean of the Faculty of Applied Sciences at Delft University of Technology) will visit the UT to reveal the hidden rules on how to most effectively publish academic papers. This is only one activity being planned within the wider context of project acquisitions of which many lectures and workshops are being organized by the FFNT.
In a perfect world, Dierkes says, `I would like to have a situation where no gender policy is necessary anymore. This is the situation when enough women reach top positions and there is a balanced view on talent. One way or another, we need more women to participate in the decision-making process.'
For a complete listing of the group's current activities and to register to become a member, visit the website: www.utwente.nl/FFNT
