PASADENA--The Henry Luce Foundation has awarded $277,000 to the California Institute of Technology to fund two new postdoctoral fellowships for two years. The Clare Boothe Luce Fellowships will be awarded to two women, one in the Division of Engineering and Applied Science (EAS), and the other in the Division of Physics, Mathematics and Astronomy (PMA).
According to Caltech president David Baltimore, the awards are important to the Institute's commitment to increase the number of women in the natural sciences and engineering. "Encouraging the brightest women investigators to attend Caltech for their postdoctoral work will augment our community in so many ways," Baltimore says, "not only as researchers, but as role models and mentors to the graduate students they work with."
Baltimore adds that the fellowships will be used to recruit and support the most qualified and talented women who have finished their doctorates and are now beginning their careers in academia and research.
Caltech requested that the Luce fellowships be earmarked for the EAS and PMA divisions because both comprise scientific and engineering disciplines in which women have been underrepresented nationwide for years. At Caltech, the EAS division currently has 19 women among its 106 postdoctoral scholars, while the PMA division has 14 women among its 117 postdocs.
Postdoctoral appointments are becoming increasingly important in the making of scientists and engineers, and Caltech postdocs play a unique role in the Institute's research mission. With their freshly minted doctorates, the new postdocs arrive on campus with skills that complement those of the existing Caltech faculty, and with the freedom to apply their knowledge in the pursuit of new ideas.
The Clare Boothe Luce Program is the largest private source of funding for women in science and engineering. Created by Clare Boothe Luce under the terms of her will, the program is administered by the Henry Luce Foundation. Since its inception, the program has awarded more than $100 million in grants to over 1,300 women in science and engineering.
Written by Robert Tindol