The Weizmann Institute is launching a new national prize to advance women in science: the Women’s Postdoctoral Award for Science Career Development, which will support exceptional Israeli women scientists working at top-tier institutions abroad in the exact and natural sciences. Candidates will have completed at least one year and no more than four years of postdoctoral training overseas—a crucial stage, as they start attaining research results and charting the next phase of their professional and personal lives.
The award will include a generous two-year financial prize for fellowship work, a series of one-on-one meetings with a career consultant, and a travel stipend for job interviews in Israel, with an eye toward encouraging the women to return home to pursue a career in Israeli academia.
This new award follows in the footsteps of the Israel National Postdoctoral Award Program for Advancing Women in Science, the Weizmann Institute’s trailblazing initiative which since 2007 has supported over 150 women in their first two fellowship years at leading international labs— thanks to pillar funding from the Clore Israel Foundation and the Charles H. Revson Foundation, as well as generous support from numerous other donors. Nearly 65% of the Women in Science postdocs who completed their training have gone on to faculty-track positions in Israeli academia.
Following that program’s success, numerous other organizations in Israel created similar competitive prizes for females in the first two years of postdoctoral training.
The Weizmann Institute therefore recognized a new need—to support these talented researchers in the later years of their postings abroad and guide them in the next steps of their budding careers.
The Women’s Postdoctoral Award for Science Career Development is administered by the Weizmann Institute’s Office for the Advancement of Women in Science and Gender Equality, headed by Prof. Idit Shachar.
