NSF INCLUDES PLANNING GRANT: Women in a Network of Discovery (WIND)

NSF INCLUDES Planning Grants Project - Women in a Network of Discovery (WIND)

This NSF INCLUDES planning grant is funded by NSF Inclusion across the Nation of Communities of Learners of Underrepresented Discoverers in Engineering and Science (NSF INCLUDES), a comprehensive national initiative to enhance U.S. leadership in discoveries and innovations by focusing on diversity, inclusion, and broadening participation in STEM at scale. The goal of this planning grant is to increase the number of women engineers from minority, low-income, and first-generation groups. The U.S. needs more women engineers to contribute to economic and national security and strengthen engineering research, commercialization, and product development through inclusive innovation. The vibrancy of inclusive innovation will positively impact academic, business, and national security competitiveness.

The WIND approach is research-based and includes the Kettering Foundation's Learning Exchanges Model, which encourages collaborative change within communities through the participation of all stakeholders in visioning, asset mapping, and decision making. The planning grant will be used to convene partners with a range of expertise and experience to build a pathway to engineering for women in North Carolina, particularly women from underrepresented groups. Initial partners include Alamance-Burlington School System (K-12), Alamance Community College (Associate Degree), and Elon University and North Carolina State University (Bachelor's Degree). The WIND project exemplifies the partnerships element of collaborative infrastructure building and efforts will be directed to developing a model and network that are scalable to the state of North Carolina and the Nation.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.