Career Development Program

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I. GOALS AND OVERVIEW The goal of the Career Development Award Program is to attract basic, translational and clinical investigators into skin cancer research, to provide them with information about human skin cancer, mentor them in their chosen career pathways, and integrate the recipients into the translational mission of the SPORE. Many investigators within the BWH Skin Cancer SPORE have longstanding interest and a substantial track record of mentoring and developing of junior faculty. This Program establishes a formal process for the identification, selection, funding and mentoring of young investigators seeking to pursue careers in Skin cancer research. The Career Development Program will be funded at $100,000 per year, with $55,000 being requested from the NIH in this competitive renewal application, and $45,000 deriving from institutional support. The intent is to fund one or two awardees per year. Individual awardees may receive funds over a single year or multiple years as fits their needs. Candidates for this award can be at several levels of training: senior level postdoctoral fellows who are moving into faculty status and instructor level junior faculty within three years of completing their training who are interested in pursuing hypothesis-driven research. The typical applicant is a junior faculty member with a strong program of research, a secure position in a mentoring environment, and the need for funding as a bridge to independence. Consideration is also given to established investigators interested in shifting their research focus to skin cancer. A process of nomination, application and committee review will generally be used to distribute the awards. On occasion, the Principal Investigator may recommend appointment (for instance if funds become available off-schedule). The purpose of the nominating process (senior faculty recommending junior faculty) is to assure the day-to-day presence of a mentor for the award recipients. Senior faculty are eligible to apply if they are not members of the Melanoma and Cutaneous Oncology Program in the Dana-Farber Harvard Cancer Center (DFHCC), seek association with the SPORE and have a promising project that would benefit from SPORE membership. In practice, award recipients should attend SPORE functions, use SPORE Cores, and meet with Dr. Kupper on a regular basis.