Faculty and staff at the University of Lethbridge take pride in their students and believe in giving them quality education with as many opportunities as possible to succeed in their chosen career path.
Established by the Women's Scholar group in collaboration with Dayna Daniels and Claudia Malacrida, the Women's Scholar Award gives female students the power to achieve their goals and reach their full potential.
Kristal Frank is one recipient of the Women's Scholar Award.
The scholarship, funded through faculty and staff giving, is based on a combination of academic achievement and financial need and is intended to support either female graduate students studying in non-traditional fields or graduate students studying gender-related issues.
"What was exciting is how quickly the members of the group agreed that it was something worth contributing to," says Daniels. "We saw an area that was underrepresented and realized we could do something to help
Kristal Frank, an MSc student majoring in policy and strategy, won the award this fall along with a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) award. Her proposed research is titled, Managerial Perceptions of Eldercare:
Implications for Managerial Work-Family Policy Allowance Decisions and the Adoption of Work-Eldercare Programs.
"It was amazing," Frank says of receiving the awards. "It was definitely a huge confidence-booster – it kind of reinforced that what I'd chosen to study had practical significance as well."
Frank has chosen to focus her research efforts on issues surrounding work-family conflict, organizational culture and gender issues at work, with the help of supervisor and mentor
Dr. Mary Runté.
"I chose to go with her primarily because that's her area of research as well," she explains. "For me, she's a big inspiration because not only does she research it, but she really lives it."
Frank graduated from the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology (NAIT) in 1998 and worked in the IT industry for eight years before coming to the University of Lethbridge. She says the decision to go back to school took a lot of reflection and she chose to pursue her degree at the
U of L because of its excellent reputation and the flexibility to do evening and weekend courses. Frank commenced her studies at the Calgary campus in 2006, transferred to the Lethbridge campus in 2007 and graduated with her bachelor of management degree, with Great Distinction, in 2008.
After completing her graduate studies at the U of L, Frank hopes to move either to Edmonton or Halifax to pursue a PhD in management and plans to use her skills to become a university professor.
"I really want to teach; to encourage and empower students."
To learn more about the Faculty of Management at the University of Lethbridge, visit this link.