A New Postdoctoral Fellows Program Aims to Increase Diversity in Academia

vanderbiltVanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, has established a new postdoctoral fellowship program with the goal of creating greater diversity in academia. The university’s Academic Pathways Postdoctoral Fellowship will emphasize academic research and scholarship, but will also include enhanced professional and leadership development training and robust mentoring. The initiative is designed to provide fellows with important opportunities to develop the teaching, mentoring and service experience that will make them highly competitive candidates for academic positions.

The Academic Pathways program will ultimately sponsor up to 12 fellows per year. While a specific goal of the program is to increase the number of women of color in the STEM professoriate, the Academic Pathways Fellowship will be open to applicants of all backgrounds and gender expressions. The first fellows will be on campus for the fall 2017 semester.

Susan R. Wente, provost and vice president for academic affairs at Vanderbilt, explains that “preparing scholars to become leaders in their chosen field has always been integral to Vanderbilt’s mission. We have the opportunity and the responsibility to give future professors the framework and support they need to build successful careers, which will have the outcome of strengthening not only Vanderbilt’s faculty but contributing to the overall quality and diversity of faculty nationally. This program will support efforts across the humanities, social sciences and life, physical and biomedical sciences across campus.”

More information about the fellowship may be found here.

Related Articles

Leave a Reply

Get the JBHE Weekly Bulletin

Receive our weekly email newsletter delivered to your inbox

Latest News

The University of New Mexico Partners With the University of the West Indies

The University of New Mexico and the University of the West Indies Five Island Campus, Antigua and Barbuda, recently created a new partnership designed to expand immersion opportunities for students at both institutions.

The Huge Racial Gap in College Completion Rates

According to a new report from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, the percentage of students who began college in the fall of 2018 and earned a credential within six years rose to 61.1 percent. For Black students who enrolled in 2018, 43.8 percent had earned a degree or other credential within six years. This is more than 17 percentage points below the overall rate. And the racial gap has increased in recent years.

American-Born Layli Maparyan Appointed President of the University of Liberia

Dr. Maparyan, a distinguished academic and prolific scholar, had been serving as the executive director of the Wellesley Centers for Women and a professor of African Studies at Wellesley College in Massachusetts.

Black Medical School Students Continue to Have to Cope With Racial Discrimination

A new study by scholars at the medical schools of New York University and Yale University finds that African American or Black students were less likely than their White counterparts to feel that medical school training contributed to their development as a person and physician.

Featured Jobs