The SWMS Eras Tour Comes to VIMS
Current SWMS President Tricia was recently invited to present on her experiences with SWMS at her alma mater! She describes her experiences and her message to VIMS, and all SWMS members, below!
This past October I was invited to present about the Society for Women in Marine Science (SWMS) at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS) as part of their interdisciplinary seminar series. In my seven years of involvement with SWMS, this was my first invitation to speak about the organization by a higher education institution so it was a very exciting opportunity for me and for SWMS. VIMS asked me to discuss SWMS, my role within the organization, and my career path. At first, I wasn’t sure where to start, but in looking back I realized all the different experiences I’d had with SWMS over the years – from co-founding the SWMS@VIMS chapter to being Vice President, and then President, of the national organization. These different experiences also interwove with my career trajectory as I first became involved with SWMS as a graduate student at VIMS, then Vice President as a postdoctoral researcher, and then President while becoming an Assistant Professor. I also realized that compared to some other professional organizations focused on identity, SWMS has been around for 10 years (we just celebrated our 10-yr birthday in 2024!) so there is history and experience I could reflect on and hopefully offer some lessons learned along the way.
As a teacher, I know that keeping content relevant and entertaining is a helpful way to ‘hook’ students so I took the same approach with my SWMS seminar by taking the audience on a SWMS ‘Eras Tour’ inspired by Taylor Swift. I organized my seminar, entitled, “Navigating growth and change: Reflections on 10-years of the Society for Women in Marine Science”, into four ‘eras’ that describe the birth, rise, and evolution of the organization over 10 years. The first ‘era’ was ‘The Inception (2014-2016)’ in which I shared how SWMS came to be as a small group of early-career woman marine scientists at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI). SWMS was primarily based in the early years around annual or semi-annual symposia that took place at WHOI, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the University of Rhode Island from 2014-2018. The first SWMS chapter was started by URI in 2016 followed by VIMS in 2017, which I helped to co-found. There was then a large growth in SWMS chapters across the country from 2017-2019, which I called ‘The Rise’ in my SWMS eras tour. During this period, SWMS also had three additional symposia, one at WHOI in 2017, one at URI in 2018, and one at University Maryland, Horn Point in 2019. These symposia also recently resulted in a peer-reviewed journal article by Canfield et al. 2023 entitled, “Building an inclusive wave in marine science: Sense of belonging and Society for Women in Marine Science symposia”, which summarized pre- and post-survey results from these symposia.
The next era, ‘Metamorphosis (2020-2022)’ (referencing Hillary Duff’s 2003 ‘Metamorphosis’ album here :p) discussed SWMS’ transformation from a small professional society into a registered non-profit organization, which occurred in 2020, as well the changes that took place within SWMS as we pivoted during the Pandemic. While this period resulted in the inactivity of a number of SWMS chapters, it also led to increased online engagement by SWMS and its members. For example, another SWMS symposia that was supposed to be held at URI in 2020, moved to virtual in 2021, and resulted in over 300 registered attendants as opposed to the ~100 attendees we typically had at our in-person symposia. We also began hosting online webinars on a range of topics from ‘Ocean Jobs in the Federal Government’ to ‘Not your momma’s interview and salary negotiation strategies’.
Finally, the last SWMS era I presented as ‘New Horizons (2023-Present)’ in which I really felt we’d reached our stride as an organization with over 400 registered members. Most of our chapters had returned with increased activity since the Pandemic and seven new chapters were added in 2024. We also revamped our website, streamlining our communication efforts and being able to sell SWMS swag (!), and, most excitingly, SWMS held its first in-person symposium in five years at Stony Brook University, hosted by the SWMS’ Stony Brook chapter, in November 2024.
I finished my SWMS eras tour by reminding everyone why we need SWMS, which, as I write this blog in February 2025, resonates with me more than ever. We need SWMS to, 1) foster the development of networking and mentoring opportunities for women in marine science for their continued progress in the field, 2) Increase retention is to improve support and sense of belonging, and 3) increase awareness of potential biases and make marine science field more inclusive.
As part of my visit to VIMS, I also got to chat with the current SWMS@VIMS members, which I realized was a completely new and reinvigorated chapter since I co-founded it back in 2017. It was great to not only share my experiences and journey with SWMS@VIMS but also learn from the current members about the dynamic programing they were offering and how they were partnering with other diverse groups to broaden their reach. Overall, it was incredibly rewarding and gratifying for me to return to VIMS with my SWMS hat on, something I don’t get to do very often, and I hope this experience will open more opportunities for SWMS in the near future.
