Dr. Linda P.B. Katehi serves as Chancellor of the University of California at Davis, a public university with an enrollment of approximately 35,000. She also holds faculty appointments in electrical and computer engineering and in women and gender studies.
Dr. Katehi obtained her bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from the National Technical University of Athens and her master's and doctoral degrees in electrical engineering from the University of California, Los Angeles. (Read more of Dr. Katehi's biography here).
Microwave Journal asked Dr. Katehi to share her experience as a woman in a predominantly male profession and her recommendations about encouraging more women to pursue technical roles in the microwave industry. We conducted this interview via email.
MWJ: How did you choose to pursue a technical career?
Dr. Katehi: I will never forget how captivated I was as a young girl growing up in Greece and watching astronaut Neil Armstrong walk on the moon in 1969. I always did well in math and science in school, but that moment changed my life forever. However, I didn't want to become an astronaut. I wanted to be one of those engineers on the ground at mission control who could plan and carry out such a complex mission and pinpoint the landing of a spacecraft on the moon that was hundreds of thousands of miles away. From that moment on, I was hooked forever on pursuing a career in science.
MWJ: How many other women were in school with you during your undergraduate and graduate years? Did you ever feel you were at a disadvantage or disrespected and, if so, how did you persevere?
Dr. Katehi: When I was an undergraduate majoring in electrical engineering in Greece, I was in a class of 189 and there was only one other woman in the class. It was very difficult, and we were never made to feel welcome or included. In fact, we were told time and time again that we were wasting a space in the class because everyone assumed we would just get married and have a family and not pursue a career in engineering.
Things were much better when I became a graduate and doctoral student at UCLA, but later, when I worked on the faculty at the University of Michigan, I experienced a lot of the same types of stereotypical thinking and bias, and it was very challenging at times to persevere.
That's why I've spent so much time trying to mentor and recruit women and other underrepresented groups into the STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) fields. We need everyone involved to stay strong as a nation, and it's also the right thing to do.
MWJ: Who were your role models back then?
Dr. Katehi: When I was in school I really didn’t feel like I had any role models, since there were so few women in my class and so few successful people I knew. But once I joined the faculty at the University of Michigan, I was fortunate to have some excellent role models, including Jim Duderstadt, who was dean of the University of Michigan College of Engineering and later Provost and then President of the university. Another excellent role model for me was Nancy Cantor, who also served as the Michigan Provost and is now Chancellor at Rutgers University – Newark.
MWJ: You selected academia as your profession, rather than industry. In making that decision, did you or do you see any significant advantages or disadvantages between the two paths for either women or men?
Dr. Katehi: It may sound strange, but I never really had a grand vision for a career. I just followed my academic and research interests and when opportunities came up, I pursued them. I have worked closely with industry throughout my career, and academic and industry both have advantages and disadvantages.
Obviously, one can make more money in the private sector, but I want to help make sure that others have the opportunity to transform their lives through education, as I had. That's what drives me every day in my job as chancellor. How can we maintain and expand our excellence as a university and make the world-class education we provide as affordable and accessible to as many people as possible? It is a difficult challenge, given how the public sector's priorities have changed over time, but it's very gratifying to be out there on the front lines advocating for higher education.
MWJ: Have you had mentors throughout your career?
Dr. Katehi: I have been fortunate to have a number of strong and excellent mentors in my career, including Michigan’s Jim Duderstadt. Others include Nick Alexopoulos, who mentored me when I was a senior undergraduate student and as a graduate student at UCLA; the late Chuck Vest, who was also an engineering dean and provost at the University of Michigan, before being named president of MIT; and Erich Bloch, a former director of the National Science Foundation and a 1985 winner of the National Medal of Technology.
MWJ: Looking back on your career, is there anything that you would change or do differently?
Dr. Katehi: I don't think so. I feel so blessed that I have been able to have a loving husband and two wonderful children who helped me maintain a balance in my life that is so important. It's easy to become consumed by your work and career obligations, and I have worked very hard my entire life. But I also know that your family and the people you love are what matter most. A job is something you can always get, and there will always be opportunities that present themselves as you move through your career. But family and loved ones can never be replaced; and as I get older, I – of course – realize that more all the time.
MWJ: How compatible is a technical career with achieving the elusive balance between a person’s work and personal lives?
Dr. Katehi: As hard as it can be to balance a personal life with a demanding career, I honestly don't think I would have had the success I've enjoyed without a family that also required my full attention. I knew I could always come home at the end of a hard day and have something other than my work to sustain me.
I often tell young women who ask me this question that it is not going to be easy, but my advice is to do everything you can to avoid becoming so consumed with your work that you don't have a family, if that's something important to you, or that you have them take a backseat to your career. To be as successful as a person wants to be, it's vital to have that perspective which only can come when your work does not consume every corner of your life. It's a challenge but something you must always be mindful of.
MWJ: As Chancellor at UC Davis, what are you doing to encourage more women to enter technical fields?
Dr. Katehi: We have many programs and are fully committed to recruiting and retaining more women and underrepresented groups to join our faculty. Right now, for instance, we are in the middle of a three-year program funded by the National Science Foundation to attract more Latina faculty to our STEM fields, and it is going very well. This is an ongoing effort that we are pursuing on multiples fronts, and we are having success.
I am very proud that the College Database has ranked the top 50 Colleges Advancing Women in STEM and that UC Davis is ranked number one in the entire country for total women in STEM programs, with 2,503 women in 169 STEM programs. There is more work to be done, but this is very good news.
MWJ: What can our technical societies (e.g., IEEE MTT-S, Women in Microwaves) do to encourage women to select technical fields of study?
Dr. Katehi: There needs to be more concentrated outreach at the K-12 level to get young girls interested in and excited by science and technology. Also, we need to show greater support for female undergraduates who are interested in science and make sure they have role models and mentors they can learn and get support from. This is very important.
MWJ: Did you hope that your daughter Helena would pursue a technical career, rather than liberal arts and a law degree? Did you encourage her to explore math, science, engineering?
Dr. Katehi: No. We raised our daughter to follow her own path and pursue her own interests. In fact, I consciously did not want to encourage her to follow in my footsteps because, as I said, I wanted her to follow her own heart, and I also would not have wanted to see her have the same experiences and difficulties I had as a woman in the technology field.
But I believe that times have changed, and the situation, while still challenging, has improved. So if my granddaughter were to ask me if I thought science or engineering were a good career choice for her, I would happily encourage her to pursue this if it was something she was interested in.
MWJ: Do you think her career choice reflects her innate personal interests or cultural messages about women in technical fields?
Dr. Katehi: Our daughter always liked and had a knack for debating and a strong sense of justice and fair play, so the law was something she naturally gravitated to on her own. Her choice is simply a reflection of her own interests and temperament about what suits her best and no reflection on anything other than her own personal choice and passions.