A Task Force on Faculty Gender Equity, charged with assessing the status of women faculty at The University of Texas at Austin and making recommendations regarding their compensation, recruitment, promotion and other areas of employment, has been established by Dr. Steven Leslie, provost of the university.
Leslie said the task force would be identifying barriers to women's professional achievement, developing concrete proposals to assure equitable representation of resources for women at all levels of the faculty and seeking strategies to ensure professional success of all members of faculty at the university.
Gretchen Ritter, associate professor of government and director of the Center for Women's and Gender Studies, and J. Strother Moore, the Admiral B. R. Inman Centennial Chair in Computing Theory in the Department of Computer Sciences, were appointed co-chairs of the task force.
"Despite a substantial increase in the number of women receiving doctorates in all disciplines, there is reason to be concerned that women remain underrepresented as tenured and tenure-track faculty within research universities, both nationally and at The University of Texas at Austin," said Leslie. "Furthermore, issues exist in regard to compensation, opportunities for professional development, and structure and availability of family support provisions. At universities across the country, task forces have been formed and senior administrative positions created to address barriers to the inclusion and success of women faculty in all fields."
The task force has formed a data collection committee chaired by Vice Provost John Dollard and four subcommittees, including: Faculty Compensation and Professional Development, chaired by Dr. Janet Ellzey; Recruitment, Retention and Promotion, chaired by Dr. Alba Ortiz; Climate and Environment, Work-Family Issues, chaired by Dr. Maggie Rivas-Rodriguez; and Administrative Leadership and the Status of Non-tenure Track Faculty, chaired by Dr. Barbara White.
Other task force members include: Dr. Jamie Barner, Dr. Elena McDonald Buller, Dean Douglas Dempster, Larry Doll, Dr. Janet Ellzey, Kristi Fisher (ex officio); Dr. Patricia Hansen, Dr. Hillary Hart, Dr. Madeline Hsu, Dr. Chandra Muller, Dr. Laura Starks, Dr. Sharon Strover, Dr. Karen Uhlenbeck, Dr. Greg Vincent (ex officio) and Dr. Robert Wilson.
