A very happy birthday to Dr. Shirley Ann Jackson, who turned 80 on Aug. 5. Jackson — whom Time magazine once called “perhaps the ultimate role model for women in science” — was the first Black woman to earn a doctorate from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Her 1973 doctorate in nuclear physics also made her only the second Black woman in the U.S. to earn a doctorate in physics.
Opening doors in science and higher education
Since her days as an undergraduate student at MIT, Jackson has combined research with public policy and advocacy. As an organizer of what became MIT’s Black Student Union, she led her peers in drafting proposals for the university administration to increase recruitment of and support for minority students and faculty. This led to an appointment on the MIT Task Force on Educational Opportunity. As part of the task force, Jackson traveled the Midwest during fall 1968, speaking to minority students about studying STEM at MIT. The impact of the task force was seen quickly, with 57 Black freshmen enrolling the following year (a huge increase from the previous three to five per year). To support these students, Jackson helped create a program still in existence today — Project Interphase, now known as Interphase EDGE.
Following her studies at MIT, Jackson’s work included research at Bell Laboratories and time on the faculty at Rutgers University. In 1994, President Bill Clinton appointed her as the chair of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, where Jackson implemented the use of computer modeling to assess the probability of risk. Following the Clinton administration, she served as president of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in New York from 1999 to 2022.
Jackson’s list of accolades is tremendous. She was appointed to the National Women’s Hall of Fame in 1998, and President Barack Obama presented her with the National Medal of Science in 2014.
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