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About Us
Program Staff Biographies
Joan W. Bennett, Ph.D.
Principal Investigator
Joan W. Bennett is a Professor of Plant Biology and Pathology in the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences at Rutgers University. She also serves as Associate Vice President for the Office for the Promotion of Women in Science, Engineering and Mathematics. Prior to coming to Rutgers in 2006, Prof. Bennett spent 35 years on the faculty at Tulane University where she taught genetics and did research on mycotoxin producing fungi in conjunction with collaborators at the Southern Regional Research Center, U. S. Department of Agriculture in New Orleans, Louisiana. After her move to Rutgers University, her research has shifted to a study of molds isolated from homes flooded in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.
In her activities with the Office for the Promotion of Women in Science, Engineering and Mathematics, Prof. Bennett participates in outreach programs for undergraduate women in science and in extensive work with faculty women in scientific, engineering and mathematics disciplines. As Principle Investigator of an ADVANCE grant from the National Science Foundation entitled "Rutgers University Faculty Advancement and Institutional Re-imagination" (RU-FAIR), she will lead a team of co-workers in efforts to develop best practices that will make hiring, mentoring, tenure, promotion and retention practices at Rutgers more transparent.
Professor Bennett is a past vice president of the British Mycological Society; a past president of the American Society for Microbiology and the Society for Industrial Microbiology; and a vice president of the International Union for Microbiological Sciences. She is a recipient of the Alice Evans Award of the American Society for Microbiology for her work on behalf of women in the profession. In 2005, she was elected to the U. S. National Academy of Sciences.
Patricia A. Roos, Ph.D.
Co-PI
Patricia A. Roos is Professor of Sociology, and Labor Studies & Employment Relations, at Rutgers University. Dr. Roos serves as the Co PI and Director of Research for the RU FAIR project. During the 2008-09 academic year, she is the Acting Director of the Center for Women & Work, located at the Rutgers School of Management and Labor Relations (SMLR). Dr. Roos received her Ph.D. from UCLA (1981), and her MA (1974) and BA (1972) from the University of California, Davis. Her research areas include work, inequalities, gender equity in higher education, and work/family.
Dr. Roos published Gender and Work: A Comparative Analysis of Industrial Societies (1985, SUNY Press) and Job Queues, Gender Queues: Explaining Women's Inroads into Male Occupations (1990, Temple University Press). She has also published widely in academic journals, on gender equity in higher education; work, family, and community; occupational feminization of traditionally male occupations; the gender gap in earnings; and race/ethnic differences in work-family attitudes and behavior, among other topics.
Dr. Roos was Chair of the Rutgers Department of Sociology (1991-97), and served as Dean, Social & Behavioral Sciences (1997-2000). She was Vice President of the American Sociological Association (1998-99), and has won grants from the Department of Labor, the National Science Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
Nancy G. Rosoff, Ph.D.
Co-PI
Nancy G. Rosoff is Associate Dean for Administration and Academic Program Development for the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and the Director of the Campus Office of Institutional Diversity and Equity at the Camden campus of Rutgers University, as well as an RU-FAIR Co-PI. An historian by training, she regularly teaches in the graduate history program and in the honors college. Her multiple administrative responsibilities include overseeing undergraduate research programs, working on matters related to recruitment and retention, and developing program to foster student success.
Her work as a scholar centers on American cultural history, particularly the study of women's historical experiences. Dr. Rosoff's current project examines the ways in which women's athletic activities were treated in American popular culture sources between 1880 and 1920. She is also working on a collaborative project with a colleague at the University of Winchester (UK) examining the role of fiction written for teenage girls in developing gender ideology.
Natalie Batmanian, Ph.D.
Associate Director WiSEM
Dr. Natalie Batmanian is a Rutgers Alumn, having received her Ph.D. in Cognitive Psychology from Rutgers University in 2003. Before attaining a position in the Stony Brook University Linguistics Department, she was a post-doctoral fellow at Hunter College, conducting research funded by the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders.
Christina Leshko, B.A.
Program Coordinator
Christina Leshko is a recent Rutgers University graduate with a degree in Psychology. She has worked in the Office for the past year as an Assistant, interviewing professors for the 'My Story' portion of the sciencewoman.rutgers.edu website; she is excited to be on the the team in the capacity of Program Coordinator. In addition, she has co-published and presented an academic poster at the annual WEPAN conference in St.Louis, MO and at the ASEE meetings in Hoboken, NJ and looks forward to fostering future events that promote women in science at Rutgers.
When not in the Office, Christina enjoys kayaking the Raritan and hiking Watchung Reservation. A native of New Jersey, she also enjoys seeking out the Garden State's better-kept secrets...
Mary Gatta, Ph.D.
Internal Evaluator
Mary Gatta, Ph.D. is a Director, Gender and Workforce Policy at the Center
for Women, and on the faculty in the Department of Labor Studies and
Employment Relations at Rutgers University. She holds a PhD and M.A. in
Sociology from Rutgers University and a B.A. in Social Science from
Providence College. Her areas of expertise include gender and public
policy, low wage workers, earnings inequality, and evaluation research on
workforce projects. She serves as the internal evaluator for the RU-FAIR
project.
Dr. Gatta has published several books, articles, and policy papers. Her latest book, Not Just Getting By: The New Era of Flexible Workforce Development released from Lexington Press's imprint Press for Change, chronicles groundbreaking thinking and research on new and innovative workforce development initiatives that delivers skills training to single working poor mothers via the Internet. Her book, Juggling Food and Feelings: Emotional Balance in the Workplace was released from Lexington Press in 2002. In addition to books, Dr. Gatta has published numerous scholarly articles and public policy papers on topics including gender equity in academia, the gender based pay gap, and welfare policy. Finally, Dr. Gatta was recently elected two a three year Council term of the American Sociological Association's Sociological Practice Section.
Crystal Bedley, B.S.
Graduate Student Assistant
Crystal Bedley is a graduate student in the Department of Sociology at Rutgers—New Brunswick and the Graduate Assistant for RU-FAIR Advance. She completed a B.S. degree in Journalism at the University of Colorado—Boulder in 2005. Her current research interests include gender equity in higher education, multiracial identity, media studies, and sexuality. Her current research focuses on the construction and maintenance of multiracial identities. She has taught Introduction to Sociology, Deviance, and Research Methods. She is also an instructor for the Ronald E. McNair Postbaccalaureate Achievement program, a program dedicated to increasing the representation of first-generation, low-income and traditional disadvantaged students in PhD programs nationwide. She is also a member of the Eastern Sociological Association and the American Sociological Association.