The University of Alabama at Birmingham received a $1.25 million ADVANCE grant from the National Science Foundation.
The three-year grant is given to the university’s Office of the Vice President for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. The grant is designed to advance gender equity for UAB faculty in the science, technology, engineering and math fields, building upon prior efforts from the National Science Foundation.
UAB said prior ADVANCE work was successful in addressing or changing policies and procedures focusing on implicit bias in hiring, tenure and promotion.
Paulette Patterson Dilworth, who has a doctoral degree and is vice president for UAB Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, serves as principal investigator of the Alabama ADVANCE Partnership for Achieving Gender Equity in STEM.
“The number of women obtaining science, technology, engineering and mathematics doctoral degrees has increased steadily in recent decades,” Dilworth said. “However, women continue to be underrepresented in STEM academic positions, especially at senior ranks and in leadership positions.”
Dilworth said UAB will utilize the grant by changing current practices and policies that inhibit gender equity and inclusion in STEM at partnership institutions. The partnership with ADVANCE will have an intersectional focus — recognizing that gender, race and ethnicity do not exist in isolation from one another and other dimensions of social identity.
UAB now joins the University of Alabama at Huntsville and three of Alabama’s historically black colleges and universities: Alabama A&M University, Miles College and Oakwood University in a partnership to implement similar practices.
