< Is 'Leaning In' The Only Formula For Women's Success In Science?

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The fastest-growing occupations in coming years will likely be in STEM - science, technology, engineering and math. In many STEM fields, women hold far fewer positions than men. We're going to explore why that is as part of our series "The Changing Lives Of Women." NPR's Kelly McEvers visited the California Institute of Technology where she met some female scientists.

KELLY MCEVERS, BYLINE: If you want to talk about women in science, you have to talk to Frances Arnold. She's basically one of the most highly-decorated scientists in the country.

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FRANCES ARNOLD: The ability to synthesize DNA is really there for us.

MCEVERS: Arnold heads the Bioengineering Center at Caltech, where she's also been a professor for 28 years. This class is called Intro to Biological Design.

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ARNOLD: You are now at the beginning of yet another revolution where we can synthesize any DNA we want.

MCEVERS: Arnold's father built one of the world's first commercial, nuclear reactors. Arnold grew up in Pittsburgh then studied engineering at Princeton which at the time had only been admitting women for a few years. She got a Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering at UC, Berkeley.

ARNOLD: I wanted to rewrite the code of life - to make new molecular machines that would solve human problems.

MCEVERS: So she came to Caltech, a small but well-funded research institute where she says anything is possible. Yeah. There were roadblocks along the way.

ARNOLD: I'm sure that there are people who are skeptical that a woman can do this job as well as a man. I am blissfully unaware of such people and have been gifted with the ability to ignore them completely.

MCEVERS: When we talk about why there aren't more women in science, one argument is that women might choose to major in science but aren't encouraged to continue up the academic ladder. Arnold totally disagrees. She admits she was lucky to have supportive parents and the money to go to college, but she also says women shouldn't wait for encouragement. If your scientist she says, you should know how to solve a problem.

ARNOLD: Bemoaning your fate is not going to solve the problem. One has to move forward.

MCEVERS: Just go and do it. That's her philosophy, you know, that whole lean in thing. To the female students at Caltech, Frances Arnold is a god, but they don't all agree with her philosophy. Nikki Peck is getting a Ph.D. in Bioengineering. Her parents are both science teachers. She went to Harvey Mudd College, a STEM school and a liberal arts school - so not so many roadblocks. At Caltech, there was one guy who acted like women were inferior and that hurt Peck's self-esteem. Still, the whole lean in thing - not her style.

NIKKI PECK: For me, like - I don't know - I consider myself an introvert. I have a hard time just like talking to people. You know, it's hard for me to get up sort of the initiative to, you know, lean in or just do it. That's kind of hard for me. So - I don't know. That attitude - I think it works really well for a certain type of woman but I don't think it works for everyone.

MCEVERS: So Peck figures she might not be the next big shot academic. Instead, she's taking a year off to go work for Google's new life extension company. She says she's a little worried about working near a city with the nickname of man Jose, where women get good tech jobs but don't stay in them. That's the deal these days. The pipeline is starting to widen. More women are getting into STEM and staying in STEM through undergrad, grad school and even that first job, but then they opt out. Peck says that's because we still haven't figured out how women can work these high-powered job and have families. It's a conversation she hoped to have at a recent cupcake social for Women in Chemistry at Caltech. Peck and her friends showed up with their male colleagues -

PECK: but they were sort of like what are you doing here? (Laughter) And then of course, our male coworkers felt like they weren't allowed there so they left. And I don't know - on the one hand, I guess that's how we feel sometimes. (Laughter) But it's still - like I don't think that the way you help out women is by pushing down men.

MCEVERS: These days, Caltech is about 70-30, men to women, which means the pipeline is widening. More women are getting into these schools. But that can also make people point fingers - say things like well you're just here because you're a - fill in the blank. Earlier this month, Caltech hosted a fly in for high school seniors from groups who've been, quote, "historically underrepresented in STEM fields." Moraa Marwanga came from the international baccalaureate program at her high school in Rockville, Maryland.

MORAA MARWANGA: Like, I'm 1 of maybe 3 black girls there and 1 of maybe 10 black people in general. With the college application process, people are like oh, you're just going to get in everywhere. You're black, and you're female, and you like math. So it's frustrating.

MCEVERS: So don't let it get to you her friend Angela Umeh from Dallas tells her. It'll be harder if you let it get to you. Maybe that's how it should be for women now they say. Call it lean to the side, and let it pass by. Kelly McEvers, NPR News.

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