Fall 2010 Fellowships Focus

Fall 2010 Fellowships Focus

Director's Corner

It is my pleasure to present the second edition of the Fellowship Focus e-newsletter. The 2010-11 Fellowship year launches with many milestones to celebrate:

  • the new class tops the 200 mark for the first time in the program's history;
  • a $30 million award from the Environmental Protection Agency, the largest in our 38-year history;
  • the 30th anniversary of the AAAS S&T Policy Fellowships' partnership with the U.S. Department of State, which launched the executive branch fellowships;
  • the 10th year of partnership with the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation; and
  • the launch of partnership with the U.S. Geological Survey and the new National Institute for Food and Agriculture at the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
  • These significant markers are testament to the S&T Policy Fellows and the excellent work they accomplish for the agencies and offices that host them, as well as to the many individuals at AAAS and our partner societies, agencies and host offices, and other collaborators who contribute to our success.
  • To keep our momentum going we welcome assistance spreading the word to recruit applicants for the 2011-12 Fellowships. The new application deadline is December 5th. To learn more about the program, please visit our website and view the online application. Also, we'll be soliciting former Fellows as application readers in late November.

Cynthia Robinson - Director, AAAS Science & Technology Policy Fellowship

 

Fellowship Updates

AAAS Welcomes Largest Fellowship Class

In September the AAAS S&T Policy Fellowships Program welcomed its largest class in the program's 38 year history. The 210 participants in the 2010-11 cohort come from a broad range of disciplines, backgrounds and career stages. Of the entire cohort, 181 Fellows will spend their year at 16 different executive branch agencies, and 29 Fellows will work in various congressional offices and subcommittees. The class includes 138 first-year Fellows and 72 Fellows who have renewed for a full second year.

As the program continues to expand so do the number of agencies and offices it collaborates with. For the first time this year S&T Policy Fellows have been placed at the United States Geological Survey (USGS) and at the newly created National Institute for Food and Agriculture (NIFA), which is a part of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).

For more information about the new class and the S&T Policy Fellowships visit aaas.org/stpf.

 

EPA Awards $30 Million for S&T Policy Fellowships

In September 2010, the AAAS Science & Technology Policy Fellowships received a $30.1 million award from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to support up to 230 fellowships over the next five years. This is the largest single award received in the history of the S&T Policy Fellowships program.

"The EPA award is a wonderful testament to AAAS, to the program, and to the Fellows," said Program Director Cynthia Robinson. "It is also a fine way to mark the launch of the 30th annual cohort of Fellows at the EPA.

The S&T Policy Fellowships at EPA, which have been operating since 1981, are encompassed under the Energy, Environment & Agriculture (EEA) fellowship category (EEA - which also places AAAS Fellows at the USDA and the USDA Forest Service, the EPA, the Department of Energy, the National Atmospheric and Space Administration, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the USGS). With the new cohort of EEA Fellows at EPA, a total of 296 S&T Policy Fellows have been placed at the Agency over 30 years.

 

Celebrating 30-Year Partnership with Department of State

The AAAS Science & Technology Policy Fellowships program is proud to celebrate 30 years of partnership with the U.S. Department of State (State Department). This collaboration began in 1980, and launched the executive branch fellowships. Prior to 1980 S&T Policy Fellows were only placed in Congressional offices. For the past three years the State Department has hosted the largest number of Fellows; and it has hosted a total of 243 Fellows.

The first cohort of Diplomacy Fellows at the State Department in 1980-81 included three Fellows; the 2010-11 class includes 35 Fellows. Fellowships at the Department of State are now part of the Diplomacy, Security and Development program area (DSD – which also includes placements at the Agency for International Development, Department of Defense, Department of Homeland Security, Fogarty International Center at the National Institutes of Health, and the Foreign Agricultural Service of the USDA).

The three members of 1980-81 cohort, Barbara Baum Taylor, Margaret Gould Burke, and Phyllis N. Windle, have remained active in science and policy since their time as Fellows at the Department of State. Dr. Baum Taylor is currently a principal at Meta Environmental, Inc., an environmental consulting and laboratory services company in Massachusetts. Dr. Gould Burke is the director of Education where she helps plan exhibits and educational programming for the California Academy of Sciences. Additionally, she sits on the board of the Ronberg Tiburon Center for Environmental Studies whose goal is to advance the understanding of the world's complex marine environments, focusing on the San Francisco Bay. For more than 20 years Dr. Windle served as a senior scientist at the Union of Concerned Scientists in Washington DC, a science-based nonprofit that works to ensure a healthy environment and a safer world. Former AAAS Fellows have held positions across federal agencies as well as in academia, industry and nonprofit organizations around the world. Read the full AAAS story

 

Social Media Outreach Expands

In an effort to build online connection across the Fellowship community, the Fellowships program has launched a Twitter feed and Facebook fan page to complement our existing Facebook and LinkedIn groups. Current and former Fellows are encouraged to share news, post information on upcoming events, and more. If you are not a Fellow, but have a question or want to know if AAAS will be presenting at a specific event or location, you can find out here as well.