Grants or Gifts Relating to Women in Higher Education

Here is this week’s news of grants and gifts that may be of particular interest to women in higher education.

The University of Tennessee Health Science Center in Memphis has received a $2,050,000 grant from the National Cancer Institute for an advanced genetics project that could contribute to targeted therapies and personalized treatment for breast cancer. The goal is to identify and validate underlying genetic modifiers of breast cancer, enabling advances to improve predictive and personalized treatments. Liza Makowski, professor of hematology and oncology in the UTHSC College of Medicine, is the lead investigator on the award.

Worcester Polytechnic institute in Massachusetts received a $276,000 grant from the Henry Luce Foundation for programs to support women starting their doctoral programs in computer science and physics. The grant will fund two graduate fellowships per year for two years. The graduate students will be mentored by a community of accomplished female faculty in the fields of computer science and physics, who will help facilitate each student’s individual academic and professional success.

More than 700 women die each year from pregnancy-related complications in the United States, even though the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says two out of three of those deaths are preventable. Pregnancy risks are especially high among women in populations that have been historically underserved. Black women in the U.S., according to the CDC, are more likely to die during pregnancy or childbirth than any other demographic. The Yale School of Public Health and Yale Medical School received a $20.4 million grant from the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute in Washington, D.C. The grant will allow researchers to compare the effectiveness of two community-based interventions designed to improve clinical outcomes among postpartum at-risk women. The two health care delivery models at the center of the study focus on awareness, early detection, and control of postpartum hypertension, as well as social and mental health factors known to impact maternal health.