“It’s really an attrition issue that needs to be addressed,” said Diana Lautenberger, director of Women in Medicine and Science at AAMC, who added that many women of color leave medical school for a variety of reasons, including not seeing faculty who look like them and not receiving the same kind of support and mentorship that majority students often get.
For the women of color who do obtain a faculty position, the pathway to promotion and ultimately tenure can often be an isolating journey. Women of color faculty are often burdened with diversity committee work and are often treated as tokens by their institution.
“There has to be organizational leadership,” said Lautenberger, the author of the report, who says that women of color often face unique barriers, including those related to the intersection of gender and race. “There has to be an awareness of the experiences that people are bringing with them.”
In 2015, the total number of full-time Black women medical school faculty (who held a rank of instructor to full professor) was 2,181. The number of Hispanic women faculty was 1,987, and there were 154 Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islanders. The largest number of minority women was Asians with 14,225. While these numbers have steadily improved over the last decade, they pale in comparison to the 64,094 White women who held full-time faculty positions during that same year.
