Our 4W Innovators and Emerging Scholars grants program supports the work of UW-Madison faculty, staff, and graduate students. All people who are working to foster gender equity and wellbeing are eligible to apply. Awards are based on an annual call and panel review, as well as scholar-initiated proposals that are granted throughout the year. This dual approach makes our grants program accessible, highly selective, and responsive to emerging opportunities. 4W grants are made possible through annual support from the University of Wisconsin Women’s Philanthropy Council and gifts from our supporters. Grant recipients become part of the 4W network, where they have access to mentorship, collaboration, leadership development, and resources to deepen their expertise related to gender analysis and wellbeing.
The 4W grants program not only provides financial resources, but fosters intellectual growth, increased social impact, and professional advancement for faculty, staff, and students. Scholars have gone on to receive extramural grant support and employment opportunities related to work initiated through this program.
Congratulations to our latest awardees!
2026 Innovation Grantees
Darshana Sreedhar Mini, Associate Professor at the Department of Communication Arts, College of Letters and Science
Telegeographies of Indian Migration: Malayan Imaginaries taps into the contact zones created through media flows between South Asia and Southeast Asia through the audio-visual infrastructures that connected Indian migrants to British Malaya. From the late 1850s to the 1960s, Malayan rubber plantations were supported by the labor imported from South India. Drawing from fields such as media studies, visual studies, anthropology, history and literature, Telegeographies track these media formations by conceptualizing the variegated artifacts using the Tamil term Tōṭṭam Ūṭakam (“plantation media”) to examine how both the media produced around the plantations like daguerreotypes, photo cartes, glass-plate negatives, photo-books, documentaries and photographs, as well as newer media formations look back at the plantation period and its legacies. In locating “plantation media” as a network of lateral audio-visual material infrastructures, this project traces how Malaysian Indian community articulate their status as minority ethnic group with plantation connections in the multi-ethnic context of Malaysia. Darshana Sreedhar Mini is an Associate Professor at the Department of Communication Arts, University of Wisconsin-Madison. She is the author of Rated A: Soft-Porn Cinema and Mediations of Desire in India (UC press, 2024) and co-editor of South Asian Pornographies: Vernacular Formations of the Permissible and Obscene (Routledge, 2024) with Anirban Baishya, and The Intellect Handbook on Adult Film History, with Patrick Keilty and Peter Alilunas (Intellect Books, 2026). She is currently working on her book titled Telegoegraphies of Indian Migration: Malayan Imaginaries which studies media flows between South Asia and Southeast Asia—specifically, between India, Singapore, Malaysia and their shared colonial pasts.
Carolina Sarmiento, Associate Professor at the Department of Civil Society & Community Studies, School of Human Ecology
Advancing Domestic Worker Justice Through a Community-Based Research Partnership in Orange County, California: Domestic work in the United States exists at the intersection of gender, race, class, and immigration status. In Orange County, one of the richest counties in the state of California, the large majority of domestic workers are immigrant women, many of whom are primary breadwinners for their families. Despite sustaining households and enabling broader workforce participation, they are often denied formal recognition as workers. This reflects a broader gendered economic structure in which care labor is invisibilized and undercompensated. This proposal outlines a community-based participatory research (CBPR) partnership designed to be part of strengthening domestic worker power, advancing higher labor standards, and improving enforcement of worker protections in Orange County. Domestic workers who include home care and child care providers in addition to people who clean homes for a living, have been organizing and developing their own domestic worker-led organization in Orange County. Rooted in principles of co-creation of knowledge and worker leadership, this collaboration supports organizing efforts to document lived experiences, build grassroots leadership, and translate research findings into organizing resources, policy and systems change. Carolina Sarmiento’s work is situated at the intersection of studying urban development, governance, and the creation and destruction of cultural spaces in working class communities of color. Her research and practice focuses on learning from the grassroots as they respond to various forms of inequality and injustice while still building transformative and creative alternatives. In critically examining urban development in low-income communities of color, she centers everyday responses that are central to community-based planning, transnational development, and the creation of new democratic processes and spaces. Through her research and teaching, she builds collaborations with organizations at the forefront of various grassroots movements and community-based struggles advancing immigrant, worker, and housing rights and racial justice.
2026 Emerging Scholar Grantees
Letícia Barbosa, Ph.D. Student in Portuguese Language and Literature, College of Letters & Science
The “Claiming Belonging” workshop is a two-day initiative that integrates artmaking and decolonial theory to foster community among self-identified Latinx and Black undergraduate women at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Participants will first examine structures of power embedded in written and visual representations of race, migration, and gender, then resignify such materials through blackout poetry and collage, transforming their analyses into artworks of critique and resistance. Together, these activities aim to nurture critical reflection, community formation, and collective artmaking. Participants’ work will be showcased in an online exhibition, and workshop materials will be shared with UW–Madison teaching assistants and faculty to support the integration of decolonial art practices into humanities and social science courses. Letícia Barbosa is a Ph.D. candidate in Spanish and Portuguese at UW–Madison. Her research examines how Afro-Brazilian women writers reimagine enslaved women’s lives through fiction, with particular attention to the embodied trauma of slavery. Letícia Barbosa is a Ph.D. candidate in Portuguese Language and Literature and a Portuguese Teaching Assistant at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her research focuses on how contemporary Afro-Brazilian women writers reimagine the lives of enslaved women and explore the embodied trauma of slavery through historical fiction. Her other interests include cinema and performance studies. Letícia earned a master’s degree in Portuguese from UW-Madison and a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the Federal University of Pernambuco.
Shrinjita Biswas, Ph.D. Student in Interdisciplinary Theatre Studies, College of Letters & Science
Performing Activism, Performing Transformation: The Feminist Street Theatre Movement and Social Justice in India: This project foregrounds the marginalized histories and the continuities of the feminist street theatre movement in India from the 1970s to the present, focusing on questions of social justice, gender violence, the politics of female solidarity, and feminism’s relationship to protest cultures and performances. Studying the intersecting historical processes of feminist politics, activism, and theatre, first initiated in the late ’70s in cities like Kolkata, Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, and Bangalore, and expanding towards the suburban regions, this research aims to develop a holistic study of the aesthetics and political economy of feminist street theatre with particular focus on feminist collectives from Kolkata, and its intertwined relationship with law and justice as well as the notions of citizenship and belonging. Through archival and ethnographic research methods this project further intends to explore the networked aesthetic of the “feminist-activist archive.” Shrinjita Biswas is a PhD student in Interdisciplinary Theatre Studies, and part of the Ethics of Care Initiative, Department of Gender and Women’s Studies. Her research entails gender and performance, feminist cultural practices, and political theatre in India. She inquires into the histories and continuities of the feminist theatre movement in postcolonial India, exploring the question of feminist ethics of care, cultures of protests and the politics of solidarity, and its relationship with performance. Her latest publications include a co-authored article for the Theatre Research International titled, “Reclaiming Public Spaces in Post-Pandemic India (Kolkata): Activist Theatre, Gender and a Resurgence of the Marginal.” An interdisciplinary artist, Shrinjita has been trained in Classical Manipuri Dance form for over fourteen years, and works at the intersections of performance, photography, video and experimental sound art. Her recent choreographic work, “The Hunt,” (December 2025) performed at H’ Doubler Performance Space (UW Dance Department) captures the themes of labor, gender, and forced migration in India.
Anhelé Sánchez Delgado, Ph.D. Student in Latin American Literature, College of Letters & Science
Genealogy of Presence: Rosario Castellanos in the United States: Sixty years ago, Rosario Castellanos—one of Mexico’s most significant feminist writers—spent a year at UW–Madison, Indiana University, and the University of Colorado Boulder as a visiting professor. More than half a century later, that episode remains suspended between footnotes and oblivion. This absence speaks to the historical fragility of Latin American presences in U.S. universities and to the unstable place Spanish continues to occupy as a language of knowledge production. This project reconstructs Castellanos’s 1966 residency through archival research and close readings of her correspondence, examining how migration, academic labor, and patriarchal violence shaped her writing. It aims to produce a scholarly article and create a permanent site of memory on campus. Anhelé Sánchez Delgado is a PhD student in Latin American Literature at the Department of Spanish and Portuguese. She holds a BA in Hispano-American Language and Literature from Universidad Autónoma de Baja California and an MA in Literary Theory and Comparative Literature from Universidad de Salamanca. Her research focuses on contemporary literature written by women that breaks patriarchal silence, autobiography, representations of violence, and collective and post-traumatic memory.
Jimin Gim, Ph.D Student in Sociology, College of Letters and Science
It Takes a Village?: How Immigrant Families Navigate Childcare in a Privatized System: This project examines how immigrant families navigate deeply privatized childcare in the United States. Drawing on interviews and ethnographic observations with Korean parents in Wisconsin, it explores how families build and sustain “villages of care” to meet everyday childcare needs, as well as the invisible mental and emotional labor and gendered responsibilities involved. Jimin Gim is a PhD student in Sociology who studies inequality, work–family dynamics, caregiving and carework. Her research examines how childcare is understood, (de)valued, and distributed across multiple actors. She has also been involved in equity- and care-focused initiatives at UW–Madison, including the Sociology Department’s BIPOC Recruitment and Retention Committee and the UW Ethics of Care Initiative.
Ximena Ibinarriaga Soltero, Ph.D. Candidate in Human Development & Family Studies, School of Human Ecology
Gendered Pathways to Adolescent Mental Health: A Community‐Informed Mindfulness Intervention in Mexico City: This project examines gendered pathways to adolescent mental health by developing and assessing a community-informed mindfulness intervention in a large public high school in Mexico City. Guided by a Community-Based Participatory Research approach, the study engages students, teachers, school leadership, and mindfulness instructors to co-design a culturally responsive, group-based program that addresses adolescents’ mental health needs. Particular attention is given to gender differences, including girls’ higher risk for internalizing difficulties such as anxiety and depression, and boys’ greater likelihood of externalizing behaviors. Using a mixed-methods design, the project evaluates the feasibility, acceptability, and preliminary impact of the intervention, while also exploring how gender norms shape adolescents’ experiences of mental health and engagement with mindfulness practices. By centering local voices and cultural context, this work contributes to more equitable and culturally grounded approaches to youth mental health promotion in Latin American school settings. Ximena Ibinarriaga Soltero is a doctoral candidate in Human Development and Family Studies and a member of AWARE Lab. Ximena is a doctoral candidate in Human Development and Family Studies at UW-Madison whose work focuses on contemplative practices, including mindfulness, compassion, and loving‑kindness. Her research centers on promoting mental health, socioemotional competencies, and well‑being through evidence‑based interventions in educational, clinical and community settings. Ximena is committed to developing culturally grounded mindfulness programs that resonate with Spanish‑speaking and underserved communities. Her work bridges academic research and real‑world impact through participatory, community‑engaged, and outreach‑oriented initiatives. With over a decade of experience in research, teaching, and program development, she brings an interdisciplinary background spanning psychology, education, contemplative practices, and prevention science. Ximena earned her MSc in the Psychology of Education from the University of Bristol, accredited by the British Psychological Society, and completed her undergraduate training in Psychology at the National Autonomous University of Mexico.
Emerging Scholar Engagement Grant
Each year, 4W awards five to ten Emerging Scholar Engagement Grants of $2500 to graduate and professional students at UW-Madison. 4W Engagement Grants are intended to flexibly support graduate students in any relevant discipline who are engaged in work related to gender and wellbeing. These grants may be used for project expenses or travel related to community-based research or practice, including internships, independent study projects, and pre-dissertation or pre-thesis groundwork. Projects have a research-to-action focus aimed at enhancing gender equity in Wisconsin or globally. They align with 4W’s vision and values, and employ gender analysis and/or use an intersectional feminist lens to address equity for all.
4W is proud to support the following emerging scholars…
Rebecca Alcock: Using Design Thinking for Humanities Centered Innovation
2019
This project guided undergraduate students through the design thinking process, helping them use design solutions to work through challenges that women face in Tharaka Nithi, Kenya. It emphasizes inclusive innovation and participation of those who have been historically excluded from design processes. Rebecca Alcock is a doctoral student in the College of Engineering studying Operations Research and Global Health.
Ruby Bafu: Studying the Impact of School Punishment on Black Girls
2019
This project supports much needed research and education scholarship on the impact of school punishment practices for Black girls in Madison at the intersections of race, gender, and class, expanding our knowledge of Black students’ sense-making processes and their academic experiences and outcomes. Ruby Bafu is a second-year PhD student in the Department of Sociology, a Mellon Mays Fellow, and a Graduate Research Fellow for the Institute for Research on Poverty. In April of 2020, Ruby was awarded a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship to continue this work.
Margaret Baker: Traditional foodways and traditional use of medicinal plants in the Ch’orti’ region of Guatemala
2022
This project employs a participatory action research framework to gather data around traditional foodways and traditional use of medicinal plants in the Ch’orti’ region of Guatemala. Using the transformative power of feminist leadership, Baker will employ a gender focus to seek the guidance and direction of women in the communities, especially curanderas or herbalists, to co-design this project and generate deliverables that will respectfully document their traditional knowledge. Margaret Baker is a master’s student in the Department of Agroecology.
Janella Benson: An Exploration of Black Women’s Experience in a Summer Bridge Program
2024
This study looks at the experiences of Black alumnae who participated in a summer bridge program in a Predominantly White Institution and the ways in which their summer experiences influenced their navigation of college during and after major socio-historical events. Janella Benson is a doctoral student in Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis.
Molly Clark-Barol: Supporting Women Impacted by Incarceration
2017
The FREE campaign organizes Wisconsin women who have experienced incarceration and identify housing as a major barrier to health, wellbeing, and continued freedom for themselves and their families. Using an intersectional approach that centers those most impacted, this project works to reconcile contradictions in current housing policies, improve re-entry policies, and advocate for additional funding for promising models of re-entry housing. Molly Clark-Barol, 4W Program Associate for Research, is a PhD student in the School of Human Ecology and Department of Sociology.
Amy Bintliff: Strengthening Wellbeing for Adolescent Girls
2018
This project supported 4W scholar Amy Bintliff’s development of an arts-based intervention called “The Wellbeing Club” for young girls with histories of family stressors. This program used art-based applications of the 4W Wellbeing Model to examine how girls define and experience wellbeing in the face of trauma. It is now administered at the University of California San Diego with plans to be scaled up in other areas of California as well as in Uganda. Amy Bintliff is an Assistant Teaching Professor in the Education Department at the University of California, San Diego.
Ariel Borns: Understanding Education and Migration for Indigenous Women in Guatemala
2021
This project aims to understand how international development education programs influence young indigenous women’s decisions to study, work, or migrate. Borns will host semi-structured interviews with young indigenous women in Guatemala enrolled in technical training and alternative education programs, as well conduct an institutional ethnography of international development NGOs working in this field. Ariel Borns is a doctoral student in the Department of Educational Policy Studies.
Mariela Quesada Centeno: Supporting Latin@ Mothers
2018
This project uses a peer support model to aid Latin@ mothers as they develop new relationships with their babies. The aim is to reduce the observed and documented health disparities in the Latino population in the U.S. and abroad through community-based health and wellness educational opportunities fueled by the community. Mariela Quesada Centeno is a PhD student in Human Development and Family Studies, a Maternal and Child Health Research Fellow at Centro Hispano of Dane County, and the manager of Roots4Change Cooperative, the first woman and immigrant-owned cooperative in Wisconsin.
Evelyn Coker: Developing a Gender-Responsive Curriculum for Girls of Color in the Juvenile Justice System
2021
Building on her self-published journal, Get L.I.T. (Learning Intentional Tools), Coker will develop a curriculum for Black and Brown teen girls in juvenile justice settings. The lessons will feature trauma-informed approaches that help girls better understand themselves through reflective journaling, self-regulation, mindfulness, and structured processes for making healthy decisions and reducing recidivism. Evelyn Coker is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and doctoral student in the Sandra Rosenbaum School of Social Work.
Margaux Crider: Exploring Agroecological Perspectives Connecting Women, Farming, and Faith
2020
In collaboration with a community of Dominican sisters at the Sinsinawa Mound, this project supports pre-thesis research on how faith, gender, and place inform socio-ecological relationships and guide decision-making. Margaux Crider is a master’s student in Agroecology and a Graduate Associate at the Center for Culture, History, and Environment in the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies.
Samantha Crowley: Unmasking Disparities Related to COVID-19 and Gender
2020
This research uses gender analysis to explore the direct and indirect impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on women and girls. Research will guide policy recommendations to elected officials related to alleviating disparities exacerbated by the pandemic. Samantha Crowley was the 4W Project Assistant from 2o19 to 2021 and recently received her MPH from UW-Madison, studying reproductive health policy. We look forward to cheering her on while she attends medical school at the UW-Madison School of Medicine and Public Health!
Rebecca Dower: Gathering Narratives to Foster Native Food Sovereignty
2017
This research involves the collection of oral histories from food sovereignty leaders in the US and Canada and growing food with the Fort Peck community in Northeastern Montana. It involves First Nations and Native food sovereignty initiatives across Turtle Island (North America). Rebecca Dower is a graduate student in the department of Civil Society and Community Studies in the School of Human Ecology.
Hilary Emerson: Debuting Lina Mangiacapre’s short and feature films at the UW-Cinematheque
2021
This project involves the American debut of Lina Mangiacapre’s Neapolitan feminist and transfeminist filmography. Emerson is working to translate, transcribe, and analyze the intersection of art, politics, and mythos in Mangiacapre’s works, raising awareness around the nonbinary transfeminist artist’s radical politics of peace and subversive philosophy of wellbeing. Hilary Emerson is a doctoral student in Italian Literature, Cinema, and Society with a PhD minor in Critical Gender, Sexuality, and Screen Studies.
Alisha Esselstein: Supporting International Transitional Justice for Women
2017
This project supported research at the Gender Justice Program at the International Centre for Transitional Justice in New York City. As a public interest law student, Alisha Esselstein studied regional conflict and gender in Nairobi, Kenya and Cuernavaca, Mexico. She formerly served as a Research Assistant at the Law and Society Trust, a human rights organization based in Colombo, Sri Lanka, where she worked on women’s rights, transitional justice mechanisms, and constitutional reform.
Khrysta Evans: Experiencing Black Girlhood Together
2020
This work examines the experiences of Black girls currently attending high school in predominantly white Wisconsin school districts. It will inform our understanding of Black girls’ meaning-making about the messages they and other Black girls receive in schools, as well as whether they utilize peer groups to navigate these messages. Khrysta Evans is a PhD student in Educational Policy Studies. She founded Black Girl Magic, a student-centered elective that creates a space for self-identified Black girls to define Black girlhood and create community to affirm each other socially, academically, and spiritually.
Sophia Friedson-Ridenour: Measuring Strategies for Women’s Empowerment in Ghana
2015
This work examined gendered constraints to economic and social empowerment for vulnerable youth and women. It has led to two recently published articles, Gender analysis for One Health: theoretical perspectives and recommendations for practice (2019) and The Limitation of market-based approaches to empowerment: lessons from a case study in Northern Ghana. Sophia Friedson Ridenour is currently a Social Development Specialist at the World Bank’s Africa Gender Innovation Lab. She completed her PhD in Educational Policy Studies at UW-Madison, where she worked as a graduate assistant for the 4W Initiative and a postdoctoral research associate in the Center for Research on Gender and Women.
Regina Fuller: Promoting Sexual Education and Adolescent Reproductive Health
2019
This project supported 4W scholar Regina Fuller’s work with the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), where she reviewed contraceptives procurement and work plan data for 46 countries and made recommendations for increasing programming among youth and women to increase their contraceptive uptake. Regina Fuller is a PhD student in Educational Policy Studies and Comparative International Education, as well as a recipient of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health Policy Research Scholars Fellowship and the Ford Foundation Doctoral Fellowship.
SJ Hemmerich: Imagining Ideal Gendered Systems into Reality with Trans and Nonbinary K-12 Students
2025
This project envisions ideal, affirming educational environments and gendered systems with and for trans and nonbinary K-12 students through interviews, art-making, and focus groups. It centers student voices to explore experiences within, beyond, and outside formal schooling. Findings will be shared through academic and public channels, and co-created interventions will inform future research. SJ Hemmerich is a PhD candidate in the Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis Department. They are a former art teacher of 9 years and were recognized as GSAFE’s 2020 Educator of the Year for their equity work and advocacy.
Colleen Henegan: Assessing the Impacts of Climate Change on Zambian Agriculture Using a Mixed Methods
Approach
2025
This study integrates predictive, geospatial climate change models with community-based research with farm cooperatives to examine how the physical phenomena of climate change interact with socioeconomic, cultural, and political elements to influence Zambia’s diverse agroecological regions – and the people living and working within them – in coming decades. Colleen Henegan is a PhD candidate in the Environment and Resources program at the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies. She is currently the teaching assistant for the Community Environmental Scholars Program (CESP) and is a member of the Kucharik Agroecosystems Lab.
Rose Hennessy Garza: Collaborating for Participatory and Inclusive Sexual Violence Prevention Research in Wisconsin
2021
In collaboration with partners from universities throughout Wisconsin, Rose will be engaging in participatory action research to develop an inclusive and stakeholder-driven research agenda to prevent campus sexual assault. Rose Hennessy Garza is a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the Implementation Science and Engineering Lab within the School of Medicine and Public Health at UW-Madison.
LaShanda Harbin: Advancing Safety for Black Queer Students: Chicago High School Students’ visions for safe educational spaces
2022
This project seeks to understand Black queer students’ perspectives regarding safety in Chicago public schools. Harbin plans to conduct individual interviews and focus groups where participants will engage in collective Freedom Dreaming, a process that involves the imagining of free and equitable futures. LaShanda Harbin is a doctoral student in the Department of Educational Policy Studies.
Linnea Hjelm: Exploring Youth Leadership in Violence Prevention
2023
This study involves working collaboratively with the RCC Sexual Violence Resource Center [RCC] based in Madison. Hjelm will work with a youth organization called the GameChangers to examine the motivations of youth to lead and direct violence prevention initiatives, the value they ascribe to their participation, and assess students’ social connectedness and psychological well-being. Linnea Hjelm is a PhD student in the department of Civil Society and Community Studies in the School of Human Ecology.
Quanda Johnson: Journeying through Art and Song in Black Brown and Tan
2019
4W provided support for scholar, poet and performer Quanda Johnson for her concert, Verisimilitudes: A Journey Through Art Song in Black, Brown, and Tans. This work is centered on ancestry, voice and truth through a vast array of strategies, including the arts, as well as championing gender equity and celebrating women of color. Quanda Johnson is a PhD candidate in Interdisciplinary Theatre Studies at UW-Madison, with a focus in African Diaspora Studies and Performance as Activism.
Laura Killingsworth: Sharing Women’s Stories
2019
To highlight women’s contributions at UW and beyond, this project supported the curation of two women’s book collections in the In Her Honor Gathering Space in Memorial Union’s Hamel Library. Laura Killingsworth is a recent graduate of UW-Madison’s Information School with a master’s degree in Library and Information Studies.
Kristin Kohlmann: Exploring traditional birth attendant’s roles in providing maternity care to displaced women in South Sudan
2022
In settings affected by conflicts, displacement, and natural disasters, community health systems, including the support of community health workers and traditional birth attendants (TBAs), are often the only option for delivering life-saving services. This project aims to understand the roles TBAs play in providing maternal care and to examine how recent displacement secondary to flooding has affected the availability and utilization of maternal and reproductive health services in South Sudan. Kristin Kohlmann is pursuing an M.D. degree at the School of Medicine and Public Health.
Kurt Kuehne: Studying “Social Distancing” of Domestic Workers in Singapore
2018
This project examines how state-designated “male” and “female” migrant populations in Singapore are forced into gendered employment configurations—including distinct forms of social boundary-making, debt financing models, employment legislation, and labor dispute systems. Kurt Kuehne is a Sociology PhD candidate focusing on international labor migration, urban sociology, and social marginalization.
Anupama Kumar: How does the Indian State “See” Women?
2024
This study employs archival research to shed light on how and why governments designed programmes promoting community based organizations like Kudumbashree that support women in getting access to microcredit and starting their own businesses. One of the questions that this project attempts to answer is what governments see as the role of women in these processes – do they view women primarily as caregivers within the home or as economic agents who must provide for their families. Anupama Kumar is a PhD student in Sociology who studies gender, development and the welfare state in the Global South.
Joonwoo Lee: Providing Equitable Access to Gender-Affirming Care for TNB Individuals in South Korea
2023
This project involves a qualitative study focusing on South Korean Trans and Non Binary (TNB) people’s experiences in the referral letter process, a letter required to access gender affirming services. Lee will disseminate the Companionship Model of referral letter writing to local clinicians and physicians directly working with TNB people to increase the number of Korean clinicians capable of offering affirming referral letter session. This model has been co-developed by Lee and his advisor, Stephanie Budge and has been disseminated to training clinicians at UW Madison. Joonwoo Lee is a PhD student in the department of Counselling Psychology.
Mengyao Niu: Teaching Science to Girls and Women in Kenya
2019
Through portable, affordable, and high-resolution paper microscopes called “foldscopes,” girls and women in rural Kenya are learning about science and STEM-related careers. The project also trains science teachers on how to use foldscopes in their teaching. As of March 2020, four primary schools in Kenya have formed science clubs for girls and are using foldscopes for STEM activities. Mengyao Niu is a PhD candidate in the Microbiology Doctoral Training Program (MDTP).
Adejumoke Olopade: Voices of Resilience – A qualitative study sharing postpartum experiences
of African immigrant mothers in the U.S. through podcasts
2025
This project will document and amplify the perinatal experiences of African immigrant mothers living in the U.S. Through a 12-episode podcast series, mothers who gave birth within the past year will be invited to share their pregnancy, childbirth, and postpartum recovery stories. The project will explore their challenges, the support systems they relied on, and the resources they found most helpful during this period. The project will generate an informational resource sheet and disseminate findings through community events and research publications. Adejumoke (Jummy) Olopade is a Ph.D. student in the Department of Civil Society and Community Studies at the School of Human Ecology, UW-Madison. She also holds a B.S. in Child Development and Family Studies and a Master of Public Health degree.
Cyra Polizzi: Enriching Theater with Accessibility, Sustainability and Feminism
2019
With a focus on community wellness and transformation, this interactive play teaches audiences about various systems of oppression that influence how we contextualize our world through theatre. Cyra Polizzi is a performing artist and graduate student affiliated with the Department of Gender & Women’s Studies and the Center for Culture, History, and Environment in the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies.
Prerna Rana: Understanding How Women’s Groups Catalyze Food Justice in India
2021
Engaging with women-led community groups in rural India can reveal nuanced understandings about the unique roles that women’s groups play in promoting health and nutrition in their communities. Using a food justice lens, Rana will explore the ways that women drive conversations about nutritional wellbeing and use collective action to catalyze change in local institutions. Prerna Rana is a doctoral student in the Department of Civil Society and Community Research.
Anika Rice: Uncovering Gendered Barriers to Agroecological Practices
2019
Through studies in Rabinal, Guatemala, this work explores how women’s knowledge shapes – and is shaped by – agroecology, the study of ecological processes applied to agricultural production systems. Anika Rice is a master’s student in the Geography Department whose research focuses on agrarian change, gender, agroecology, feminist political ecology, transnational migration, and farmer-to-farmer pedagogy.
Kimberly Rooney: Developing high school-level teaching materials featuring women authors of sub-Saharan Africa
2023
Rooney will be developing a set of high school-level teaching materials that feature Fatou Diome and Scholastique Mukasonga, female sub-Saharan African authors, and their penetrating views on the school. She will collaborate with French and English Language Arts teachers from three Wisconsin high schools, and will develop lessons that center African women’s voices and foster critical dialogue on the very educational apparatus through which students are learning. Kimberly Rooney is a PhD student in the Department of French and Italian.
Makamae Sniffen: He Lei Aloha o Kaleleonālani: The Beloved Queen Emma Naeʻa Rooke
2024
This project focuses on Queen Emma Naeʻa Rooke in order to create a more holistic history that amplifies Native Hawaiian women. Historical accounts of mōʻī wahine Emma, a Native Hawaiian queen, have often credited her husband, King Kamehameha IV with the establishment of educational and medical institutions. However, this study challenges that narrative and demonstrates the active role she played during the 1800s in investing in the health and intellectual well-being to support a thriving lāhui (nation). Makamae Sniffen is a doctoral student in Educational Policy Studies.
Valerie Stull: Improving Humanity Through Edible Insects
2018
In collaboration with the MIGHTi Project, this research assesses ways to optimize the use of edible insects for human nutrition, smart economic development, recycling, and agroecosystem sustainability. Valerie Stull is a PhD research associate in the Global Health Institute investigating issues at the intersection of agriculture, the environment, and global health.
Lauren Vollinger: Synthesizing Lessons from the 4W STREETS Fora
2019
4W scholar Lauren Vollinger participated in a scholarly exchange with UW through the Big Ten Academic Alliance’s Traveling Scholars Program. During her time at Madison, she worked with the 4W STREETS Project to document the 4W STREETS of Hope Fora, published under the UNESCO Chair on Gender, Wellbeing and a Culture of Peace. Lauren Vollinger is a PHD student in Ecological-Community Psychology at Michigan State University.
Theresa Watts: Assessing Women’s Risks for Acquiring HCV
2018
This in-depth literature review uncovered 10 key themes across 29 studies related to risks for acquiring hepatitis C virus (HCV) among young adult women in the United States: drug use as a coping strategy, transition to injection drug use, awareness of HCV, social norms of drug use, relationship between drug use and sexual activities, incarceration re-entry, housing instability, lack of community HCV resources, social constructs, and policies affecting drug markets. Theresa Watts graduated from UW–Madison in May 2019 and is currently an Assistant Professor at the University of Nevada, Reno–Orvis School of Nursing.
Paris Wicker: Studying Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction
2019
This project supported professional training for 4W scholar Paris Wicker related to wellbeing conceptualization and agency in college access and preparation programs. It also informed Wicker’s work on how Black and Indigenous women teach, learn, and embody wellbeing and self-care in educational spaces, and how it shapes student engagement and development. Paris Wicker is a Ph.D. student in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis with a minor in Sociology studying the intersections of wellbeing praxis, racialized experiences and resilience, and college student engagement in higher education.
Pearly Wong: Understanding Gender and Environmental Justice in Pharping, Nepal
2018
Through integrated research and community education, 4W scholar Pearly Wong studied how gender and caste impact women’s notions of health, gender, disasters, and the environment. Pearly Wong is in a joint PhD program in Cultural Anthropology and Environment and Resources with the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies.
Emily Young: Graduate students’ experiences with mental health and disability access supports at a large research University
2022
This project explores how graduate students with mental health conditions or disabilities negotiate university policies for disability access and mental-health support while charting out unique pathways to finishing their degrees. Young plans to conduct student interviews focused specifically on the intersection of gender, disability, and violence in female graduate students’ experiences of policies and resources to support their mental health and disability access. Emily Young is a PhD candidate in the Department of Educational Policy Studies.
Innovation Grant
4W awards three to five Innovation Grants of up to $7500 for UW-Madison Faculty and Staff. 4W Innovation Grants are provided as general support — which can be used toward summer salary, course buy out, or another arrangement with the school or department — to allow a faculty or academic staff member to devote time to develop a key initiative related to gender and wellbeing. Projects align with the vision and values of the 4W program and have a research-to-action focus that aims to enhance gender equity in communities locally or globally. Projects also employ gender analysis and/or use an intersectional feminist lens to address equity for all.
4W is proud to support the following innovators…
Jennifer Angus: Developing a Co-Design and Microenterprise Project in Nepal
2022
A collaboration between UW-Madison students and women artisans around the world, this project helps to enhance the design, quality, productions, and sales of artisan handicrafts, thereby increasing economic empowerment and wellbeing. Jennifer Angus is a professor in the Design Studies Department in the School of Human Ecology. (2018)
Another project being led by Angus aims to connect artisans and expert makers working with felt in Nepal and Ecuador to each other. Connecting artisans directly to each other seeks to de-colonize the design process and promote an exchange between peers. To facilitate a meaningful exchange, Angus proposes a co-design project between the two groups using technology and ultimately having an exhibition of the felt co-design work in one of SoHE’s galleries.
Fabu Carter: Collaborating with the African Women’s Studies Center in Kenya
2019
This academic exchange with Wanjiku Kabira – a UW-Madison alumna, scholar of Kenyan Oral Literature, and Professor of Women’s and Gender Studies at the African Women’s Studies Center in Nairobi, Kenya – will lay the groundwork for ongoing collaboration between 4W and the AWSC. Fabu Carter is a poet, columnist, storyteller, educator, and Senior Outreach Specialist with the Wisconsin Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center, as well as Madison’s former Poet Laureate.
Pajarita Charles: Supporting Parenting Connections for Incarcerated Mothers
2020
Work with the Wisconsin Department of Corrections (DOC) introduces an evidence-based parenting program for mothers in the Women’s Correctional System. This initiative will build on existing collaborations, focus on enhancing gender equity for a highly vulnerable group, offer opportunities for student learning, and provide a unique pathway to translate research into practice in Wisconsin and – with adaptations – beyond. Pajarita Charles, Assistant Professor in the School of Social Work.
Dekila Chungyalpa: Sharing Practical and Spiritual Resources to Address Climate Change
2020
Support for a forthcoming book will provide practical, spiritual, and psychological resources to address eco-anxiety and climate distress, particularly among marginalized and climate-vulnerable groups such as women, youth, indigenous leaders, and communities of color. Dekila Chungyalpa is the Director of The Loka Initiative at the Center for Healthy Minds.
Celina Doria: Exploring Self-Managed Abortion Care in the Midwest
2025
In the wake of the Dobbs decision and ongoing threats to abortion access, an increasing number of pregnant people have turned to self-managed abortion (SMA). This study will explore how pregnant people in the Midwest are accessing and experiencing SMA. In doing so, this study aims to highlight ways to facilitate equitable and socially just access to abortion in evolving political landscapes. Dr. Celina Doria is an Assistant Professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Sandra Rosenbaum School of Social Work. Her research centers the embodied experiences of marginalized women and pregnant people as they navigate, resist, and heal from intersecting inequalities and oppressions.
Larissa Duncan: Transnational Exploration of Mindfulness-Based Childbirth and Parenting (MBCP)
2023
This project will assess the acceptability of MBCP to reduce stress during pregnancy, childbirth and parenting consistent with the needs and preferences of Latino/x/e people. The project aims to explore how a program created by a white midwife with a deep care for pregnant people, can be made accessible in new Spanish speaking contexts in Latin America. Larissa Duncan is an Associate Professor in the department of Human Development and Family Studies.
Lara Gerassi: Identifying Barriers to Identifying Sex Trafficked Patients
2018
This case study at Planned Parenthood in Madison aimed to explore barriers to identification of sex trafficking from provider perspectives. Preliminary findings suggested that providers experience role confusion related to whether it is their job to assess and intervene if a disclosure is made. Additionally, there are misconceptions of what sex trafficking is and therefore what to indicators to look for. Lara Gerassi is an Assistant Professor in the School of Social Work and co-leads the 4W STREETS Project.
Mary Hark: Developing Papermaking Skills for Women in Rural Ghana
2018, 2021
In 2018, Mary Hark received an Innovation Grant to support employment opportunities for women craft practitioners in Kumasi, Ghana by helping them increase product development for papermaking. It led to the first hand papermill in West Africa capable of producing high-quality papers entirely from local botanicals. Mary will use her 2021 Innovation Grant to build on this work and develop a paper bag fabrication site and sales promotion efforts in collaboration with local women entrepreneurs. Mary Hark is a Professor in the Department of Design Studies.
Nancy Kendall: Strengthening Education and Global Development in Malawi
2016
This ongoing project examines education – broadly defined to include school-based programs and the many non-formal education spaces in society – and its role in international development, particularly in creating equity and voice for women and girls. Nancy Kendall is the Chair of Educational Policy Studies Program, Director of the African Studies Program, and Director of the Development Studies Program.
LB Klein: Queering Bringing in the Bystander®: Manualizing an LGBTQ+- Specific Adaptation of a Campus Gender-Based Violence Prevention Program
2024
This project aims to create a manual of the adapted version of the Bringing in the Bystander® College Prevention Program, that takes into account the experiences of LGBTQ+ students. This LGBTQ+-specific adaptation of BITB has the potential to both promote gender equity in higher education and to build skills for preventing sexual violence beyond a students’ time at UW-Madison or another college. LB Klein is an Assistant Professor in the Sandra Rosenbaum School of Social Work.
Elizabeth Larson: Developing a Wellness Program for Caregivers
2018
This “5Minutes4Myself” wellness program was created to provide supportive services for caregivers of children with autism and develop performance-based assessments for children. Elizabeth Larson is an occupational therapist and scientist with over thirty years of clinical and research experience working with children with disabilities and their families.
Mary Michaud: Fostering Wellbeing through Nature
2019
This pilot study explores how nature and green spaces can help UW employees – particularly women – manage stress and improve wellbeing. Mary Michaud is an instructor in the Center for Patient Partnerships at the UW Law School. She teaches courses on systems thinking in health care for UW’s Master of Public Health Program and focuses on increasing opportunities among low-income children and families to access nature and green space.
Darshana Mini: Gender Justice and Workplace Equity in Indian Cinema
2022
This project examines how discussions of gender issues are addressed in the labor organizing in Indian film industries, with a particular focus on the response of institutional film bodies to the #MeToo movement in the entertainment sector. Mini plans to map how the crisis narrative around the events surrounding #MeToo shaped media discourses and public concerns about the need for institutional guarantees for survivors who seek legal redressal against sexual harassment. Darshana Mini is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Communication Arts.
Katherine Phelps: Exploring Gendered Embodiment at UW-Madison
2020
This project uses the process of “body mapping,” to explore the ways in which gender inequities like sexual violence manifest in and on the body and mediate daily experiences of body consciousness for female/feminine identifying college students. Katherine Phelps is an Instructor in the Department of Gender and Women’s Studies.
Erika Rosales: Raising Awareness about the Impact of Immigration on Children
2019
This ongoing project involves research, curriculum development, and educational programming on topics related to health and human rights of children in adversity around the world, with a focus on Latin American migration and the US-Mexico Border. The work has informed much of 4W’s efforts related to health and human rights, and particularly immigration’s impacts on children and families in Madison and beyond. Erika Rosales is a Human Resources Coordinator at WIDA in the Wisconsin Center for Education Research (WCER).
Stephanie Rytilahti: Producing an Oral History of Gender and Women’s Studies Instruction UW-Madison
2019
This project tells stories of women from UW-Madison’s past and present through an archive of oral interviews with contributors to Women’s and Gender Studies across the UW System. Stephanie Rytilahti is the Director of the Wisconsin Women’s and Gender Studies Consortium where she facilitates the collaboration of research, pedagogical initiatives, and strategic planning of all gender and women’s studies programs and departments across the UW-system.
Lesley Sager: Building a Makerspace in Kenya
2019, 2022
By creating a workspace for women to make hand-crafted baskets and engage in leadership and skill-building training, this project supports health and micro-enterprise efforts for women and children in Tharaka-Niki, Kenya. Lesley Sager is a Wisconsin-based interior designer and instructor in the School of Human Ecology, as well as a 4W faculty leader for the Global Artisans Initiative and founder of the nonprofit Merry-Go-Strong. (2019)
Sager’s latest project will strengthen the ongoing campus-community partnership by bringing more awareness of the work being done by Tharaka Women’s Welfare Program, the success of grassroots initiatives, and the power of simple solutions to help solve complex problems such as domestic violence. Sager plans to continue visiting new villages, doing home visits, gathering stories, and documenting the progress of the Kiondo project. (2022)
Laura Schlachter: Examining and Empowering Gender Diversity in U.S. Cooperative Boards
2021
By bringing a feminist lens to cooperative governance research at the UW Center for Cooperatives, Schlachter will develop educational materials about gender dynamics on cooperative boards. Materials will emphasize the relationship between gender diversity, cooperative performance, and community impacts. Laura Schlachter is a researcher at the University of Wisconsin Center for Cooperatives.
Erika Marin-Spiotta: Supporting Bystander Intervention and Workplace Climate Training
2020
This project is part of a National Science Foundation ADVANCEGeo Partnership that has developed a community-based model for interactive bystander intervention and workplace climate training, which responds to two needs identified by STEMM leaders: 1) development of anti-harassment training that is relevant to STEMM disciplines; and 2) research on the unique experiences of minoritized and underserved groups. Erika Marin-Spiotta is a Professor in the Department of Geography and leads the Earth Science Women’s Network.
Valerie Stull: Munzi ni Munzi Amayi (A Woman is a Village): A Rural Women’s Shop to Address Menstrual
Poverty & Build Social Connective Tissue
2025
The “Munzi ni Munzi Amayi” (A Woman is a Village) project aims to address menstrual poverty in rural Zambia through a community-driven Women’s Shop with an adjacent Tea Room/Salon. Using participatory design methods, the project will engage local women in all aspects—from determining inventory and pricing models to entrepreneurial training, providing affordable menstrual hygiene products and other essentials while creating a safe space for women to gather, learn, and build social connections. Dr. Valerie Stull is an interdisciplinary environmental health scientist, Faculty Associate in the Department of Community and Environmental Sociology, and Research Scientist in the Center for Sustainability and the Global Environment at UW-Madison. Her current interests span soil health, farmer wellbeing, edible insects, and maternal and child health.
Uchita Vaid: Gendered Geographies of Urban Housing Redevelopment: Understanding Girlsʹ
Perceptions of Community Spaces in Ahmedabad.
2025
Centering the voices of girls aged 8–18, this project explores how slum-to-apartment redevelopment transforms their daily lives and access to safe, social spaces. Using a feminist Photovoice method, girls document how changes in the built environment impact their agency, safety, and sense of belonging in their communities. Grounded in lived experience and co-produced knowledge, the project has the potential to offer important insights for designing more inclusive, girl-centered urban housing policies and supports girls as co-creators of knowledge and advocates for equitable cities. Dr. Uchita Vaid is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Design Studies at University of Wisconsin-Madison. She investigates interactions between design, human behavior, and health, with a goal to create healthy, supportive, and equitable environments for living, working, and playing.
Uchita Vaid: Mapping Women’s Social Networks in Informal Housing in India
2023
This project undertakes the critical task of mapping and documenting existing social networks of women living in urban slums in India, as well as understanding the essential properties of such networks. The study argues that redevelopment policies need to be assessed from a gendered perspective to fully understand their societal consequences, which includes a systematic documentation of existing social networks and their impacts for women’s wellbeing. Uchita Vaid is an Assistant Professor in Design Studies.
Giri Venkataramanan: Bringing Electricity to Rural India with Mahila Microgrids
2017
This demonstration project will provide reliable energy for clean water supply, medical facilities, communications, and education at the community center. It is organized to be managed by local women’s cooperatives; the word “mahila” means “woman” in many South Asian languages. Each hamlet has a locally managed co-op branch, which owns all the electricity assets at the hamlet. Giri Venkataramanan is a Professor in the School of Engineering.
Susan Webb Yackee: Developing Gender-Informed Leadership Seminar Curriculum
2021
This project aims to enhance the La Follette School curriculum for the Wisconsin Women in Government (WWIG) Leadership Seminar by developing interactive faculty lectures on gender, politics, diversity, equity, and inclusion in public sector agencies. Susan Webb Yackee is the Director of the La Follette School of Public Affairs and a Collins-Bascom Professor of Public Affairs and Political Science.