BU Astronomy has Lady Problem

There hasn't been a single woman graduate student entering the astronomy department at BU since the fall of 2011. That class had one woman. She left after the first year to go be with her boyfriend. My class entered in the fall of 2010; there were 9 women. Of these nine women, one has left by choice, and four others have been asked to leave. As with UCI, the number of women that are asked to leave is disproportionate. A higher percentage of women leave than men (in my informal tally). Why is that? I don't believe that it's because the women aren't smart enough to get through. There is something systemic going through the department. And now apparently they are raising the minimum physics GRE score to 50%. The argument is that there is a correlation between GRE scores and success in classes, comprehensive exams, and research. But it is fairly well established that standardized tests are biased towards men, and it's a correlation, not exact. I would not have gotten in had that been the cutoff when I applied. However, I have the highest GPA that the BU astronomy department has seen in 15 years. 15 years! I passed the comps on the first try. I have a published paper, and a second one in the docket. If the cutoff had been in place, BU would have missed out on an excellent student. After a rocky start at UCI, I have excelled at BU. I wish they would be able to see past the test scores, etc. and not be so rigid about this. This policy will continue the trend of not having any women in the department. The few that do get in notice that there aren't very many of us. I'm not going to lie if I get asked about it. This is bullshit and it cannot continue. Either BU will have to change its policies, or they can deal with the consequences.