More »
University Communications

University of Richmond Economics Professor Will Help Direct $350,000 Grant From National Science Foundation

October 10, 2003

Dr. KimMarie McGoldrick, associate professor of economics at the University of Richmond, will be one of five project directors for a $350,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to the American Economic Association.

The four-year grant will support two national and four regional mentoring workshops and follow-up reunions designed to increase the number of tenured female faculty in economics.

The national workshops, which are designed to help about 80 junior women economics faculty members, are primarily for research universities.

The regional workshops, which McGoldrick will organize, will focus on institutions that emphasize teaching, research and community service. They will be held in conjunction with regional economics association meetings.

In the workshops, senior and mid-career faculty members will mentor junior participants, who also will attend sessions on such topics as tenure, understanding the teacher-scholar model, grant writing and time-management. About 100 junior female faculty are expected to participate.

A 2002 study showed that gender differences in promotion rates are considerably larger in economics than in both the humanities and the natural sciences, the grant proposal says. Furthermore, women in economics have a particularly difficult time achieving tenure, compared both with men in economics and women in other fields.