VCU news

By Laura Ingles
VCU School of Medicine

The Virginia Commonwealth University Institute for Women’s Health is the sole recipient of a five-year grant that aims to enhance gender equity initiatives in the science, technology, engineering, math and medicine workforce. Titled the VCU National Coordinating Center for Advancing Gender Inclusive Excellence, the $3.8 million grant will support the creation of a national repository of resources and strategies to overcome systemic gender-based inequities impacting the biomedical sciences academic and research workforce.  

The grant brings together experts from the VCU School of Medicine, College of Engineering, School of Education and Wright Center for Clinical and Translational Research. Susan Kornstein, M.D., executive director of the IWH; Barbara Boyan, Ph.D., director of the VCU Institute for Engineering and Medicine; and Mangala Subramaniam, Ph.D., senior vice provost for faculty affairs, will lead the initiative as co-principal investigators.  

Under its multidisciplinary leadership, the AGIE team will collect and evaluate data on gender inclusivity and equity strategies that academic institutions across the U.S. have established. The goal is to compile and build a central, accessible repository that makes it easy for schools and organizations to assess their own performance in advancing women in STEMM and then find tailored, targeted programs that they can implement.  

Kornstein described institutional change related to diversity, equity and inclusion in higher education as “complex, contested and slow-moving.” Even when organizations want to implement changes, she said, they often face structural barriers.  

“What’s missing is the development of a central hub to support and advance gender equity programs through collecting, validating, evaluating and disseminating strategies and outcomes,” Kornstein said. “And that’s what this grant will make possible.”   

In collaboration with the NIH, the VCU AGIE team will also award and monitor up to 15 $50,000 pilot grants for research institutions to develop innovative strategies to address gender inequities in the STEMM academic or research workforce.  

This is not the first time the IWH has tackled an issue like this. Kornstein, Boyan and Subramaniam, along with Maike Philipsen, Ph.D., a professor at the School of Education, and Vanessa Sheppard, Ph.D., interim dean of the School of Public Health, are also co-PIs on ADVANCE-VCU. This multidisciplinary project funded by the National Science Foundation aims to increase faculty diversity by developing strategies to recruit, retain and advance women faculty in science, technology, engineering and math fields. 

Arturo Saavedra, M.D., Ph.D., dean of the School of Medicine, commended the team for its multi-pronged approach and leadership on a national scale.  

“This is what multidisciplinary research is all about — addressing the nation’s most complicated problems at the intersection of science, technology and the humanities,” Saavedra said. “The AGIE team’s efforts will transcend the boundaries of our own university, support peer institutions across the U.S. and devise solutions for the equitable advancement of women in underrepresented fields where their talent will advance our knowledge and societal progress.”  

This story was originally published on the VCU School of Medicine’s website.