ADVANCE Leadership Award: Collaborative Research: Leadership Skills and Community Building Program for Junior Women Engineering Faculty in Engineering

Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond VA

Investigators

Abstract

The goal of this proposed work is to establish a regionally-organized, self-sustaining leadership training program for junior women faculty in engineering disciplines. By simultaneously training women engineering faculty in leadership and constructing a regional peer-mentoring network, the investigators hope to increase job performance and satisfaction for academic women in engineering, thus increasing both retention and advancement. The proposed activity is based on a pilot program conducted in the Northeast and will fund a three-year series of regional meetings in the mid-Atlantic that will provide leadership training, facilitate networking, and will be used as a model for other regions of the country. The specific objectives of this proposed program are to: 1. Train junior women engineering faculty in leadership, communication and conflict management through an experiential learning program; 2. Educate women about the academy through an "insider's perspective" from a senior woman academic engineer; 3. Enable and foster peer-mentoring and regional networking among junior women faculty in engineering; and 4. Promote the expansion of the program throughout the United States.