Cate Samuelson, Ph.D., is a senior research associate at the University of Washington Center for Workforce Development. She is responsible for the qualitative research analysis on the Sloan Foundation-funded national study called Project to Assess Climate in Engineering (PACE). She also manages qualitative components of several evaluation and needs-assessment projects. She has worked as a research assistant and independent research consultant on a variety of qualitative research projects and evaluations, including those focused on educational leadership, STEM education, and academic and social supports for disadvantaged students. Prior to her career in research, she worked as a public school teacher for eight years.
Elizabeth Litzler, Ph.D., is the director for research at the University of Washington Center for Workforce Development and an affiliate assistant professor of sociology. She directs research projects from conceptualization, methodological design, and collection of data and analysis to dissemination of research findings. Dr. Litzler manages the Sloan-funded Project to Assess Climate in Engineering (PACE), which uses quantitative and qualitative methods to examine the culture for women and underrepresented minorities in 21 engineering colleges nationwide. She also directs the external evaluation for the National Center for Women & Information Technology (NCWIT). In addition to her leadership in the office, Dr. Litzler is a member of ASEE and a board member of the Women in Engineering ProActive Network (WEPAN). Her research interests include the educational climate for students in science and engineering, and gender and race stratification in education and the workforce.
Paige Smith, Ph.D. is the director of the Women in Engineering Program in the A. James Clark School of Engineering at the University of Maryland. Paige has over 20 years of experience with recruiting and retaining diverse populations in engineering. Under her leadership, the Women in Engineering Program received the 2008 National Engineers Week Introduce a Girl to Engineering Day Award. She is the principal investigator for a National Science Foundation's Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Talent Expansion Program (STEP) grant called the Successful Engineering Education and Development Support (SEEDS) Program. SEEDS extends successful women in engineering retention programs to all first-year and new external transfer students in the Clark School. Paige is the co-lead for the Mid-Atlantic Girls Collaborative (MAGiC), a regional collaborative within the NSF-funded National Girls Collaborative Project which brings together girl-serving organizations across Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, and Washington, D.C. that are committed to increasing the number of young women pursuing science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) careers. Currently, Paige is serving as the Immediate Past President for the Women in Engineering ProActive Network (WEPAN). Paige earned her Ph.D. and M.S. in industrial and systems engineering and B.S. in engineering science and mechanics from Virginia Tech.
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