UCONN Collaborative to Advance Equity Through Research on Women and Girls of Color

Last November 2015 the Anna Julia Cooper Center at Wake Forest University and the White House Council on Women and Girls announced an initiative to promote scholarship and research on women and girls of color. By 2050, women of color will constitute more than half of all women in the United States. However, they (along with girls of color) are infrequently the central subjects of scholarly inquiry. This research deficit has meaningful consequences for the ways our institutions contribute to public discourse, policymaking, and knowledge about women and girls of color.

To address this research deficit, the University of Connecticut has become a partner institution in the Collaborative to Advance Equity through Research on Women and Girls of Color (“The Collaborative”). It also has committed to efforts to broaden our knowledge in these areas through supporting research on women and girls of color. (See the report, herewith: https://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/whitehouse.gov/files/documents/ADVANCING_EQUITY_FOR_WOMEN_AND_GIRLS_OF_COLOR_REPORT.pdf.) The University of Connecticut was one of the first universities to have made such a commitment.  (See http://ajccenter.wfu.edu/2015/11/24/the-collaborative-to-advance-equity-through-research/.)

As a partnering university, the University of Connecticut committed to this cause by designating focus to research, teaching, and programming to promote the advancement of knowledge about women and girls of color.  As such, the University now has two Post-Doctoral Fellows, Dr. Shannon Gleason and Dr. Alexandra Moffett-Bateau, who are visiting scholars and professors during the 2016-2017 academic year.  As fellows, they will be conducting their research on women/girls of color, teaching courses to undergraduate students respective to their research specialties, giving guest lectures and presentations on their research, leading themed-research workshops and discussions of our Research Grant Fellows, and participating more broadly in our University’s community.

Through the University’s support, we also have 16 Research Grant Fellows (faculty, staff, graduate students, and an undergraduate student), of which 12 research projects on women and girls of color have been funded. The research projects of both the Post-Doctoral Fellows and the Research Grant Fellows focus on two themes:

1. STEM Pipeline Framing and Intersectional Issues for Women and Girls of Color; and
2. Environment, Public Health, and Intersectional Issues for Women and Girls of Color.

Via partnerships and outreach across the University, disciplines, organizations, and even local and state governments, we seek to promote awareness, activism, and public policy responses to address issues affecting women and girls of color.

In sum, the University of Connecticut will have contributed to The Collaborative through the following ways:

1. The promotion of professional development and research support for junior scholars conducting research on women and girls of color;
2. The promotion of research on women and girls of color through internal grant funding of related research projects and sponsorship of research workshops advancing grant writing and publication/dissemination of research in scholarly outlets;
3. The promotion of learning about women and girls of color through undergraduate course offerings, University lectures and fora, and other translational research;
4. The promotion of communal discourses and engagement in issues concerning women and girls of color via external University relationships with activists, practitioners, and members of the local community; and
5. The promotion of equity for women and girls of color through research, teaching, and service to the University community, the Academy, and beyond.

For more information, please follow the links for the 2016-2017 Postdoctoral Fellows and the Research grant recipients. Also, contact Shayla C. Nunnally (Shayla.nunnally@uconn.edu), UCONN Campus Coordinator.