Environmental Fellows Program - Harvard University

The Environmental Fellows Program at Harvard University

The Harvard University Center for the Environment will name six new Environmental Fellows in April 2009. Their two-year post-doctoral program will start in September 2009. The fellows will join a group of remarkable scholars who will be beginning the second year of their fellowships. Together, the Environmental Fellows at Harvard will form a community of researchers with diverse backgrounds united by intellectual curiosity, top-quality scholarship, and a drive to understand some of the most important environmental challenges facing society.

The Harvard University Center for the Environment awarded six fellowships in 2008, and expects to award six fellowships in 2009 and six per year thereafter. The Center will organize a co-curricular program to ensure that the fellows get to know each other and each other's work. All fellows will attend biweekly dinners with their colleagues, faculty members, and guests.

Purpose: The Harvard University Center for the Environment created the Environmental Fellows program to enable recent doctorate recipients to use and expand Harvard's extraordinary resources to tackle complex environmental problems. The Environmental Fellows will work for two years with Harvard faculty members in any school or department to create new knowledge while also strengthening connections across the University's academic disciplines.

The award: The fellowship will provide an annual stipend of $54,000 plus health insurance, a $5,000 allowance for travel and professional expenses, and other employee benefits.

Selection criteria:

    * Applicant's prior academic and professional success and his or her potential contribution to scholarship or practice
    * Project significance: the potential impact of the research project on scholarship at Harvard and on environmental problems
    * Host's commitment: the host faculty member's enthusiasm for the proposed project and fellow, the host's ability to mentor the fellow, and his or her ability to provide office space and a productive work environment.
     * Diversity: The selection committee will select a group of fellows in 2008 who will complement those selected last year, creating a group of approximately a dozen men and women with diverse ethnic and racial backgrounds and a diverse set of academic interests and skills. The ideal group would include fellows working with host faculty members at every one of Harvard's professional schools and many of the departments overseen by the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. Recipients-and hosts-may include people with degrees in the sciences, economics, law, government, public policy, public health, medicine, design, and the full array of humanities. Their research topics will be equally varied.

The Harvard University Center for the Environment:

The Center encourages research and education about the environment and its many interactions with human society. The Center draws its strength from faculty members, researchers, and students from across the University who make up a remarkable intellectual community of scholars, teachers, and practitioners of diverse fields. The Center's mission is to strengthen and expand that community by supporting research, encouraging faculty and students to apply their particular expertise to environmental topics, and providing a convivial space for collaboration. The Center is located in the University's Geological Museum at 24 Oxford Street, Cambridge.

More information is available online at www.environment.harvard.edu