Since its inception in 2006, the CU-ADVANCE Center has run programs, collected data, offered mentoring and hosted workshops, all with the goal of boosting the number of women faculty in engineering, math and science.

With its five-year grant period drawn to a close, and as the center continues another year with a no-cost extension, its leaders point to the many ways its goals have been met, but also what more needs to be done.

"The number of people who participated in [events] was greater than expected," said Marjolein van der Meulen, professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering and ADVANCE co-principal investigator. "I think many people had not thought about the great opportunities that come from interacting with other women across campus. I think that was a really big outcome."

The five-year, $3.3 million grant from the National Science Foundation allowed Cornell to develop programming on recruitment and retention of women faculty across 52 departments that are historically underrepresented by women. For example, a well-attended ADVANCE workshop, "It Depends on the Lens," developed in partnership with Cornell Interactive Theatre Ensemble, dealt with issues of unconscious bias in the hiring process.

The center also hosted many networking events for women and collected scores of data on its progress. Kim Weeden, associate professor of sociology and ADVANCE co-PI, and others developed "pipeline reports," which other universities are now using, that detailed the number of women Ph.D. graduates disaggregated by disciplines from top schools.

Many of the programs developed by ADVANCE will move into the provost's office next year, with the appointment of Yael Levitte, ADVANCE executive director, to the new position of associate vice provost for faculty diversity and development. http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/Feb12/facultyDiversity.html She will report to John Siliciano, senior vice provost for academic affairs, who will be responsible for faculty diversity issues. Among Levitte's duties will be, together with Siliciano, meeting with deans and chairs to set realistic diversity goals; training search committees; broadening faculty applicant pools; increasing retention in underrepresented groups; and providing faculty development and advancement opportunities.

As of September 2011, ADVANCE reported 72 hires of women among the 52 departments under the purview of the grant, which include engineering and physical, social and life sciences. Of those, 15 were hired with tenure, which aligned with the goal of bringing in 15 senior women over the grant's five-year period.

Another goal was that each ADVANCE department's faculty would be at least 20 percent women. There are now 25 departments that still range under the 20 percent; at the outset, there were 31.

"Some have moved from 3 percent to 15 percent," Levitte said. "Although we haven't made the progress we meant to, it was a very ambitious goal in five years. Our progress is also positive for a time where, for one academic year, there was almost no hiring."

Mechanical and aerospace engineering, for example, is still below 20 percent, but it is a large department and recently merged with Theoretical and Applied Mechanics. There are six female faculty members in mechanical engineering, compared with two during the 10 years before ADVANCE; a "huge increase," van der Meulen said.

The positive influence of ADVANCE programming is also evident in the vet college's representation of women faculty, as well as improvements in how it recruits, said Judith Appleton, associate dean for academic affairs. Among these efforts: helping recruit senior women faculty by arranging meetings for candidates with other senior women from other STEM departments; the CITE videos about recruitment and bias that have been viewed by most, if not all vet college faculty; and the many ways in which ADVANCE programs have helped introduce and welcome new women faculty to campus.

"ADVANCE has kept the issue of the representation of women among the faculty in front of all of us," Appleton said. "Reminders are important in order to make sure the progress is sustained."

The leaders also point to data from the Faculty Work Life Surveys of 2005 and 2010 to show that ADVANCE programming has had an impact on women's experience and perception in their fields.

Among the surveys' findings:

Co-PI Sheila Hemami, professor of electrical and computer engineering, said the ADVANCE leadership is especially pleased with achieving 100 percent participation women in the 52 ADVANCE departments -- everyone attended at least one event over the five years, while the average was three events.

"At the three-year point we had 75 percent participation," Hemami said. "By the end of the grant, everyone chose to participate."