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Science 31 March 2006:
Vol. 311. no. 5769, p. 1848
DOI: 10.1126/science.311.5769.1848b

News of the Week

PROFESSIONAL SOCIETIES:
Physics Institute Settles Suit, Takes Steps to Increase Diversity

Adrian Cho

"This book is stolen. Written in part on stolen time, that is." When science journalist Jeff Schmidt penned those words, he inadvertently began a 6-year legal tale that even he didn't see coming. The yarn ended last month, as Schmidt settled a lawsuit against his former employer, the American Institute of Physics (AIP), which represents 10 professional societies.

In the suit, Schmidt claimed that AIP, based in College Park, Maryland, fired him in 2000 for protesting the lack of racial diversity on the editorial staff of AIP's magazine Physics Today. AIP says it was responding to his claim that he used company time to write his book Disciplined Minds: A Critical Look at Salaried Professionals and the Soul-Battering System That Shapes Their Lives. The book's first line says as much, although Schmidt says he was engaging in hyperbole.

Under the settlement, most of which is public, AIP admits no wrongdoing. Schmidt, who was an editor at Physics Today for 19 years, receives compensation for lost wages and benefits, pain and suffering, and legal fees. He also got his job back--just long enough to resign--and a recommendation that says his work consistently met or exceeded requirements. "Getting any one of these terms would have surprised me," Schmidt says. "Getting all of them is amazing."

The Washington Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs, which helped represent Schmidt, reports in a press release that AIP also agreed in the settlement to support efforts by the National Society of Black Physicists (NSBP) and the National Society of Hispanic Physicists (NSHP) to become nonvoting members. If invited, AIP will also conduct a science writing course at the next NSBP annual conference, according to the release. AIP would not comment on the settlement.

"Historically, AIP has always worked with the NSBP and NSHP to promote diversity," says Marc Brodsky, AIP executive director and CEO. Brodsky says Physics Today now has at least one minority editor but that he doesn't generally ask employees about their ethnicity.

As the dispute wore on, Schmidt, 59, became a minor cause célèbre among some physicists. Hundreds signed a statement accusing AIP of squelching free expression.

Jean Kumagai, an editor at Physics Today from 1989 to 1999, says she and Schmidt raised the issue of workplace diversity with higher-ups. "We suggested that they actually practice what they had on paper as a policy," says Kumagai, now an editor at IEEE Spectrum magazine. "And that didn't go over too well."

However, Graham Collins, an editor at Scientific American who worked at Physics Today from 1991 to 1998, says Schmidt deserves some of the blame for the conflict. "There were serious problems at the magazine, but he was one who tended to exacerbate the situation."

Schmidt, who has not been employed since he was fired, credits researchers for speaking out. "I think physicists protested my firing because it made the institution of physics look as political as other fields," he says. But, he adds, few voiced concern about racial diversity.





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