NSF Award
2204389
The Nevada State College (NSC) Pursuing Equity to Enhance Retention (PEER) project will address workload disparities in female and underrepresented The Nevada State College's (NSC) Pursuing Equity to Enhance Retention (PEER) project will address workload disparities in female and underrepresented minority faculty using an intersectional lens to establish institutional support for a scholarship at a teaching-intensive institution. NSC is a minority-serving institution (MSI), a Hispanic-Serving (HSI), and an Asian American Native American Pacific Islander Serving Institution (AANAPSI) in an Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR) jurisdiction. Invisible service disproportionally impacts women and other underrepresented faculty. The PEER project will adapt and implement evidence-based systemic change to address the intersectionality of women in STEM. It will address reverse power dynamics by creating transparent workloads and providing scholarship and psychosocial support to improve faculty job satisfaction, research, and tenure & promotion. The results of this project will help inform best practices to support women of color in STEM at teaching-intensive MSIs.<br/><br/>The specific aims of the PEER Project are to address three institutional challenges identified by female and underrepresented racial minority STEM faculty at NSC: 1) inequitable service and teaching loads, 2) lack of recognition and rewards for invisible service, and 3) inadequate scholarship and career development support. The PEER Project objectives are to 1) improve equity via the development of faculty workload dashboards and department equity plans to ensure fair distribution of teaching and service loads, 2) increase recognition via the development and implementation of academic policies that mitigate workload imbalance and reward invisible service, and 3) enhancing support mechanisms by revising and bolstering extant services that prioritize professional development and collaborative mentorship for faculty. The PEER project will support the full inclusion of all women and historically underrepresented STEM faculty and will disassemble institutional barriers. The project will impact the teaching and research infrastructures at NSC. Expected project outcomes include improvement in faculty retention and research capacity, as evidenced by attainment of tenure and extramural funding, peer-reviewed publications, and career longevity.<br/><br/>The NSF ADVANCE program is designed to foster gender equity through a focus on the identification and elimination of organizational barriers that impede the full participation and advancement of diverse faculty in academic institutions. Organizational barriers that inhibit equity may exist in policies, processes, practices, and the organizational culture and climate. ADVANCE "Adaptation" awards provide support for the adaptation and adoption of evidence-based strategies to academic, non-profit institutions of higher education as well as non-academic, non-profit organizations.<br/><br/>This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
