CRACKING NG the Glass Ceiling

摘要

Reading Sastry Pantula's reflections (https:// magazine, amstat. orglblogl 2021101101 Imy-asa-story-sastry-pantula) of his early associations as an Asian with the ASA community inspired me to reflect on my own early experiences as a female in a predominantly male profession in the 1960s and '70s. To accomplish this, I have to start at the very beginning, in 1954, when I matriculated as a 16-year-old freshman at Duke University. To the total dismay of my family and friends, I was determined to major in mathematics with a minor in economics. In those days, the men and women at Duke had separate campuses. Because of my major, I had to take a 10-minute bus ride followed by a long trek to the math/ physics building on the men's campus to attend most of my classes. I almost always enjoyed the distinction of being the only female in the class. William Hotelling was one of my classmates; I only learned much later he was the son of the statistician Harold Hotelling.