Myra Strober
Myra Strober
Myra Strober is Professor of Education, Emerita at the Stanford Graduate School of Education and Professor of Economics (by courtesy) at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. Her research and consulting focus on gender issues in the workplace, the economics of work and family, and multidisciplinarity in higher education. Strober recalls her early years in Brooklyn, her undergraduate education, and her doctoral studies at MIT, where she was one of only two women in her class. She relates how she made her way to California, teaching as a lecturer at UC Berkeley before taking an assistant professorship at the Stanford GSB. Strober discusses her initial experiences teaching on the virtually all-male faculty there, her attempt to secure tenure, and how she became a tenured faculty member at the School of Education.
She recounts the creation of the Center for Research on Women and discusses fundraising for the center and the lecture series that attracted overflowing crowds. In addition, she discusses her service on the Committee on Recruitment and Retention of Women Faculty at Stanford and her experience as a sexual harassment advisor counselling female faculty members. She shares her perspectives on the challenges facing women in academia, such as a low percentage of women on the tenured faculty, salary disparity, and a lack of support. Strober also relates the story of how Stanford successfully competed to host and edit the preeminent women’s studies journal, Signs and its impact on the faculty and students involved. She discusses her research on occupational segregation, including her theory of how the relative attractiveness of occupations impacted work opportunities for women, and her research on childcare.
Interview Excerpts
The Challenges of Raising Money for the Center for Research on Women
Early Activities of CROW