ICRW Merges With Re:Gender

Article Author

Joseph Shaffner

AUTHOR

Joseph Shaffner

Director, Global Communications

Media Contact

Anne McPherson

Vice President, Global Communications email [email protected]

In 2016, ICRW merged with Re:Gender, formerly the National Council for Research on Women. Re:Gender was founded in 1981 by feminist researchers to promote research by and about women. With Mariam K. Chamberlain as the founding president, they created a membership organization to facilitate collaboration among researchers and share information with the general public.

Over the next 20 years, the NCRW expanded to become a platform for feminist research on issues of identity through such publications such “Risk, Resiliency, and Resistance: Current Research on Adolescent Girls;” “Sexual Harassment: Research & Resources;” “Immigration: Women and Girls, Where Do They Land?” and “Who Benefits, Who Decides? An Agenda for Improving Philanthropy.”

Re:Gender’s latest publications can be found here

In the late 1990s, the organization expanded its strong community of academic centers and researchers to include corporate and higher education leaders. In 1994, NCRW created the Presidents Circle — a network of current and former college, university and university system presidents and chancellors — to expand the organization’s reach into academic leadership and deepen connections for member organizations within campuses. The Corporate Circle was launched in 2000 to augment corporations’ diversity and inclusion initiatives by facilitating access to academic research. Collectively they developed programs to advance women into leadership positions in corporations and academic institutions.

In 2013, following a national listening tour and intensive strategic planning process, the organization developed a new vision and structure. It transformed from a member organization to an expanded cross-sector network of over 450 institutions and individuals that worked to better connect and align academic research and the practical information needs of policy, advocacy, corporate and community groups. The organization applied a broad gender lens focused on issues in three interconnected focus areas: Identity, Economic Well-Being and Thriving Environments. As the final phase of the planning process, the organization’s network was engaged to help select a new name, and National Council for Research on Women became Re:Gender.

The Re:Gender mission was to end gender inequity and discrimination against girls and women, by exposing the root causes and advancing research-informed action. Working with multiple sectors and disciplines, Re:Gender worked to shape a world that embraced fairness across difference – a world in which gender and sex are not used to determine one’s worth or opportunity. By bringing to light how assumptions about gender and sex restrict all members of society, the organization prompted people to shift their understanding and behavior. Re:Gender worked to broaden use of the word “gender” by moving away from “woman and girls” to addressing the full gender spectrum, as well as the intersections of gender and race, sexual orientation, class, immigration status, nationality, ability, etc.

Although primarily seen as an organization concerned with U.S.-based issues, Re:Gender has always had a foothold in international work. However, Re:Gender recognized that its capacity to broaden its international lens was limited by its small size and relative lack of resources and infrastructure. Thus in 2016, Re:Gender began to explore new opportunities and new possibilities for achieving a gender-equal world, out of which came the decision to merge with the International Center for Research on Women (ICRW), with which we shared a decades-long commitment to promoting gender equality and advancing women in the U.S. and globally and a commitment to promoting research-informed action.