Pamela Freeman

Cover of "Picture an Astronomer: Best Practices for Retaining Talent in Astrophysics", which features an illustration of a 19-year-old Vera Rubin looking through a telescope over a backdrop of a first light image of spiral galaxies from the Rubin Observatory.

Happy International Women's Day!

Perfect time for me to (re)share our white paper on increasing the retention of women in professional astrophysics (really full of suggestions that broaden participation in academic science in general).

arxiv.org/abs/2512.24465

🧪🔭☄️👩‍🔬

I submitted my comments about these proposals with the helpful guide from the folks at DarkSky! darksky.org/news/two-sat...

Today is the last day for SpaceX comments, and there are three more days for Reflect Orbital comments 📝🔭⏰

Several people in full body Moka pot costumes move across a stage. The costumes are in vivid colours, including yellow, red, orange, purple, and many shades of blue and green.

this gave me @artbutmakeitsports.bsky.social vibes

Why do we do astrophysics? At time of writing, large language models (LLMs) are beginning to obtain the ability to design, execute, write up, and referee scientific projects on the data-science side of astrophysics. What implic...

Astronomers: highly recommend this thoughtful opinion piece by @hogg.bsky.social on how to think about our field in light of the development of large language models. whether you agree with him or not it’s vital to discuss the principles behind our science. 🔭 arxiv.org/abs/2602.10181

Anecdotes and guidance notes: surviving and thriving as a woman in science Anecdotes and guidance notes: surviving and thriving as a woman in science, Gaggio, B, Driscoll, E H, Robinson, F C J, Singleton, J, MacManus-Driscoll, J L

In honor of the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, here's an interesting article about the experiences of early career women in physics. Though we have made some progress, there is still a lot of work to do to improve the culture/climate in physics. 👩‍🔬⚛️🎢 #IDWGS

the Epstein files are really devastating because they remind me of how many girls and women miss out on professional opportunities, mentorship and careers because of how many powerful, rich and influential men only view girls and women — and interactions with them — through the lens of sex

Friends, I’d like to show @ucalgary.bsky.social that @bsky.app is where the cool kids hang out and that they should start posting here more and less/none at TheBadPlace™️. Show them some love by reskeeting this 100000000x. 🧪

'not only is this writing technical, dry, formulaic, and locked up behind paywalls, but it is also, counterintuitively, the main output by which scientists are evaluated and upon which they cast most of their hopes for making an actual difference... Hopefully the impossibility of all this is clear.'

Behold, a Deeply Compelling Science Writing Manifesto! | Culture Study Get more from Culture Study on Patreon

there's a lovely discussion about scientific writing in today's culture study with @annehelen.bsky.social and @bgmerkle.bsky.social

www.patreon.com/posts/behold...

I'm not sure where I learned to write scientifically, but I've definitely been subject to '“read a few papers and write like that”'

After reviewing nearly 200 applications from prospective grad students and postdocs over the past few months for a couple different 🧪⚒️ postings, here are some tips, at least as they apply to North American positions. I hope they help future applicants. Share with your networks. 🧵

The final Calvin and Hobbes, which appeared in papers 30 years ago today.

Canadian physics counts: an exploration of the diverse identities of physics students and professionals in Canada The lack of diversity in physics remains a worldwide problem. Despite being a quantitative discipline relying on measurements, there is a paucity of data on the demographic characteristics of underrep...

Interesting results in this new paper:

Canadian physics counts: an exploration of the diverse identities of physics students and professionals in Canada.

🧪 🇨🇦 ⚛️ 👩‍🔬🎢

this account is my favourite part of my feed these days

Basic light pollution diagram showing four different streetlight set ups ranging from more light pollution on the left to less light pollution on the right. The most pollution option, labelled "very bad" is a street lamp with a round uncovered bulb on top, making a sphere of light in the air. The next option, labelled "bad" has a tiny cap on top, that limits the upward pollution a bit. The "better" option is mostly uncovered on top, limiting pollution above the streetlight. The final option, labelled "best" has a full shroud overtop, limiting the light to only below the streetlight, where it is needed for pedestrians and vehicles.

Lots of folks captioning aurora photos like "for a few minutes we didn't think about politics"

guess I'm built different, every time I'm out trying to see night sky stuff I frequently think about how much light pollution is entirely preventable with just a tiny bit of regulation

A List of Things Said to Have Been Ruined by Women

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The astrophotographer I worked with earlier this month, Jeanine Holowatiuk https://www.instagram.com/jeanine.holowatuik/ https://northernescapephotography.com/about/ sent me some horrifying (Halloween-levels of scary) time lapse movies she took of Comet Lemmon.

Why horrifying? Starlink.

I frequently take comfort in the fact that the Universe is vast and beautiful and entirely unaffected by petty human foolishness

Is this episode a post-defence therapy session? Is it offering grad school advice? Or is it two friends having a giggle? Whatever it is, I enjoyed recording this with Pooja ☺️

my personal favorite

for younger audiences, Space Scoop! it shares news from many different organizations and has a great astro dictionary for reference www.spacescoop.org/en/

Happy International Day of Women and Girls in Science 🧪🔭✨

We’re celebrating today by appreciating the women, past and present, who inspire us! We're also featuring a teaser of Dr. Pooja Woosaree and Dr. Pamela Freeman’s upcoming episode where they debrief on their PhD experiences! Stay tuned 📻