A three-million-dollar National Science Foundation grant has been jointly awarded to Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), Johns Hopkins University, and New York University to fund the development of a new career advancement model, Project ELEVATE, through the Alliances for Graduate Education and the Professoriate (AGEP). Effective summer 2022, the institutions will team up to develop a new model that promotes equitable advancement of early career tenure-stream engineering faculty from underrepresented groups in STEM.

Project ELEVATE (Equity-focused Launch to Empower and Value AGEP Faculty to Thrive in Engineering) will focus on three major areas:

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• Equity-focused institutional change designed to make structural changes that support the advancement of AGEP faculty
• Developing and sustaining an infrastructure that facilitates impactful mentorship of AGEP junior faculty in support of career advancement
• Inclusive professional development that equips all engineering faculty and institutional leaders with skills to implement inclusive practices and to support career advancement.

Carnegie Mellon University will serve as the lead institution for the work, and Alaine Allen, CMU Engineering associate dean for diversity, equity, and inclusion, will champion efforts as the principal investigator. The full project team is comprised of:

Carnegie Mellon University

• Alaine Allen, Principal Investigator
• Shelley Anna, Co-Principal Investigator
• Linda DeAngelo, Co-Principal Investigator
• William Sanders, Co-Principal Investigator
• Neetha Khan, Project Manager

Johns Hopkins University

• Sridevi Sarma, Principal Investigator
• Darlene Saporu, Co-Principal Investigator
• Ed Schlesinger, Co-Principal Investigator

New York University

• Elisa Riedo, Principal Investigator 
• Jelena Kovačević, Co-Principal Investigator
• Yao Wang, Co-Principal Investigator (Co-PI)

Project ELEVATE will provide a framework for institutional change at private, highly selective research institutions to enable all faculty to be members of a collaborative community.

A representative from the University of Pittsburgh, School of Education, will serve as the internal evaluator for this project.

- This press release was provided by College of Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University