Women in Science at Columbia (WISC) was founded in February 2004 by women graduate students in the Chemistry department. Valerie Kuck, formerly of Lucent Technology’s Bell Laboratories, had just come to speak about the disparity between male and female tenure rates and job satisfaction in academia in chemistry, and pointed out that women earning PhDs in chemistry stated that (in her survey data) a supportive group of women would have helped to shape their career in a positive direction.

Several graduate students decided to form their own supportive network of women graduate students and post-docs to facilitate mentoring and guidance among women scientists. Soon, graduate students in Physics, and Applied Physics and Applied Mathematics got involved and helped shape the organization into a broad group of women scientists working to promote mentoring and support among the women in their individual departments, across scientific disciplines, and throughout the university. WISC is the only student-run group recognized by the Graduate Student Advisory Council (GSAC) for women in science at Columbia University that encompasses all science departments. Events sponsored by WISC are organized by graduate students and include Girls Science Day, begun in 2004 and the first event of its kind at Columbia.