Hello CEE Students,
Please take a look at this excellent opportunity for students of color* to participate in FUTURE Ignited.
If you are interested in being nominated, please email CEE Dept. Chair, Laura Lowes (lowes@uw.edu), CEE Ugrad Advising (ceadvice@uw.edu) or your favorite CEE Professor.
Let us know if you have any questions!
-Brian
*FUTURE Ignited uses an inclusive definition of “students of color” to include those who have been historically underrepresented in STEM including, but not limited to, African American/Black, Latin(x), Native/Indigenous/First Nation, and Hawaiian/Pacific Islander.
Subject: Invitation to nominate junior or senior students of color for FUTURE Ignited
The Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences at Caltech invites you and other faculty in your department to nominate your top rising junior or senior students of color* who may be interested in pursuing a PhD in Earth, environmental, or planetary science for FUTURE Ignited, an online virtual conference to be held on October 17. Participants in FUTURE Ignited will have an opportunity to engage in short science talks and “day in a life” presentations by current graduate students and to hear from panels of current students and faculty addressing topics including applying to graduate school, challenges of graduate life, financing graduate study, community-building, and much more. For seniors, the program includes small-group follow-up sessions about two weeks later to workshop the elements of graduate school applications. For juniors, the program includes information about Caltech’s WAVE program of summer undergraduate research experiences for students of color (https://sfp.caltech.edu/programs/wavefellows). The goal of FUTURE Ignited is to support the ambitions of aspiring young scientists of color in the geosciences and to cultivate a diverse next generation of scientific leaders.
FUTURE Ignited is being run this year for the first time. It is an outgrowth of Caltech’s successful FUTURE of physics fly-in program for female students interested in graduate school in physics. However, this program differs in three essential ways: it is aimed at students of color, it is by necessity a virtual program this year, and it reaches across all five of Caltech’s science and engineering divisions and their graduate options. The GPS version will include the campus-wide programming in addition to panels and content dedicated specifically to the Earth and planetary sciences. We will explain the structure and goals of our programs in geology, geochemistry, geobiology, geophysics, planetary science, and environmental science and engineering. Many of these programs regularly recruit students whose undergraduate majors are in allied fields, including chemistry, physics, biology, astronomy, applied mathematics, and more … so we encourage you also to think broadly about the students that you might nominate for the program. One cross-cutting program that spans all of Caltech’s divisions is the Resnick Sustainability Institute, where students, post-docs, faculty, and staff work on solving aspects of the water, climate, and energy problems facing our world. FUTURE Ignited will have specific programming on these topics, which may appeal to students whose interests lie between traditional disciplines.
We are requesting that you or your colleagues complete a very short nomination form, which can be accessed through our website: http://futureignited.caltech.edu/. Nominations are due by September 28, 2020.
Please distribute this announcement among your colleagues and encourage them to submit nominations. The student does not have to be from the same university as the nominator and does not have to be a U.S. citizen or a U.S. based student (we welcome you to nominate a student you may know through a research collaboration, visit, etc.). We strongly prefer nominations from faculty but will also consider nominations from non-faculty and self-nominations. Please do not hesitate to contact us at diversity@caltech.edu if you have any questions about the event. Please note that participation by juniors in this year’s on-line conference does not preclude them from being nominated to attend an in-person FUTURE Ignited conference as a senior next year.
We are committed to building an inclusive cohort that recognizes and celebrates the diversity of students’ intersectional identities and experiences.
*We use an inclusive definition of “students of color” to include those who have been historically underrepresented in STEM including, but not limited to, African American/Black, Latin(x), Native/Indigenous/First Nation, and Hawaiian/Pacific Islander.
Sincerely,
Paul Asimow
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Paul Asimow (He/Him/His) asimow@gps.caltech.edu
Eleanor and John R. McMillan Professor of Geology and Geochemistry
Chair of the GPS Committee on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
California Institute of Technology
1200 E. California Blvd. M/C170-25
Pasadena, CA 91125 USA
(626)395-4133 FAX (626)395-1995
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