Resources for Students

Science, Technology, and Society touches on the modern world's critical issues. Its questions cross all disciplinary boundaries. Students interested in STS have great resources available to them:

Read about STS-related tracks in several departments.
Review our list of courses across the curriculum.
Search our faculty listing for professors in dozens of departments.
Use our student listing to find graduate students interested in related areas.

News Items

02/08/08

4S/EASST Annual Meeting

Submission is now open for the joint 4S/EASST Annual Meeting. The deadline for submitting abstracts and session proposals is Feb 16.

Find online submission forms for abstracts and for sessions at www.4sonline.org/meeting.htm. Please read the instructions carefully. For example, do not submit your paper individually if a session organizer is submitting your paper as part of a panel.

The theme for this conference is "Acting with science, technology and medicine". More information about the associations on the respective web sites:

www.4sonline.org
www.easst.net

02/04/08

Graduate Students Small Grants Program

The Center for Race and Gender (CRG) at the University of California Berkeley, announces the availability of grants of $500 to $2,000 to support graduate student research or creative projects that address issues of race and gender. Topics should be consonant with the CRG's mandate to promote increased understanding of race and gender and their intersections in a wide variety of social, cultural, and institutional contexts, especially on the Berkeley campus and its neighboring communities, but also in California, the nation, or the world. Projects may be oriented toward academic research or may approach race and gender issues from the perspectives of the media, fine arts, and performing arts. Projects that deal with both race and gender are strongly preferred.

ELIGIBILITY: Applications can be submitted by any student enrolled in a graduate program at UC Berkeley. Proposals that support dissertation or thesis research are strongly encouraged.

GRANT PERIOD AND USE OF FUNDS: Grants will be awarded for a period of one year from the start date. Funds may be used for direct costs related to the proposed project, such as travel to archival or ethnographic research sites; supplies and services, and equipment rental. Funds are not intended for equipment purchase, stipend, living expenses, conference attendance, or educational travel. Grant payments will be in the form of reimbursements for expenses.

GRANTEE REPORTING: Grant recipients will be responsible for submitting a brief midterm report of their progress along with the faculty mentor's evaluation of the project's progress to date. Grant recipients are required to submit a final report within two weeks of the end of the grant period containing: 1) an itemized expense report; 2) a statement of what was accomplished; and 3) the faculty mentor's evaluation of the project. Grant recipients may be asked to present their projects at a CRG Forum and their project description will appear in the Center's newsletter, Faultlines.

APPLICATION PROCESS: Please submit the following: an original and two copies, single sided, do not staple (forms at Center for Race and Gender)

• Student Information and Agreement form
• Faculty Mentor Information and Agreement form
• 100 - 200 word abstract
• 3 page project description
• Timeline for project completion
• Budget and budget justification
• Faculty mentor support letter
• Curriculum vitae

Committee on the Protection of Human Subjects approval or exemption Letter. If CPHS has not sent notification by date of application, indicate date of submission and pending status. Grant funds will be released only after approval or exemption letter is submitted.

Submit all application materials to: Graduate Student Grants Program, Center for Race and Gender, 642 Barrows Hall MC 1074, Berkeley, CA 94720-1074

APPLICATION DEADLINE: April 2nd at 3:00 p.m. Incomplete applications will not be considered. Awards will be announced within two weeks of the deadline. INQUIRIES: Direct inquires to centerrg@berkeley.edu.

01/28/08

CITRIS White Paper Competition

CITRIS is proud to announce the third annual CITRIS White Paper competition, which will give away $25K in cash prizes for the best ideas that demonstrate the ability of IT to address a major societal challenge.

The IT for Society contest is open to students from all four CITRIS campuses: UC Berkeley, UC Merced, UC Santa Cruz, and UC Davis. See Rules and Guidelines for information on the competition and Awards for information on last year's winners.

DEADLINE: All submissions are due 5:00 p.m. PST April 11, 2008. Late entries will not be accepted. All entries should be submitted electronically to it4society@gmail.com in HTML, Word, or PDF.

Finalists will be asked to make a short presentation on their proposal.

LENGTH: White papers should be 5-10 pages in length, not including appendices.

PRIZE: A total of $25,000 in cash prizes is available, which will be allocated as follows: First Place: $12,500, Second Place: $7,500, Third Place: $3,000, Fourth Place: $2,000. Prizes will only be awarded if there are high-quality submissions. The cash can be used a scholarships or to support the proposed project or idea (e.g. research, travel, workshops, miscellaneous expenses).

ELIGIBLITY: At least one member of the team must be an undergraduate or graduate student from one of the four CITRIS campuses: UC Berkeley, Davis, Santa Cruz or Merced. Multidisciplinary teams are strongly encouraged but not required.

DECISIONS OF THE JUDGES: Decisions of the judges are final and not subject to appeal.

FACULTY ADVISOR: Winners who intend to use the money to support their proposed idea or project will be required to have a faculty advisor. This is not required at the time of submission.

REQUIRED INFORMATION: The following information must be required (which does not count against the 5-10 page limit) Names and brief bios of team members, including major and student status (e.g. undergrad, grad) Contact information for primary contact. Whether or not you consent to public, online dissemination of your white paper. 1-2 paragraphs on what your team would do with the money.

Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Investigator Awards in Health Policy Research: Building Human Capital

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Investigator Awards in Health Policy Research program supports highly qualified individuals to undertake broad studies of America's most challenging policy issues in health and health care. Grants of up to $335,000 are awarded to investigators from a variety of disciplines for innovative research projects that have national policy relevance.

Applications are welcomed from investigators in the fields of anthropology, business, demography, economics, engineering, ethics, genetics, health and social policy, health services research, history, journalism, law, medicine, nursing, political science, psychology, public health, science policy, social work, sociology and others. The program seeks a diverse group of applicants including minorities, researchers early in their careers, and individuals in nonacademic settings.

The deadline for receipt of letters of intent is March 26, 2008 (5:00 pm ET). The complete call for proposals is available online.

Those interested in submitting a proposal are urged to contact Bob Barde immediately.

New NSF RFP on "Human and Social Dynamics"

NSF has just released its Request for Proposals for this year's competition on *Human and Social Dynamics*. This is a competition that rewards interdisciplinary collaborations: All proposals must include three or more senior personnel from at least two different fields.

The Human and Social Dynamics (HSD) priority area fosters breakthroughs in understanding the dynamics of human action and development, as well as knowledge about organizational, cultural, and societal adaptation and change. HSD aims to increase our collective ability to understand the complexities of change; (2) understand the dynamics of human and social behavior at all levels, including that of the human mind; (3) understand the cognitive and social structures that create, define, and result from change; and (4) manage profound or rapid change, and make decisions in the face of changing risks and uncertainty. Accomplishing these goals requires multidisciplinary research teams and comprehensive, interdisciplinary approaches across the sciences, engineering, education, and humanities, as appropriate.

The FY 2008 competition will include three emphasis areas (agents of change; dynamics of human behavior; and decision making, risk, and uncertainty). HSD encourages projects investigating complexity and systems thinking, with a goal of revealing the emergent properties of dynamic systems. HSD also encourages projects identifying human drivers of environmental change and exploring the consequences of environmental change on humans. Such research is central in equipping us to handle the most pressing environmental problems for our nation and the world.

Most successful projects will be funded at up to $750,000 total costs over three years. A few projects that involve big data collection, international, or student components will be funded at up to $1.25 million. The full RFA is available online.

If you would like help in assembling and submitting an HSD proposal, please contact Bob Barde well in advance of the February 19 deadline.

01/07/08

In summer 2008, the Social Science Research Council will sponsor twelve (12) Dissertation Proposal Development Fellowships in the field of Critical Studies of Science and Technology Policy, with an emphasis on comparative and international topics. These fellowships will fund participating graduate students from US universities to pursue predissertation summer research and to attend two integrated workshops designed to prepare them to learn and explore research and dissertation proposal development strategies in STS and closely related fields.

Except in unique circumstances, applicants should be in their second or third year of PhD programs and must not yet have defended their dissertation prospectus prior to attending the workshops. The due date for applications is February 8, 2008, and applications must be filed through the SSRC application portal:

http://programs.ssrc.org/dpdf

Critical Studies of Science and Technology Policy [ PDF ]

08/15/07

Michelle R. Clayman Institute for Gender Research Fellowship Program
The Michelle R. Clayman Institute for Gender Research at Stanford University hosts around 7 leading scholars each year. Generally, they will be tenured or tenure-track faculty, but we are also open to considering postdoctoral fellows and high fliers from industry and business. Faculty would be expected to join us for one, two or three academic quarters. Each Research Fellow will be offered a stipend of up to $60,000 depending on status, plus office space, library access and so on. All the practical details of our Fellowship Program, and more about the Clayman Institute, are at: http://gender.stanford.edu. The closing date for the current round of applications is October 29, 2007.

The Clayman Institute is currently focusing on gender / women in the STEM fields. We have a particular interest in "gendered innovations" - that is, where the introduction of gender analysis into science and engineering can change the nature of knowledge itself, for example by challenging existing preconceptions, encouraging new ways to look at old problems, or even changing or creating fields of research.

Applications are sought from scholars working in the following areas of research:
Gendered Innovations in Knowledge; Title IX in Science and Engineering; Gender in the Physical and Technical Sciences, and Math; Gender in Engineering and Computer science; Gender in Environmental Sciences; Gender in the Life Sciences and Biotechnology; Medicine and Women's Health; and Clustering in Scientific Subfields.

08/02/07

The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI)
Postdoctoral Fellow, Environment, Production and Technology (EPTD)

The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) seeks a Postdoctoral Fellow (PDF) for a two-year, fixed term, renewable appointment based at IFPRI headquarters located in Washington, D.C. Working with the Research Fellow and Senior Scientist leading the Global Change research theme of IFPRI, and in close collaboration with other staff as appropriate, the successful candidate will conduct research and analysis on land use patterns and shifts under alternative scenarios of global environmental and economic change.

TO APPLY:
Go to www.ifpri.org .  Click on "Careers" and "Research Positions" to link you to Position # 07-142 – Postdoctoral Fellow, EPTD.  Please complete on-line application, including a complete curriculum vitae and a detailed letter of interest.  Also complete section providing 3 references.

CLOSING DATE:
AUGUST 26, 2007 or until filled

Detailed Announcement

07/16/07

Abe Fellowship Program

The Abe Fellowship is designed to encourage international multidisciplinary research on topics of pressing global concern. The program seeks to foster the development of a new generation of researchers who are interested in policy-relevant topics of long-range importance and who are willing to become key members of a bilateral and global research network built around such topics. Applications are welcome from scholars and non-academic research professionals. Funding for the program is provided by the Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership.

Applicants are invited to submit proposals for research in the social sciences or the humanities relevant to any one or combination of the following three themes:

• Global issues
• Problems common to industrial and industrializing societies
• Issues that pertain to US-Japan relations

Application Deadline: September 1, 2007

07/13/07

New MSc in Medicine, Science & Society at King's College London

The rapid global development of the bioeconomy of the life sciences has produced a demand from those wishing to understand, analyse and engage with the scientific, social and ethical implications of this powerful new knowledge domain. In response, the Centre for Biomedicine & Society (CBAS) at King's College London has developed a new MSc in Medicine, Science & Society commencing in September 2007.

This interdisciplinary social science MSc focuses on innovations in biomedicine, particularly new medical technologies. The CBAS course is unique in emphasising the processes of translational research through its focus on the interactions between the lab, the clinic and beyond. King's is a global leader in health science research, hosting more Medical Research Council (MRC) Research Centres (five) than any other University. The MSc therefore examines the social science dimensions of innovative biomedicine in a unique supporting context.

Program Flyer [ PDF ]

For further information please see the CBAS website.

01/02/07

New Masters in Science, Society and Development at the Institute of Development Studies - University of Sussex

• Unique focus: How science and technology can contribute to poverty reduction, social justice and environmental sustainability
• Two full scholarships for African students
• Full details about the new MA: http://www.ids.ac.uk/ids/teach/mascience.html