The Suit Magazine

Dr. Margaret-Ann Armour, Associate Dean of Science Diversity at the University of Alberta, stumbled into chemistry at the age of five when she began to experiment in her family’s kitchen. “I couldn't understand why, when I put dough in the oven, I wasn't allowed to eat it,” she told The Suit Magazine. She asked so many questions that her mother and her high school chemistry teacher both encouraged her to follow her interest in science, leading her to pursue a degree in chemistry.

Born and raised in Scotland, she received her bachelor's degree at the University of Edinburgh and went to work as a research chemist at a paper-making company. She was eventually awarded a Master's degree from the University for her industrial research. “That made me decide I enjoyed research,” Armour said. “So I came to the University of Alberta and did a PhD in physical organic chemistry.” After completing her postdoctoral work at University of Edinburgh in 1970, she returned to Alberta to become a faculty member.

Armour's responsibility in her current position as Associate Dean is to increase faculty diversity. “The difficulty is, if we don't have women as faculty members teaching our undergraduates, then the role models are missing,” she said. “We have large numbers of young women coming into science; we're over 50 percent women in undergraduate [science] classes. If they never have a woman teaching them in their undergraduate days, there's a message being given to the young women that they don't really belong here.”

Faculty members must spend five years working at the university before receiving tenure – and this after having spent years getting their undergraduate and PhD degrees and completing their postdoctoral studies. As a result, women are often required to trade the opportunity to achieve tenure for the opportunity to raise a family. The faculty hiring process is also complicated by an unconscious gender bias. “Letters of reference, when they're written for women, tend to emphasize – to a greater extent than the letters for men – their interpersonal skills,” Armour explained, “whereas the letters for men tend to emphasize technical skills. If you're not aware of that, you tend to think 'Oh, this woman can't be as good a researcher because the emphasis is on what a very good relationship she has with her graduate students.'”

Helping to establish women in leadership roles is not a new task for Armour. In 1984 she became Vice-Chair and Convenor of Women in Scholarship, Engineering, Science and Technology (WISEST), which recently co-founded the Canadian Coalition of Women in Engineering, Science, Trades and Technology (CCWESTT). Out of CCWESTT has come the recently established Canadian Centre for Women in Science, Engineering, Trades and Technology, the WinSETT Centre.  As President of the WinSETT Centre, Armour encourages women to take on leadership positions.

The Centre is developing a modular program to empower women for leadership roles and to help persuade women that leadership is an option for them. “What we would like to see happen is that people in leadership still can have a balanced life,” Armour said, “recognizing that there are times when your whole energy has to be given to your leadership role, but that that shouldn't be happening all of the time.”

The economic downturn has complicated her work by making it difficult to acquire government and industry funding.  “I've noticed more and more women – and men – are making intentional decisions not to take on leadership roles because they're asking, 'What's this going to do to my way of life? What's in it for me?' And I think that's a very good question to ask.” she said.

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