Teresa Boyer, EdD
Founding Director, Anne Welsh McNulty Institute for Women's Leadership; Associate Professor, Education and Counseling | Villanova University
Villanova, PA, UNITED STATES
Teresa Boyer, EdD, is an innovative leader in economic and social equity for women
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Areas of Expertise (8)
Equity in Education
Work-Life Balance
Women's Advancement
Pay Equity
Gender Equity
Women in the Workforce
Women's Leadership
#MeToo
Biography
The founding director of the Anne Welsh McNulty Institute for Women’s Leadership at Villanova University, Dr. Teresa “Terri” Boyer is a go-to media source on issues of gender equity, women in the workforce, work-life balance, women’s education and leadership development. Dr. Boyer is accomplished author who has published widely on educational and workforce equity, institutional reform for equity, women’s education and leadership, the effectiveness of equity programs, and assessment and teacher training. Prior to Villanova, she served as executive director of the Center for Women and Work and as an assistant research professor at Rutgers University. Dr. Boyer regularly speaks nationally on topics related to advancing women in education and the workplace, and has worked with dozens of major companies and institutions on gender initiatives
Education (3)
University of Alabama: EdD, Education
University of Alabama: MA, Higher Education Administration
Villanova: BSc, Secondary Education
Links (1)
Affiliations (5)
- National Alliance for Partnerships in Equity (NAPE): Executive Board
- US Department of Education, Office of Career, Technical and Adult Education (OCTAE): Moderator, Advancing Equity in Adult, Community College, and Career and Technical Education Online Community
- National Alliance for Partnerships in Equity (NAPE): Member, Human Subjects Research Internal Review Board
- National Science Foundation: Panel Reviewer
- Next Steps Working Group: US Department of Education, Office of Career, Technical and Adult Education
Select Media Appearances (18)
Women dominate Golden Globe directing category for first time
KYW Newsradio online
2021-02-21
For the first time in its 77-year history, the Golden Globe Awards have nominated a majority of women in the category of Best Director of a Motion Picture. Last year, there was an uproar when no female directors were nominated. This year, there are three are in the running. Terri Boyer is director of Anne Welsh McNulty Institute for Women’s Leadership at Villanova University. "This year is a real record breaker," said Terri Boyer, director of Anne Welsh McNulty Institute for Women’s Leadership at Villanova University. "Many people have termed it as a big crash through the glass ceiling in the film industry, in that for the first time ever, women are the majority of the nominees in the Best Director category." In fact, before this year, the Golden Globes only nominated women directors 5 times in it’s 77 year history. The nominees are Chloe Zhao for "Nomadland," Regina King for "One Night in Miami," and Emerald Fennell for "Promising Young Woman." "The other interesting thing from an identity perspective is that two of those women are also women of color," detailed Boyer. "Chloe Zhao is Chinese, and Regina King is Black."
2020 saw great strides for women, but it also exposed inequities we should fix in 2021
USA Today online
2021-01-11
The year 2020 highlighted a paradox in the advancement of women’s leadership. Women made large cracks in the glass ceilings of bastions of male dominance. The "first evers" in powerful aspects of our economy and culture include the first woman of color to be elected into our nation’s executive branch, the first woman of color general manager in Major League Baseball, the first Black woman to serve as U.S. Naval Academy brigade commander, the first two women to share the Nobel Prize in chemistry, and on Dec. 30, the first woman to serve as head coach of an NBA game. Women fought hard for these achievements, as Vice President-Elect Kamala Harris noted in her acceptance speech, and Kim Ng acknowledged in the dogged, decades-long pursuit of this goal in her statement released by the Miami Marlins. And all of these accomplishments should be celebrated. Yet 2020 also showed us that women, especially women of color, are bearing the brunt of the effects of the global pandemic and social unrest. Last year gave us a road map to improving gender equity in 2021. What a year of COVID laid bare Hiding behind the accomplishments of 2020 are the inequities that continue to bubble under the surface: overrepresentation in jobs and industries that have lower pay, higher risk and less job security (particularly in this economy); pay gaps; workforce policies that have never adequately addressed the need for caregiving responsibilities among workers; biased perceptions of women’s leadership skills; and, despite perceptions of a recent narrowing in the gender gap on time spent doing care work at home, decisions in many households to have women’s jobs outside the home be the ones that suffer when a choice needs to be made.
When you are interrupted, how to be heard
The Philadelphia Inquirer online
2020-10-14
You’re speaking. But then someone forcefully interjects. Maybe the topic is heated; maybe it’s full of emotion. Maybe the interrupter is just being a jerk. Our cutoff culture is getting fresh side-eye because of the presidential and vice presidential debates. President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden’s debate was nonstop talk-overs (the Washington Post called Trump the “interrupter-in-chief”), while Vice President Mike Pence and Sen. Kamala Harris’ exchange reminded many women of how irksome it is when men cut us off while we’re making important points. Experts say our conversations — whether with our family or on Zoom calls with colleagues — are more charged now because our country is so divided, and we’re stressed out by the pandemic. The interruption has become a weapon. And, frankly, it’s unacceptable. We all want to be heard. We need to do better. If the ground rules are being ignored and your discussions have devolved into a pandemonium, these tips should help calm the conversation down, whether we’re at home, at happy hour, or on an hours-long conference call.
A woman has not won a screenwriting Oscar since the George W. Bush administration. Activists call it a travesty.
Washington Post online
2020-02-20
“It’s a vicious cycle,” said Teresa Boyer, an expert in social equity and gender economics and founding director of the Anne Welsh McNulty Institute for Women’s Leadership at Villanova University. “Not seeing women [on the podium] leads to them not getting opportunities, which leads to not seeing women [on the podium] again." ... “I think we’ve seen this before,” said Villanova’s Boyer. “We have a reckoning and then one person wins and everyone says, ‘well, we’re done now.’ And before you know it 12 years go by."
Getting women's soccer team equal pay for equal work more complicated than it seems
KYW Newsradio radio
2019-07-10
"We have a clear example of gender bias in the workplace, although it's about athletics and sports, and people tend to think of entertainment as different, this is what happens in many work places," said Terri Boyer, director of the McNulty Institute for Women's Leadership at Villanova.
A stadium of soccer fans chanting ‘Equal pay!’ feels like a turning point. Will it be?
Philadelphia Inquirer online
2019-07-08
As the president of the world soccer federation prepared to hand out medals to the Women’s World Cup champions Sunday, a chant broke out from the fans in the French stadium who’d just watched their team from the United States cement its place in the history books: “E-qual pay! E-qual pay!" … “Everyone in that stadium saw some reason to take up that cause, and I don’t think they were just speaking for the athletes,” said Terri Boyer, director of the Anne Welsh McNulty Institute for Women’s Leadership at Villanova University.
Ageism, or Prejudice Against Our Future Selves
The Broad Experience online
2019-06-05
In this episode we meet Villanova University women's leadership professor Terri Boyer, and founder of Magnificent Midlife Rachel Lankester. Each discusses age discrimination (which is perpetrated by both men and women) and suggests ways we can tackle it, beginning with women not buying into the narratives we've been fed over the years.
World Bank: American women lag behind international peers
KYW Newsradio radio
2019-03-11
A new study from the World Bank, out in time for Women's History Month, looked at gender equity in 131 countries. The results deliver some disturbing news for the United States: American women lag behind their counterparts in other economically advanced nations. The study, called "Women, Business and the Law 2019," examined the usual lifetime milestones: starting a job, getting married, having children, running a business. Terri Boyer, PhD, director of the McNulty Institute for Women's Leadership at Villanova University, says the U.S. ranks 62 out of 131 and is on par with much smaller countries.
Six Countries Have Equal Laws for Men and Women But Research Says US Still Has Far to Go
KCBS radio
2019-03-03
A decade ago, the World Bank released a wide-ranging study which determined that zero countries treat men and women equally under the law. The follow-up report which was just released says that six countries now make the cut. The US, however, was way down in 62nd place, tied with the Bahamas, Kenya and Malawi. … Dr. Terri Boyer is the Director of the Institute for Women's Leadership at Villanova University. She tells KCBS Radio anchor Melissa Culross the US is far behind its economic peers and it mainly comes down to one factor.
Miss America Changes
Voice of America -- American Cafe radio
2018-06-12
It is the oldest beauty pageant in the United States, but now you won’t be able to call it that anymore … for some perspective on this issue I talked with Terri Boyer, she’s the founding director of the Villanova University Anne Welsh McNulty Institute for Women’s Leadership in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
#MeToo shone at the Grammys and Davos, but was it just lip service?
NBC News.com online
2018-01-31
“CEOs need to look in their own backyard and ask, ‘What is our culture like here?’ Everyone is aware that #metoo is happening and it’s a problem, but they don't necessarily think of their own [workplace],” said Terri Boyer, founding director of the Anne Welsh McNulty Institute for Women’s Leadership at Villanova University.
One Year Later: How Inaugural Women's March Sparked a Movement
KCBS Radio radio
2018-01-19
Millions of women took to the streets last year in response to President Trump’s inauguration, sparking a movement that’s seen women across the country run for office the first time, demand equal pay, and spark a conversation on sexual harassment, assault, and consent … let’s take a look at how things have evolved with Dr. Terri Boyer, founding director for the Institute for Women’s Leadership at Villanova University
This Life: Was Oprah right? Is a new day on the horizon for women?
Atlanta Journal-Constitution online
2018-01-11
That Hollywood would use the stage for activism isn’t all that unusual, Boyer said. The inclusion of those outside that circle was. “It wasn’t just the privileged (mostly white) Hollywood elite, but that several of those elite brought women activists whose identities and experiences were vastly different from their own — and yet they were finding commonality,” she said. “This is just a start, but if the movement continues, with all women coming together and saying, your problem is my problem, even with acknowledgment of our difference, then our unified strength will lead to a truly ‘new day.’”
The Lack Of Women Leaders Is A National Emergency
The Huffington Post
2017-10-28
That one sentence sums up more than the situation with Weinstein, now accused of sexual harassing or assaulting more than 50 women. That same power imbalance exists in every corner of the country, in the White House, Congress, the media, police departments, academia, most big law firms, and nearly every major corporate boardroom, corner office and C-suite.“Weinstein is the embodiment of the power differential that plays out all over the workplace in the United States,” said Teresa Boyer, the director of the Anne Welsh McNulty Institute for Women’s Leadership at Villanova University.
A Proposal for Lasting Change in Workplace Culture
Morning Consult
2017-10-27
The last few weeks have been filled with news stories of women’s experiences sexual harassment and assault in the workplace and beyond, leaving the public expressing shock, dismay and even disgust…Instead of despair about the harsh reality of change — or rather, the lack thereof — I’d like to propose a different approach. We need to change the culture of our systems. What we could see playing out before us is the catalyst for the first steps in systemic change. Terri Boyer is the founding director of the Anne Welsh McNulty Institute for Women’s Leadership at Villanova University.
Manufacturing can help itself by hiring more women, study says
NPR's Marketplace
2017-04-24
Manufacturing has rebounded since the recession, and there are lots of lean, mean, technology-driven manufacturers thriving all over country. Yet employers increasingly complain they can’t find enough skilled workers to meet current demand and grow. A new report says the industry could help itself a huge amount by doing one thing: hiring more women.
Poll Finds Most Voters Embrace Milestone for Women, if Not Hillary Clinton
The New York Times
2016-09-16
Teresa Boyer discusses the importance of the 2016 Presidential election for women.
What Oscar snubs say about gender inequity among directors
KYW Newsradio radio
2020-02-09
"That one line from the movie where Marmee says, 'I've been angry every day of my life,' captures so much of the discussion that's going on in Hollywood," said Terri Boyer, director of the McNulty Institute for Women's Leadership at Villanova University. "When you think about #MeToo, about the pay equity issues, you have this movie that really epitomizes it." Boyer said there were 18 or so female directors in the top 100 box office successes of 2019, but none were nominated for Best Director. All five Best Director nominees are men and four are white. Boyer said when the film industry starts talking about gender inequity among directors, then there will be change. "People are becoming more aware and then that switches to a conscious effort," she suggested. "Hopefully there will be a trend of change and recognition for the great work that women are doing."
Research Grants (2)
Advancing Equity in Career and Technical Education
US Department of Education, Office of Career Technical and Adult Education
2015-17
Technical Assistance for Implementing Career Pathways Systems Initiative
US Department of Education
2015-17
Select Academic Articles (3)
Advancing Equity in Career and Technical Education: A review of the literature
Report to the US Department of Education, Office for Career Technical and Adult EducationBoyer, T., Robinson, M., and Gracia-Rivera, G.
2016
Creating Pathways to Leadership: An Academy Model for Leadership Development in Career Pathways Implementation for Career and Technical Education
White paper commissioned by the US Department of Education, Office for Career Technical and Adult EducationBoyer, T., and Robinson, M.
2016
Men in Women's Jobs
Sociology of Work, SAGEBoyer, T.
2013
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