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thedrifter
01-16-07, 09:04 AM
Female officers leave legal, medical, clergy fields

Group tasked to find out why, help women advance
By Gordon Lubold - Staff writer
Posted : January 22, 2007

Women don’t go as far as men in the legal, medical and clergy fields, and a Pentagon advisory group mandated to focus on women’s and family issues is trying to find out why.

Despite the fact that all three fields play supporting roles in the military — and therefore offer more opportunity for women than do the combat-arms fields from which they are banned — women just don’t stay in these fields, said Mary Nelson, who chairs the Defense Advisory Committee on Women in the Services.

While the legal, medical and clergy fields tend to attract more female officers than other fields, most leave by the time they reach the O-4 paygrade, she said. As a result, in the medical field, for example, there are only two female flag officer physicians, one Army and one Navy. In the legal field, there is only one female lawyer — a soldier — in the flag ranks, said Nelson.

It’s not as if there isn’t a robust pool of women from which to draw in those fields, officials said. While about 15 percent of the military is female, the medical field overall comprises about 25 percent women; the legal field is at least 25 percent women. But the number of female officers dwindles significantly after the first several years.

Root of the problem

Nelson’s committee still doesn’t know why. But the group has been ordered by David S.C. Chu, the Pentagon’s personnel chief, to find out.

The committee’s final report, including recommendations for how to improve retention among women in those fields, will be completed by March, staff members said.

As part of the effort, the group is looking to see if barriers exist that inhibit women from advancing in those fields, or if there are other factors, perhaps beyond the military’s control.

Six weeks of maternity leave could serve as an example of the kind of factor that might prompt a woman to get out of those fields.

As a result, one of the group’s recommendations could be to offer sabbaticals, so-called “on-ramp, off-ramps” allowing men and women in those fields to get out of the military to have a child, for example, and then resume their military careers later on, said Nelson.

Such sabbaticals could still allow service members to retain many of their benefits, she said.

While the focus of the report is admittedly narrow, it is hoped that the committee’s recommendations for retaining personnel in the medical, legal and clergy fields will have a wider application.

Chu wants to see if the same kinds of fixes could be applied to other jobs in which senior females are in short supply, such as aviation.

“He hoped they would be fixes that could translate into other fields,” said Army Col. Denise Dailey, the committee’s military director.

Panel below strength

Even as the group prepares its report, it is looking to beef up its own ranks, which were severely cut by former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and have recently dwindled even further through attrition.

Rumsfeld, who blew into the Pentagon in 2001 with a mandate to make the defense bureaucracy lighter and more agile, didn’t limit his focus to combat brigades, expensive weapons and other sacred cows. He also shrank the size of many of the more than 60 Pentagon advisory groups to make them work more effectively.

DACOWITS was reduced to 13 members from its previous 35, which some saw as an effort by Rumsfeld to marginalize the group, established in 1951.

But Nelson, installed as chairwoman last year, has no qualms about that. “I think he made an excellent decision,” she said.

The group would function very well with 13 members, she said — if it only had that many. Through attrition, the board has been reduced to five members, and the committee awaits new appointments.

“We would like to go back to 13,” Nelson said. “Five doesn’t work.”

Contrary to the notion that the panel has been marginalized, Nelson and Dailey said DACOWITS has accomplished important work, including helping the Defense Department provide more services and help for women and their families.

For example, the group advocated the Military OneSource program, intended as a one-stop shop for information about all things military, and also helped to make more service members — especially spouses and families — aware of the service.

The committee also has made recommendations of questions to add to the Defense Department’s periodic surveys of the force so they yield more useful information, Dailey said.

Ellie