Economist Rohini Pande, a Rafik Hariri professor of International Political Economy at the Harvard Kennedy School, Harvard University, won the 2018 Carolyn Shaw Bell Award, the American Economics Association announced on Wednesday. The award was first presented in 1998, and is named after Carolyn Bell Shaw, the Katharine Coman chair professor emerita of Wellesley College.

“The award is given annually by the American Economic Association Committee on the Status of Women in the Economics Profession to recognize and honor an individual who has furthered the status of women in the economics profession,” a press release by the association said. It added that the award will be presented at the annual CSWEP business meeting and award ceremony held during the 2019 meeting of the association at Atlanta, Georgia.

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The statement said that Pande earned her doctorate in economics from the London School of Economics in 1999. Before this, she taught economics at Columbia University and Yale University. “Professor Pande is an accomplished development scholar and gifted academic leader,” the press release said.

“Professor Pande provides an incredible example of what any person – male or female – can aspire to in the profession,” the statement said quoting one of her supporters. Quoting another supporter, it said: “She has led not only through example and achievements, but in her earnest and unwavering mentoring of women in the profession.”

The association said that Pande has taken steps to ensure gender parity in the economics field. “She ensures that the concerns women academics have, and the barriers they may face, are given serious attention,” it added. “For example, she shaped hiring practices so as to better identify and recruit underrepresented minorities and women for tenured positions and actively advocates for diversity in conferences or seminar speaker programs.”