CONFERENCE PROGRAM FOR YOUNG MINORITY SCIENTISTS

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A Travel Fellowship program has been established by the Society for Neuroscience to assist and encourage young minority students and neuroscientists to attend annual meetings of the society. This program is intended to attract students and post-docs from traditionally underrepresented minority groups to the field of Neuroscience and to expand their opportunities within the field. Neuroscience is one of the more recent specialty areas in bio-medical research and teaching. Since its, inception the Society has grown to reach a membership of over 13,000. Members come from numerous disciplines that include biochemistry, neurology, physiology, anatomy, pathology, psychology, psychiatry, engineering, and other related fields. The integrated study of the nervous system has evolved into one of the most challenging areas of theoretical and experimental biology, medicine and engineering. Projections for the future of the field are bright and continued growth of the Neuroscience Society is expected. In the face of such bright prospects, there is, however, the depressing condition of a gross underrepresentation of ethnic minorities in the neurosciences. This condition, in fact, exists in all areas of science and is not unique to the neurosciences. Many members of minority groups study the sciences at small colleges or universities. Few, if any, of these institutions have neuroscience programs and therefore minorities attending these institutions are not exposed to the neurosciences. The Society for Neurosciences, therefore, seeks to rectify this problem. An attempt is being made to increase the number of minorities in the neurosciences both as active researchers land as teachers. Personal interaction with highly competent, established scientists is a major factor in successful career development of young scientists. The proposed Travel Fellowship program would expose selected minority students and post-docs to the neuroscience community, and expose the Travel Fellow to recent developments in Neurosciences. The mentorship program provided to the Travel fellows stimulates personal interaction with a wide cross section of neuroscientists. This "mainstreaming" approach is designed to facilitate both informal interaction and access to science institutions. Travel Fellows will be given a questionnaire to elvaluate the program. In addition, a questionnaire will be sent to past Fellows to inquire about their professional well being.