#nonbinary in stem

[yourlocalwheeliebin]

Lads, I've decided to work towards my BSC Hons degree. Environmental science/biology, here we goooooo

[thread-bare-theoretician]

my PhD defence, told in three vignettes (w/ people censored for privacy)

[thephysicsgraduate]

Fall 2019, during my first semester of research, the dept. lab manager took this picture of an eager Sara. Jack made sure to stop me in the halls often over the years to ask how things were going and tell me he was “prouder of me than usual.”

When I struggled to balance all of my work, and I didn't feel like I was fit for research, I always knew I had a “friend and colleague” in my corner who believed in me even when I didn't believe in myself.

The fact that I stuck with research and inevitably fell in love with it, failures and all, is largely thanks to Jack’s unwavering faith in my ability to overcome any obstacle.

Thank the people in your corner and strive to be a person that passionately believes in other people

[musicallynerdy]

Do you have any advice for a non-binary person considering a STEM career?

I wish I did. I'm at the beginning of my career- I got my bachelor's degree last year and I've been job hunting since. My general advice for both STEM and non-STEM careers is don't take any shit. As much as you can, advocate for yourself. I have my pronouns on my resume. Does that get me less interviews? Probably. Does it also weed out people I wouldn't want to deal with anyway? Yes. Things will also be different depending on what branch of STEM stuff you're going into and within that what career track you choose. If you're going into medicine, your experience is going to be different than someone going into environmental engineering which will be different than a chemist working in academia which will be different than a chemist working in industry... I find it all to be a little stressful at times. My one piece of advice I do have that surrounds publishing-- if you end up publishing before legally changing your name, you can still publish under your chosen name. I highly recommend using initials. I have one publication right now under my deadname, but it's just my first initial and my last name (eg. J Doe et al). Thankfully, my first initial of my deadname is my middle initial of my actual name (eg. SJ Doe et al). But yeah, I could have published that paper under "SJ Doe" as opposed to "J Doe" (not my real initials or last name) even tho i haven't changed my name yet and honestly it would help me down the line. Such is life. Being non-binary in a world where HR and payroll want your legal name on forms and you have to select a binary gender marker on job apps and all that shit is difficult, I'm not going to lie to you. But I have met some amazing, super respectful people in my college and postgrad time. Seek out those people. Seek out other nonbinary and trans folks in your field. Use twitter (weirdly, a ton of scientists are on twitter. Most of the ecologists and all of the archaeologists I pay attention to are on twitter). Don't get discouraged. It's hard sometimes, and you'll have low moments, not just with gender stuff but in general. But I love what I do. I love being in the lab. I love learning new things, designing experiments, troubleshooting assays, going over data, talking shop with other professionals. And the people I have chosen to regularly associate myself with are super respectful of me as a scientist and as a human being. If you love your field, you can do it. I hope that helps, I'm sorry if it's a little rambly. I wish I had more concrete advice to give you, but at this stage in my career, that's what I've got. Stick with it. It's worth it. I promise.

[fellenleaf]

quantumly

[iguanastevens]

Look it's me being all science-y and shit

[thephysicsgraduate]

Sunday - 13 June 2021 - one

I am two weeks into the nine-week preliminary exam prep class for my Ph.D. program, and I am all sorts of overwhelmed. I was doing some self-reflection on my way to the library, and I realized how the last two weeks of experience and emotion feel a bit out of reach. I hope to do a little bit of daily reflection (visual and textual) here, so I at least have something to look back on later.

I went out for drinks with a few people from my class which felt nice, but things still feel incredibly awkward and new. It is nice to know that I'm not the only one who feels overwhelmed by everything. I spent all of Friday and Saturday resting and not doing any schoolwork, and I slowly got into the swing of things this morning. Came to school in the afternoon to start reviewing for our thermal physics diagnostic exam tomorrow and got a bit distracted exploring the beautiful library.

My apartment has not had any air conditioning the past two weeks, and it is going to be out until at least the 21st, in terms of sensory difficulties that make it a real pain to try to work at home. I also despise virtual textbooks, but that's my only option for this week's thermal physics review, so I will have to suck it up, I guess. I will appreciate the lighter backpack, I suppose.

[thread-bare-theoretician]

ok actually I'm applying for jobs and mostly it's a matter of ticking "I don't want to say" when companies ask for gender, bc there's only male and female options. BUT LOOK AT THIS FUCKING PLACE

This has never happened beforeee.