The Institute of Physics must do better on diversity

A recent article from the institute’s leadership is worrying, say Andrew Princep and colleagues

UK academia has a gender problem, and a deep lack of diversity generally. Although roughly half of all academics are women, the proportion of women at the professorial level is half what would be expected based on the pool of people at less senior levels.

In physics, this problem goes much deeper: only 20 per cent of junior academics are women, with 11 per cent of physics professors being listed as women.