A comprehensive and dynamic leadership fellowship to support careers of women researchers from academic and research institutions in Africa was launched recently.
The Open Doors Fellowship Program (ODFP or Open Doors) for women researchers in Africa was announced in November 2021 and 6 months later has started the maiden program for three African women from early to mid-career working at research and academic institutions in Africa and interested in receiving scientific and leadership skills to help them advance their research careers.
While almost the same number of men and women study scientific subjects at bachelor’s and master’s levels, fewer women advance to PhD and leadership levels. Many drop out due to family responsibilities among others, thwarting efforts to achieve diversity, equity, and inclusion. This is referred to as the “leaky pipeline” of women in science.
“ODFP seeks to increase the proportion of African women in senior and leadership positions in scientific academic and research institutions to help build more gender-inclusive and diverse research and academic institutions for current and future generations,” says Laura Cortada-Gonzalez, Senior Scientific Officer at VIB-International Plant Biotechnology Outreach (IPBO). [add link to IPBO site here]
The program targets women scientists working at national and international research centers and universities in agriculture-related fields in agrobiotechnology, plant breeding, molecular biology & genetics, microbiology, chemical ecology, plant & soil health. The fellowship is strictly for post-doctoral researchers who must have completed their studies in the last three years.
The selected fellows have now started their training on hard science and in communication and leadership skills through a blend of online and face-to-face classes and a three- month stay at a Belgian laboratory to build networks with Belgian researchers for collaboration in research projects. (See related story here [add link t first story here])
The fellows will also receive a series of incentives after they return to their duty stations to increase their scientific visibility. These include support with fees for publishing in Open Access journals, grants to travel to international congresses, and continuous support with online training courses from the VIB training portfolio for 24 months.
In the second phase of the program, the fellows will also conduct activities locally through ‘science on the road’ events and promote women’s role in science and academia within their communities.
“We shall start small by supporting 10 fellows over the next three years and will grow the number gradually as we partner with more African organizations and Belgian institutions and contribute towards the empowerment of many more women scientists in Africa,” says Cortada-Gonzalez.
While the fellowship is for a duration of 24 months, the period may be extended to women who become pregnant or with other health challenges. This will be determined on a case-by-case basis by the advisory board of the ODFP.
The comprehensive program will also work at the institutional level, including training the fellow’s direct supervisors and providing a stimulus program to impel women’s progression in their careers at these institutions which also have a role to play in addressing gender diversity and inclusion.
The first round of selection of the applicants took place in January 2022 followed by online interviews and final selection of the awardees in March. The awardees arrived in their receiving institutions in Belgium in May.
Open Doors is a project of the VIB-IPBO with funds from the Marc and Nora Van Montagu Fund. Partners in the initiative include the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), African Women in Science and Engineering (AWSE), BeWise, The UGent Africa Platform, and the African Women for Biosciences (AWfB).
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For more information, visit the website: https://ipbo.vib-ugent.be/en/open-doors-fellowship-program; Contact email: ipbo@vib-ugent.be
About the UGent- VIB International Plant Biotechnology Outreach (VIB-IPBO)
VIB-IPBO is a non-profit scientific organization established in 2000 as a partnership of the Vlaams Instituut voor Biotechnologie (VIB), a world-leading life sciences research institute based in Flanders (Belgium), and Ghent University (UGent). VIB-IPBO’s vision is to ‘contribute to the participatory engagement of agricultural communities and local actors in LDE to new sustainable agricultural systems, to enable a healthy planet with a sound social, cultural, economic and environmental development.”
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