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I was very pleased to serve as Co-PI on Georgia Tech’s NSF ADVANCE grant from 2001-2006. To initiate the institutional transformation
necessary to advance women to senior ranks and leadership positions, Georgia Tech’s proposal to ADVANCE included five major threads.
1) Termed professorships to form intra- and inter-College networks: One tenured woman full professor in each
of the colleges is the designated ADVANCE professor. The title and the funds associated with the ADVANCE Professorship confer the prestige
and funds equivalent to those accrued by other endowed chairs at the institution and recognize the importance of activities to build workforce infrastructure.
I am proud that Mary Frank Fox has been selected for a second five year term to develop and nurture networks of information, mentoring, and exchange
for the women faculty in the Ivan Allen College.
2) Collection of MIT-Report-like data indicators—and a research program to define the issues and solutions: To assess whether
advancement of women occurs during and after ADVANCE, data are collected on key indicators such as rank, years in rank, and tenure.. A full research program
collecting and analyzing data from surveys and interviews has defined organizational issues and solutions: http://www.advance.gatech.edu/measure.html
3) Family-friendly policies and practices: Georgia Tech has instituted the following family friendly policies and practices:
stop the tenure clock, day care, active service/modified duties temporarily to allow reallocation of percentages of time to cope with change in life circumstances such as birth or adoption of a child, and lactation
stations for nursing moms. http://www.advance.gatech.edu/family.html
4) Mini-retreats to facilitate access to decision-makers and provide informal conversations and discussion; These meetings, focused on topics of interest and concern to all faculty,
such as case studies of promotion and tenure and training to remove subtle bias in promotion and tenure decisions, have provided opportunities for the tenure-track women faculty to interact with the institutional
leadership and express their opinions/views on matters of mutual interest.
5) Removal of subtle gender, racial, and other biases in promotion and tenure: A Promotion and Tenure ADVANCE Committee (PTAC) assessed existing promotion and tenure processes,
explored potential forms of bias, provided recommendations to mitigate against them, and elevated awareness of both candidates and committees of expectations and best practices in tenure and promotion.
The interactive web-based instrument, Awareness of Decision in Evaluation of Promotion and Tenure (ADEPT) developed allows individuals to participate in a virtual promotion and tenure meeting. This instrument,
along with PTAC materials, can be accessed at: http://www.advance.gatech.edu/promotion.html
As the NSF funding officially ends, the challenge is to continue working with a team of folks from Tech committed to institutional advancement and implementation of changes to improve the retention and promotion of women.
Maintaining connections with those at other institutions and with the broader national context for women and minorities in science and engineering coincides with my personal research and life commitments toward this goal.
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 As ADVANCE Professor, my aim is to make the advancement of women in the College and Institute key to the
institutional success and stature of Georgia Tech—so that the advancement of faculty and the advancement of the institution support each other. This Ivan Allen College (IAC) electronic Network of Women Faculty is in that spirit:
the web site is a means of profiling IAC women faculty, and supporting networks of information, collaboration, mentoring, and exchange.
In the past five years, it has been an honor and privilege to help foster the advancement of IAC women faculty through a range of initiatives. These have included:
1) focused luncheon discussions each year on topics such as such as publication productivity, the interface of teaching and research, and climates for diversity by gender, race, and ethnicity;
2) cross-college events on topics such as “what makes a proposal fundable,” and equity in tenure and promotion;
3) annual workshops on “grants and proposals” in collaboration with the IAC associate dean for research;
4) materials for advancement posted on the Resources page of this website and on the IAC ADVANCE Professor website at http://www.prism.gatech.edu/~mf27/links.html;
and 5) the IAC-ADVANCE listserve.
In this next phase of the institutionalization of ADVANCE, I will continue the listserve for IAC women as a means of communication, information, and exchange, and also the regular announcements on the Women, Science, and Technology (WST) Center
listserve to showcase accomplishments of faculty. In the continuing period, I plan to give particular attention to discussion and events focusing upon “strategic advancement” and productivity, satisfaction, and success. This involves our
attention to critical transitions between academic ranks, from assistant to associate, and associate to full, and to sustained advancement for those at full, senior ranks—and to the organizational and institutional climates, cultures, and practices that
support the flourishing of faculty.
You—our IAC women—are exceptionally talented, and responsive collectively in ways that are a continuing inspiration. It is a privilege to stand with you—and work together. |
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