Meet The Sidbury Group President

Carmen K. Sidbury, Ph.D.

Dr. Sidbury is currently President of the Sidbury Group, LLC (TSG).  TSG is a small woman owned business focused on enhancing diversity and inclusion in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM).  As a STEM Advocate, Dr.Sidbury brings 30+ years of experience in industry, government and higher education and an extensive network of thought leaders, strategists and technical professionals to provide clients with dynamic deliverables  She is an outside-the-box thinker who enjoys exploring the myriad ways technology, strategy, and process improvement can help organizations make better decisions, navigate complex challenges, and solve real problems.

Dr. Sidbury served as the Associate Provost for Research at Spelman College from 2011 – 2016.  In this role she provided vision and leadership to support Spelman’s research and student development mission through externally funded programs and activities.  The work entailed developing strategic partnerships with students, staff, faculty, secondary schools, private industry and federal agencies to develop programs and services to prepare students for lifelong learning, leadership, and service to sustain Spelman’s legacy as a leader in preparing African American women for success.  She is the Founding Director of the Spelman Design and Innovation Center and continues to be engaged in national efforts to make Historically Black Colleges and Universities centers of innovation and entrepreneurship.

From 2009 to 2011 Dr. Sidbury served as a Program Director at the National Science Foundation (NSF) for the Graduate Research Fellowship Program, in the Division of Graduate Education of the Education and Human Resource Directorate.  In this role she led the historic expansion of the Program, doubling the number of Fellowships from ~1,000 in 2008 to 2,000 in 2010 and 2011.  She had specific oversight of initiatives to promote the professional development of Fellows and designed the Engineering Innovation Fellowship Program (EIFP).  While at NSF she was honored with the Director’s Award for Collaborative Integration.

In 2007 Dr. Sidbury joined Spelman College as an Associate Dean.  In this role she coordinated academic support services and student advising across disciplines for sophomore and junior students. Prior to joining Spelman, Dr. Sidbury was an Assistant Dean in the College of Engineering at the University of Washington. She was responsible for the overall management of programs designed to recruit, retain and support outstanding and diverse pools of undergraduate and graduate students in the areas of engineering and science.  Dr. Sidbury’s initial appointment in higher education was at Georgia Tech where she served as the coordinator for the NASA SHARP program.  She later became the inaugural Program Manager for Diversity of the NSF funded Science Technology Center, Materials and Devices for Information Technology Research.

Carmen has years of professional experience in technical positions at AT&T Bell Laboratories and Lucent Technologies.  At Lucent she had various assignments in telecommunications product design and development.  She also served as Director of Opto-Mechanical Systems for Luxcore Networks, Inc. in Atlanta, Georgia where she leveraged her technical expertise to develop packaging solutions to enable Luxcore's next generation optical networking systems.

After several years at AT&T-Bell Labs in Whippany, NJ, Carmen returned to graduate school and in 1995 became the first African-American female to earn a PhD in Mechanical Engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology.  She has also earned BS and MS degrees in Mechanical Engineering from North Carolina A & T State University

She has written, published and presented research findings at national conferences and is a member of several organizations including the American Evaluation Association, National Society of Black Engineers, Society of Women Engineers, National Association of Multicultural Engineering Program Advocates, and a founding member of the Society of STEM Women of Color.  She serves on the advisory board of the Materials Research Science and Engineering Center at University of the Nebraska-Lincoln, the Emerging Researchers National Conference in STEM and recently served on the Board of Directors for the Women in Engineering ProActive Network (WEPAN). .