The Harvard University Center for the Environment is accepting applications for the 2017 class of Environmental Fellows. This exceptional program enables doctorate recipients to utilize Harvard resources and work with faculty to advance knowledge on a significant environmental problem.
Interested in becoming an Environmental Fellow? Consider the Keith Group as a host.
Under the leadership of David Keith, Gordon McKay Professor of Applied Physics at Harvard’s John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences and Professor of Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School, the Keith Group is a fast-growing team of researchers working at the intersection of climate science and technology with a focus on the science and public policy of solar geoengineering. The work spans everything from detailed climate modeling looking at sea-level impacts and hurricane intensity, to lab experiments testing the chemical properties of innovative compounds, to social science experiments on the interaction of solar geoengineering and carbon mitigation. See the group’s publications or learn more about David. Overall solar geoengineering research efforts at Harvard are quickly expanding beyond the Keith Group.
If you are interested in becoming an Environmental Fellow with the Keith Group, please email Lizzie Burns at eburns@g.harvard.edu.
Additional information from the Harvard University Center for the Environment’s website is below:
The Center is now accepting applications for the 2017 class of Environmental Fellows. The application deadline is 5pm on January 18, 2017.
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 includes a salary of $64,000 per year, employee health insurance eligibility, up to $2,500 reimbursement for travel expenses, and a $2,500 allowance for travel and other professional expenses. 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.
The Harvard University Center for the Environment expects to award approximately six fellowships for the 2017 cohort.
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
- Diversity: the selection committee will select a group of fellows in 2017 who will complement those selected the previous year, creating a group of approximately 13 men and women with diverse 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.
- Harvard candidates: those who received terminal degrees from Harvard and post-docs currently working at Harvard are eligible for the fellowship provided their research and host arrangements take them in new directions that are significantly distinct from their Ph.D. research and forge new connections within the University. Harvard candidates should not propose to continue to work with the same professors or lab groups with whom they are currently associated. No candidate should propose to work extensively with his or her thesis advisor.
- Interdisciplinary research projects are encouraged, although this is not a requirement for the fellowship. Candidates with interests in a single discipline are encouraged to apply.
- 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.
Finding a Host:
Potential candidates should start early to identify and establish a relationship with a Harvard faculty member to host his or her research. The host will be a mentor to the fellow and will provide office space and basic administrative support. In agreeing to be a host, the faculty member is making a significant commitment. Successful candidates will be enthusiastically recommended by their proposed host. Each applicant's host must submit a letter of support (maximum of two pages) to the selection committee describing in detail the level of commitment to the research and the candidate.