No sexuality please, we’re scientists

Traditionally perceived as heterosexual and masculine dominated subject areas, the ‘LGBT STEM’ project aims to highlight the importance of LGBT+ visibility in the STEM fields and encourage more people to begin a career in this area who might otherwise have been discouraged.

The University of Sheffield hosted the second LGBT STEMinar on Friday 13^th January, aiming to showcase work from diverse fields and encourage collaborations between different companies, subjects, universities and departments.

Between 9:30am and 6pm, the Richard Roberts Building was host to a myriad of talks and panel discussions ranging from ‘The Ecosystem Time Machine’ to ‘The Distribution of Star Formation in MaNGA Galaxies’. The event gathered a large following on social media, with the hashtag ‘#LGBTSTEMinar17’ trending nationally for most of the day. Judging from the tweets, the inclusion of a Doctor Who inspired acronym went down a storm.

The meeting received an incredible level of support from high-level societies including the Royal Society of Chemistry and the Institute of Physics. In an interview with the journal Nature, David Smith, a chemist at the University of York, stated that: ‘It's a time of big change in science. Fifteen years after the culture broadly changed, we are now talking about our personal lives and acknowledging who we are.’

Perhaps the most important aspect of the day would be the realisation that the focus was on science rather than sexuality. When in a completely judgement-free environment, all that mattered was the content of the talks. As Brexit looms, it is now so important to continue raising awareness of LGBT+ innovations in the STEM fields if the UK wants to remain a key player in the science community.