The Collaborative to Advance Equity Through Research releases first annual report

More than 50 leading institutions and organizations across the United States are engaged in a multi-year commitment to invest in research by, for, and about the lives of women and girls of color.

This month, the Collaborative to Advance Equity Through Research released their first annual report, Putting Women And Girls Of Color At The Center: Shifting The Tide Of Research Through Institutional Leadership and Sustained Investments. The report documents groundbreaking work — including new research, postdoctoral positions and evidence-based initiatives.

Wake Forest University launched the Collaborative in November 2015 at a daylong summit on Advancing Equity for Women and Girls of Color co-hosted by the White House Council on Women and Girls and the Anna Julia Cooper Center.

In addition to sharing research work accomplished at each institution over the past year, the report provides models of substantive, meaningful investments made by multiple types of institutions including colleges and universities, community-based organizations, publishers, and advocacy and policy organizations.

The Collaborative began as a coalition of 24 institutions with a collective commitment of $18 million through 2020. In its first year, membership has more than doubled and the total budgetary commitments more than quadrupled, growing to 55 members with more than $75 million in independent commitments.

“Scholars and institutions of the Collaborative to Advance Equity through Research believe the lives of women and girls of color must be at the center of historical, social, political, economic, scientific, cultural, and artistic inquiry,” Melissa Harris-Perry, Maya Angelou Presidential Chair at Wake Forest University, writes in the report’s introduction. “Provosts, deans, directors, and other institutional leaders have publicly acknowledged the need for research investigating women and girls of color and the value of this research in advancing equity for women and girls of color. By joining the Collaborative, they have declared that this research is an institutional priority.”

The investments and initiatives highlighted in the report include: new postdoctoral fellowships and faculty positions; undergraduate and graduate student research  support; STEM pipeline programs and research initiatives; community-based participatory research; the development of new quantitative and qualitative data and research material; the generation of research-based policy solutions; the utilization of research approaches that position girls and women of color as the experts on their own lives; and the translation of research into community-centered information, programs, and initiatives.

More information is available on the Anna Julia Cooper Center website.

About the Collaborative to Advance Equity Through Research

The Collaborative to Advance Equity Through Research is a national coalition of institutions in the United States committed to taking meaningful action to support and improve research addressing the lives of women and girls of color. Collaborative members make commitments to and invest resources in research at their own institution for a minimum of five years, and work collaboratively with other members to build new connections, share promising practices, and support the advancement of research addressing the lives of women and girls of color.

About the Anna Julia Cooper Center

The Anna Julia Cooper Center is an interdisciplinary center at Wake Forest University with a mission of advancing justice through intersectional scholarship. The Center supports, generates and communicates innovative research at the intersections of gender, race and place, sustaining relationships between partners on campus and throughout the nation in order to ask new questions, reframe critical issues, and pursue equitable outcomes. The Center is directed by Melissa Harris-Perry.