Opinion: In the wake of COVID-19, academia needs new solutions to ensure gender equity

Here, we examine ways in which COVID-19 is amplifying known barriers to women’s career advancement. We propose actionable solutions, which include the formation of a Pandemic Response Faculty Fellow or Pandemic Faculty Merit Committee (PFMC), new/revised tenure and promotion metrics created by the aforementioned committee, and a framework to ensure that the new metrics and policies are adopted college-wide. We also caution against the popular tenure clock quick fix that poses a potential threat to a diverse future for academia.