OU professor receives grant to study trends
Education: Women’s careers will be focus of survey

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Published: November 12, 2009

NORMAN — A University of Oklahoma faculty member will receive about $1 million to study long-term trends of women and minorities in science and engineering careers.

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"This grant will fund our survey in 2012, emphasizing biological sciences. With those data, I will be able to track the progress of women and minorities among science careers over a 10-year span."
Donna Nelson,
associate professor of chemistry

Donna Nelson, an associate professor of chemistry, received one of 14 National Institutes of Health grants focusing on factors that influence the careers of women in biomedical and behavioral sciences and engineering.

Tracking faculty

Her team’s project, "Building an Evidence Base for Developing Effective Intervention Strategies for Women,” will carry out the fourth generation of the Nelson Diversity Surveys, which track the national demographics of tenured and tenure-track faculty in science and engineering departments at research universities.

Past results of her studies have been cited by the U.S. Congress, National Science Foundation and other agencies that follow trends in women and minorities in higher education.

"This is the largest grant I’ve received and the first through NIH,” Nelson said. "This grant will fund our survey in 2012, emphasizing biological sciences. With those data, I will be able to track the progress of women and minorities among science careers over a 10-year span.”

The $16.8 million in NIH grants were issued in response to a 2007 National Academies report that called for a national effort to maximize the potential of women scientists and engineers.