Gender Bias in Academia

It's possible that you were victimized this way, although hard to tell from what you have provided here. Was any specific mention made of your children and divided attention between them and your graduate program?

I do know this kind of thing happens in academia, of course. When I was in graduate school I recall my advisor once remarking to me about another female graduate student who had recently had a child. He said, "her focus hasn't been the same since this baby business." I was pretty shocked and considered it a warning on how I was likely to be viewed if having a baby before tenure.
 

An African American girlfriend of mine was in medical school at a prestigious west coast university and was really treated in her department as a rising star. In her third year became pregnant. While none of her advisors/mentors ever said anything to her, she felt that once the word was out that she was pregnant, they all dropped her like a bad habit! Indeed, a fellow medical student of hers said she overheard whispers that she had become "another statistic" - Black single mother, dropping out of school. Of course she had no intention of dropping out, but she found it difficult to find faculty support after that.
 

I was recently kicked out of a top school. No one seemed terribly interested in me as a (new) PhD student as soon as it was known that I have two school age children. For instance, while it was made abundantly clear that late papers were forbidden across-the-board, my professors did not feel it was important to hand back my papers in a timely manner (one was ten weeks late!). Because of the lack of critical feedback, I could not improve or adjust. Needless to say I was indignant when they told me that a major reason for the termination of my fellowship was due to a lack of improvement over the course of two quarters. Beyond this, common courtesies extended to other students were not extended to me (extensions for sickness etc). I also feel that the department’s PhD advisor purposely counseled me in terms of an exit strategy. When I took my dispute to the Dean of Students, he spent most of his time honing his skills in bureaucratic evasion, so I have recently decided to look for a lawyer.

-Anonymous