The Providing Opportunities for Women in Education Research consortium was developed to address inequities that people who identify as women or non-binary experience in educational research. We also work with our membership and broader research community in their efforts to address issues of social justice and systemic inequities. The most current iteration of blatant racism and violence, as those of the past, is deeply troublesome for us; we know that we cannot fully understand how it has impacted our membership and their communities. As an organization we unequivocally say that Black Lives Matter. We acknowledge and condemn white supremacy and racism. We recognize that centuries of systemic inequity and racism have a real and profound negative impact in the day to day lives of our colleagues of color, both professionally and personally. We acknowledge that now is the time to listen, engage, and take specific actions that combat systemic inequalities and racism in all of our organizational structures. Most of our research and scholarship engages young children and adolescents. These children and adolescents should not have to fear for their lives and those of their family and friends. We urge our membership to consider how they can use their expertise to take action in their own communities. We are committed to change in our own organizational structure and goals to ensure that we are supporting these efforts. We are committed to doing this through our own reading and learning, engagement and action in our own communities, and as always, we welcome feedback from all our members about how we can better serve both our membership and the broader educational research community.  
 
We are here to connect, support, and advocate,
 
Emily Solari, President, ejs9ea@virginia.edu
Sara Hart, President Elect, shart@fcrr.org
Jill Pentimonti, incoming President Elect, jpentim2@nd.edu
 
On behalf of the Steering Committee.

Emily Solari, Ph.D.

​Just two weeks ago, I had been prepared to send a letter to our POWER membership about the organization’s plans for the new decade. The contents largely outlined the goals and mission of the organization, described some of the work we had been actively and sometimes quietly engaged in, and our aspirations moving forward. It became evident two weeks ago the world was quickly changing, and today, having re-read what I wrote weeks ago, it became crystal clear that much of what I had outlined is no longer relevant.
 
As I have settled into a forced homeschool situation with my three young boys coupled by an exponential work load increase, the things I deemed important two weeks ago are no longer. Today I worry about the health of my nuclear family, my aging parents and grandparents, and my friends far and wide. In a very real way, I worry about being able to manage my job while also managing my kids at home. I hope that someday soon, I will get through just one zoom call without my 5-year-old interrupting it by yelling some totally asinine thing that at the very least worries the participants on the call, and most certainly makes it so that they are judging my parenting. As I work late into the night trying my hardest to catch up, I often get paralyzed by the thought that I just can’t do it all. I can’t, and quite frankly, I just don’t want to. It feels weird to be pushing so hard on the ordinary work things when the world is in such a desperate and strange state. I worry that my kids are worried. Should I be concerned that they have started playing a game called “social distance freeze tag”, I mean- this is odd, right? I worry about the kids in schools, those who usually benefit in some way from my work, and are often the most marginalized in schools- how are they coping at home? Essentially, I worry about all the things. And, I am concerned that with all this worry, about my family and the world around me, that I will never again be able to fully engage in the deep and critical thinking that is required in our line of work to be a productive scholar.
 
At the same time, I realize that my concerns are happening from a place of great privilege. I have a roof over my head, resources for myself and my children, and job security. I am keenly aware that not all the people that make up our membership are in the same situation. I have spent a lot of time thinking about the impact this situation will have on my more junior colleagues and those not situated in tenure or tenure line positions. Since so many of us work in applied research settings there is no doubt that research agendas have been disrupted. This will have more of a negative impact on our junior colleagues than more senior, there is just no way around this. Folks who hear the tick tock of the tenure clock, or were collecting data as pilot study to submit an early career grant are more impacted. Similarly, dissertation studies are being altered as we speak and graduate students and postdocs are looking at a new reality of a potentially even more difficult academic job market. 
 
When POWER was first conceived we had a laser focus on three main goals, which are to advocate, support, and connect people in educational and human development research, with a particular interest in lifting up junior women in our fields. Now, more than ever, is the time to think about how we can do this as a collective group. I have heard from several good friends who are more junior that they feel hesitant about speaking up against the narrative around productivity during this time. To those people, I would like to scream, “I am here for you and I think many others are as well.” It is so important for us to keep in mind that for people who are in vulnerable positions within the academic structure, their vulnerability is exacerbated in times like these. The question becomes how do we use our collective voice to support ourselves and those around us.   
 
Advocate. I am hopeful that the people who are in positions of power across the multiple institutions that we represent, and those that have secure job positions, will be unapologetic in their advocacy for folks in our community for whom this is not their reality. Those of us who can speak up, should. We should be asking the hard questions about how our institutions are going to deal with tenure related concerns and funding of graduate students as we move forward. I am not suggesting that we all have to be publicly vocal, some very important things can happen at the local level. Be the person who surfaces the issues at the faculty meetings, engage with your other more senior colleagues about these concerns. Lead the efforts around how we will rethink the notion of productivity in 2020 and 2021. Ask the hard questions about your institution’s plan to support graduate students. Bottom line, our junior colleagues should not be left alone to consider how the current situation is going to impact them differentially and in inequitable ways. 
 
Support.  People are approaching this new reality in drastically different ways, and I have found over the past two weeks that this means that there are very different types of supports that folks need. One interesting consequence of our current situation is that I have heard on more than one occasion more senior colleagues suggesting that this time is a great time to be productive. I’ve heard - we are stuck at home, why would we not consider how we can use this time to write more papers, conceive of grant ideas, etc.? To those people, I ask that you stop to consider how this narrative impacts the people around you and how actively resisting the notion of sustained and even increased productivity during this time may be a supportive step for women and our more junior colleagues. As people are settling into this new reality, we each have our own individual distractions. Some of us have increased childcare and/or eldercare responsibilities, some of us are scrambling to provide quality content to our students in an online platform for the first time, many of us have seen research disrupted. Many of us are feeling a heightened state of anxiety- we are concerned about our students, our families, the world. Let’s be mindful of this in our interactions, especially those of us who are in positions of power within institutions. And more importantly, let’s try to be intentional in support of our colleagues, especially those who are struggling to find secure footing in their personal and professional lives during these extremely trying times. 
 
Connect. Let’s be purposeful about connecting with each other, both socially and professionally. One of the most successful activities that POWER has been engaged in over the past two years is our most simple - we host happy hours at professional conferences and meetings. These happy hours serve as a safe place for women, and, others who support women in our field to talk about successes, issues, and create meaningful relationships. Early on, our steering committee recognized that we are more powerful as advocates when we communicate with each other. As our new reality sets in, we should share what is working for us, how our institutions are responding, and ideas for advocacy and supports across institutions.  Please also connect with me and with our steering committee as you see fit, we want to hear from you and we want to know how we can support your efforts at your institutions. 
 
Let’s take care of and be kind to each other and ourselves as we move through this uncharted territory. 

Over the last several months, the POWER Steering Committee had the pleasure of interviewing Drs. Patricia Edwards, Shelley Gray, and Kate Cain. Please see our website for more information about their backgrounds and commitment to mentoring.

As an inspiring start to the New Year, we will be sending out ambassador interviews over the next few weeks. With Dr. Patricia Edwards, we had a thoughtful conversation about what to consider when advocating for yourself and for others. Stay tuned for our next installments!

What is the best advice you’ve received in your career?
The best advice that I’ve received is that you need to have a focus. What do you want to be best known for? You can’t know everything about everything, but you can know a lot about something. Can you attract people to come and work with you? If so, you will need a focus to build up your CV in a way that attracts a talented team. When you finish your dissertation, let this launch your career instead of jumping around to this and that.


What are the most important characteristics of a good mentor?
The key to a good mentor is to know what will make an individual successful in the academy and in their given academic institution. A good mentor advocates for their mentees in many ways, such as increasing their visibility through nominating them for awards and getting them on national committees. Sometimes you will have to use your mentoring skills to negotiate for your mentees.

I want to make sure women are given equal opportunities. I want to make sure they get a seat at the table. At one of my past institutions in the 70’s, I saw that there were no women with tenure and moving through the ranks. Therefore, I tried to make sure that women who were right for this job were given opportunities and the experience they need to move through the ranks.

In academia, it is all about your reputation. No one gets to where they have gotten without help. Who do you want to help move through the ranks? How do you want to leave a legacy? This is good not only for them but for you and your institution. Women need to know the rules and then we can play it just as well or better than the boys.


What are the most important characteristics of a good mentee?
As a mentee, you need to listen to the good news AND the bad news. We need to see bad news as a learning opportunity and be humble. For example, my advisor marked my writing up so much with a red pen that it looked like it had been given a blood transfusion. I was so upset at first. But then I realized that the feedback was coming from a place of caring and I needed to learn from it. And I did. And on my later papers, my advisor didn’t need to mark them up.

Remember that you own the responsibility for your own success. Your mentor is there to support you, but you need to do the work.


What advice do you have to help people manage their time effectively and stay engaged? 
I think that many junior faculty don’t know how or when to say no. As one of my colleagues says, “No is a complete sentence.” When someone asks you to do something, you want to consider “Who’s to benefit?” For instance, as a person of color, I am asked to be on many committees and serve in other roles. I have to be careful that I don’t get sliced up to the point of incompetency. Think of yourself like The Giving Tree. You only have so many resources to offer.
As a minority researcher, I get asked to do things all the time. I told someone I am not a minority anymore because you can get so sliced up and diced up. My advice is work 8 hours, sleep 8 hours, and do something else for 8 hours. And if you overcommit, you won’t be able to hold up your end of the bargain. Then your reputation suffers and you don’t want people to think of you as someone who says “Yes” but does not do what they promised.

However, saying no can be tricky because you also need to be a good citizen of your institution. Sometimes, especially as you become more senior, you need to say yes to requests because if you don’t do it, then someone else will have to do it. You want to protect your junior colleagues. You also need to be careful about who you say no to. There are two people that you have to work well with - your Dean and your Chair. Sometimes there are situations where they ask you to do something that you didn’t plan on - like a search committee. You need to be flexible.

It’s also important to remember to take a long view of your career. There are some years that you will be at the top of your game and producing a lot, and some years you will not be because of personal issues. But if you take the long view, you will always retain a focus on quality and ways to move the field forward, even if you are not publishing the same amount as in other years.


What are some of the things necessary for success that you think women researchers might not think about or need support in developing?
One thing is that the ability to teach is not going to get you tenure. But the inability to teach will get you in trouble. You have to be able to teach but also do research, write grants, and national service.

I keep copies of winning grant applications and share these as examples with my mentees so they can see what this looks like.

It’s also really important to learn how to negotiate for academic positions. We hold a negotiation workshop for our doctoral students to learn critical negotiation skills. I tell people that institutions have a salary range that they can offer, and I explain that women are earning less than men. But women did not pay less for their PhD training than men did, so why should be paid a lesser salary? That doesn’t make sense.

It’s important to know how to talk to policy makers. As researchers, we are trained to be careful about what we say about our research. At least within my own discipline, when we talk about the implications of our work, we typically limit it to suggestions of areas for future research. Trying to use our research findings to influence policies can seem like a  daunting concept. However, in recent years, institutions are devoting considerable resources into helping academics build their skills, so they can communicate complex science or technical social science into ‘user friendly’ and digestible soundbites. If your research overlaps with nationally recognized policy, then this provides the opportunity for you to talk with multiple audiences. Since coming to MSU in the fall of 1989, I have continued to be an articulate spokesperson and my service has taken three forms. I have served the university, professional organizations, and parents and children. For example, I have responded to more than 50,000 teachers, administrators, daycare providers, adult educators, legislators, and governors around the country regarding the two family literacy programs I developed. I served as an advisor to the U. S. Department of Education, specifically the Department's Office of Elementary and Secondary Education and the Office of Planning, Budget and Evaluation. My work with the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education led to the document Preparing Young Children for Success. It provides guideposts that may be helpful in taking actions to achieve the first national goal, Readiness for School. Without careful counsel, such reforms are likely to create more problems than they solve. My contributions to these policy statements and to the research and development that they support for the next five years is crucial, for I reminded the Department that teachers need to be educated in how to accommodate the needs of the changing family. My work with the Department brought me in contact with many key state and national leaders which has served as an important avenue for the dissemination of my scholarship from MSU. I was also a consulting reader of "The Mechanics of Success for Families: An Illinois Family Literacy Report." This experience also brought me in contact with several state and national leaders. Also, I had the distinct honor and pleasure to testify in Washington on March 9, 1989 to the Congressional Subcommittee on Select Education about my work with families and children. Additionally, because of my work with families and children, I was invited to the 52nd Presidential Inaugural "Bells for Hope" Historic Event and Reception in Washington, DC, January 1993.

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