The School of Civil and Environmental Engineering is pleased to announce the appointment of Professor Kimberly E. Kurtis as an ADVANCE Professor in the Institute's College of Engineering 
(CoE), effective July 1, 2012. This pretigious title is awarded by CoE Dean Gary May and Georgia Tech Provost Rafael Bras.
The NSF ADVANCE Program is designed to increase the participation of women in the scientific and engineering workforce through increased representation and advancement of women in academic scientific and engineering careers. To meet this goal, the program provides opportunities for both individuals and organizations in an effort to support new approaches to improving the climate for women in U.S. academic institutions and to facilitate women's advancement to the highest ranks of academic leadership.
The ADVANCE program at Georgia Tech is coordinated by the Institute's ADVANCE Team (ADVANCE Professors and the Center for the Study of Women, Science, and Technology). Team members take an integrated approach to institutional factors supporting the full participation and advancement of women faculty. Dr. Kurtis states, "I feel honored to have been selected as the College of Engineering ADVANCE Professor. I look forward to working with Vice President Ervin, Dean May, and the Institute's other ADVANCE professors to continue to promote the program's values of equity, diversity, excellence and advancement of faculty."
In this position, Dr. Kurtis will work within the College and across the Institute on multiple charges including:
1) the development of faculty netowrk committed to institutional transformation;
2) advising Deans, Chairs and the Provost and the Vice President for Institute Diversity on issues vital for the success of women faculty;
3) developing and implementing strategies and initiatives to address gender equity issues in hiring, promotion and retention of women faculty; and
4) facilitating events related to the advancement of women faculty.
The funding from the Professorship will also be used to support Dr. Kurtis' research program. Her research interests include investigations into the relationships between multi-scale structure and performance (i.e., both durability and mechanical properties) of structural materials, with an emphasis on cement-based materials. Her work is recognized for its use of emerging methods and novel approaches to provide new fundamental insights into the behavior of cement pastes, mortars, and concretes necessary for improving their early age behavior and long-term durability.
Dr. Kurtis joined the faculty of Georgia Tech in 1999. She earned her BSE (1994) in Civil Engineering from Tulane University under a Deans Honor Scholarship and her PhD (1998) in Civil Engineering from the University of California at Berkeley, where she was a Henry Hilp Fellow and a National Science Foundation (NSF) Fellow. Throughout her career, she has been the recipient of numerous honors and awards, has authored more than 100 technical publications, and holds two U.S. patents. Dr. Kurtis is a Fellow of the American Concrete Institute and the American Ceramics Society. For additional information about Dr. Kurtis, visit: http://ce.gatech.edu/people/faculty/701/overview.