Human Capital Initiative’s POWER Receives $500,000 Program Grant

As part of the new Program on Women’s Empowerment Research (POWER) at the GDP Center, we are thrilled to report that the HCI team working on this program recently received a three-year grant for $500,000 from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation to support a range of projects under this program.

The goal of POWER is to support rigorous, evidence-based research that investigates the causes and consequences of women’s empowerment on human well-being. The program grant will support long-term data collection, new fieldwork, and local collaboration on a range of topics from women’s reproductive health to behavioral decision-making to women’s access to safe transport. The larger goal of the program is to look critically at three core issues within the larger narrative of women’s empowerment, including human capital (health & education), mobility and access, and sustainable economic empowerment.

Aligning with the mission of the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies, Mahesh Karra, Rachel Brulé, and Patricia Cortes (Questrom School of Business) will take an interdisciplinary and analytic approach to this research. They will also engage the wider policy-making community with their findings to create a broader and more lasting impact.