Professor named INFORMS Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Ambassador
Published: Feb 17, 2021 4:10 PM
By Virginia Speirs
Alice Smith, Joe W. Forehand/Accenture professor of industrial and systems engineering, was named a Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Ambassador for the Institute for Operations Research and Management Science (INFORMS) for her project “Stimulating Participation of Underrepresented Groups in INFORMS Editorial Boards.”
The project aims to widen the diversity of people who are included in the peer-reviewing and editing process of scholarly journals, specifically INFORMS journals. It is one of 11 projects selected for the year and ambassadors for each project will present their findings at the INFORMS annual meeting.
“I am very honored to be named an INFORMS Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Ambassador,” said Smith, who also holds a joint appointment with the Department of Computer Science and Software Engineering. “I have been active in broadening participation in STEM, especially engineering, for more that 30 years and there is still much to do. This project aims to improve this situation by demystifying the journal reviewing and editing processes and providing role models and lessons learned from successful editors. INFORMS is the largest professional society for industrial and systems engineering and sponsors a wide variety of respected journals, so it is the perfect place to enact this potentially impactful project.”
Smith received her bachelor's degree in civil engineering from Rice University and received her MBA from Saint Louis University. She received her doctorate degree in engineering management and systems engineering from Missouri University of Science and Technology.
Smith’s research interests include computational intelligence, optimization of complex systems, modeling and simulation, facility and network design and manufacturing process control. She has been an Auburn University faculty member since 2001 and has been involved with INFORMS since 1995.
INFORMS promotes best practices and advances in operations research, management science and analytics to improve operational processes, decision-making and outcomes through an array of highly-cited publications, conferences, competitions, networking communities and professional development services.
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