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 College of Health Sciences at Marquette University in Milwaukee has been awarded a five-year, $1.8 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to study the differences in how men and women are impacted by seasonal affective disorder, a disturbance that disproportionately affects women. The research team will conduct studies to generate novel insights into how light alters the function of neural circuits in both sexes and comprise the basic foundations for identifying novel ways to combat seasonal pathology. The research is under the direction of Jennifer Evans, an associate professor of biomedical sciences at the university. Dr. Evans holds bachelor’s and doctoral degrees in psychology from the University of California, San Diego.

The College of Engineering at the University of West Florida received a donation from Muhammad and Fatema Rashid to establish the Dr. Faeza Rashid Kazmier STEM Scholarship Endowment for women students. Muhammad Rashid, professor emeritus in the Hal Marcus College of Science and Engineering, was with the electrical and computer engineering program at UWF from its inception in 1994 until he retired in 2009.

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill received a $1 million gift from alumna Donna Lee Gutterman to support the women’s volleyball program at the university. Gutterman, who holds a bachelor’s degree and an MBA from the university, was the first scholarship athlete in volleyball at the university.