I have been a US Air Force weather forecaster for 12 years now. I’ve worked in several countries around the globe, in many differently-organized weather units: huge training squadron in St. Louis, Mo; mid-size weather shop in Osan, Korea; very small forecast team in Honduras; mid-size weather shop again in Misawa, Japan; and now fairly large weather squadron in Seoul, Korea. Of our current 3,000 or so-strong weather career field, I have personally met probably 60% of the people, and a higher proportion if we disclude the recruits who came into it two years or more after me (those who hold a lower rank than me). Realistically, I think I possess a large enough breadth of knowledge of this small career field to state that I have a statistically significant amount of experience—and the leadership at the officer level is overwhelmingly white, and male. When you think about the fact that the highest ranking active duty officer in weather is a Colonel (personnel code O-6), and that there are only about 15 Colonels in the career field at a time, it is very telling that every single one of them is white and male, and has been for as long as I can remember in my career. The same goes for one rank below, lieutenant colonels (of which there are many).
For lower-scale leadership, there is a bit more diversity. My last unit at Misawa was a mid-size weather shop, commanded by a captain. She was a woman of Japanese descent, and I would bet money that she is the only Asian female officer in weather. In fact, I have only ever met one other Asian officer in the career field, and he had also been a previous weather shop commander at Misawa. There are very few African-Americans even in weather, let alone in leadership positions—you see it more on the enlisted rank-and-file side than in the officers. I have still never seen a single African-American female officer; the highest rank I have ever seen an African-American female attain in my career field was here at my current squadron, where a woman was selected for promotion to Senior Master Sergeant (among the top 2% of the Air Force), but promptly left the career field to go commission as a nurse and officer.
Where am I going with this? I think there might be a few factors as to why senior leadership within the career field is overwhelmingly white and male. Meteorology is considered a STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) field, and requires a bachelor’s of science with a huge amount of complicated math, physics, dynamics, and other boring junk underpinning it. I personally have no intention of ever getting this degree, because it would bore me to tears and probably prove way too much for me, academically. All officers have to possess a meteorology degree (or at least an earth sciences degree with a minimum amount of physics and math) in order to be commissioned. I know from previous classes that I have taken that STEM departments at universities are generally having trouble keeping women and minorities in their departments long enough to graduate. Similarly, I know that we as a nation are generally lagging behind on our STEM abilities. Put these two things together with the fact that meteorology tends to be seen as a purely academic pursuit, with very little practical (economic) value outside the military or the National Weather Service (both of which are small communities within themselves), and you have a recipe for a career field that proceeds with almost exclusively white male dominance.
Since the enlisted side does not depend on a university degree, you do find more women and minorities, but still not many. To be accepted into weather, someone must usually score high enough on the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery, as well as generally volunteer. You occasionally find people who were simply picked for weather based on their test scores, but most were volunteers. I think the real problem with getting more women and minorities into the enlisted side is that weather is a very small and relatively unknown career field. I personally had no idea it existed back in 2003 when I was handed a book and told to pick a job. The mere fact that there is so much training involved blew me away, and honestly probably serves as a bit of a drawback to many prospective recruits.
The good thing in all this is that I have seen more and more fresh female lieutenants coming out of the training programs, as well as an increasing number of minorities. I know universities have been making a big push for STEM graduates in the last 5 years, and this looks like it is starting to pay off for Air Force weather. We do need the change in leadership, in my opinion. I used to tell my previous captain in Japan, who I miss all the time, that she should definitely become the career field director, and she should hire me as her aide.