Sharon Bird

On leave for 2024-2025 academic year

Sharon R. Bird is currently on leave. She received her PhD in Sociology from Washington State University. She has previously served as Professor and Head of Sociology at Oklahoma State University; program director for the National Science Foundation’s ADVANCE program to promote, recruit, and retain women faculty in science, technology, engineering and math and the Alliances for Graduate Education for the Professoriate program which supports students and faculty of color in those fields; and Professor of Sociology at Iowa State University, where she was also Research Director of the ADVANCE program, Co-I on the Iowa State ADVANCE award and Faculty Affiliate in Women’s and Gender Studies and African American Studies. In 2016, she received the Lessen Prize for Research on Teaching and Learning from the American Association of Philosophy Teachers. Her research and teaching interests include social inequality (race/class/gender), work and organizations, race and ethnic relations, enhancing diversity in higher education, sociological and gender theory, and research and evaluation methods. Sharon is excited to focus her energy and sociological training toward growing Women’s and Gender Studies and is looking forward to developing collaborative relationships to support social justice scholarship, teaching and outreach across the campus and the state. She is also looking forward to enjoying camping adventures in her VW Westfalia vanagon throughout West Virginia.