In the coming months, AIP will hold competitions to select its State
Department and Congressional Science Fellows for next year. The AIP
Fellowship programs offer U.S. scientists an interesting opportunity
to assist your country by providing technical advice and analysis to
the nation's domestic or foreign policymakers.
Applications for the AIP State Department Science Fellowship must be
postmarked by November 1, 2001. For the Congressional Science Fellowship,
applications must be postmarked by January 15, 2002. Applicants must
be U.S. citizens, be members of one or more of the ten AIP Member Societies,
and have a PhD (in some cases, equivalent research experience may be
considered). Both Fellowships will begin in the fall of 2002; see the
web sites listed below for more details on how to apply.
Many of today's most challenging issues possess a scientific or technical
component. Examples include access to and use of information technologies,
implications of global warming, export controls and trade, intellectual
property rights, security and intelligence capabilities, and energy
policy. With its Fellowships, AIP seeks to provide a public service
by enabling scientists to spend at least a year actively supporting
the work of the Congress or the U.S. Department of State in addressing
such issues. AIP State Department Science Fellows work in a bureau or
office of the State Department, while Congressional Science Fellows
serve in a Member's office or work for a congressional committee. AIP
sponsors its Fellows - as do many other scientific societies - under
the auspices of the American Association for the Advancement of Science
(AAAS).
The programs are intended to benefit the federal government, the science
community, and the individual. Fellows offer their technical expertise
to support the making of laws and policy; in return, they gain an understanding
of the legislative and policymaking process, and they help to expand
the dialogue and relationship between the government and the scientific
community.
AIP STATE DEPARTMENT SCIENCE FELLOWSHIP:
Applications must be postmarked by November 1, 2001; see http://www.aip.org/mgr/sdf.html
for qualifications and application requirements.
In a report last year, the Department of State acknowledged "the
growing significance of science and technology based issues in foreign
policy," and pledged to "do what is necessary to respond to
this challenge." The Department joined forces with AIP to establish
the AIP State Department Science Fellowship, and in May, the first Fellow
in this new program was selected. He is George Atkinson, a professor
and former department head of Chemistry and Optical Sciences at the
University of Arizona, and President and CEO of Innovative Lasers Corp.
He has taken a leave of absence from the university to serve his Fellowship
term.
In a March 2001 speech, Senator Jeff Bingaman (D-NM), chairman of the
Energy and Natural Resources Committee, stated,
"I believe the State Department and its employees stand
at the international intersection of ideas and information, of cultures
and communities, and, in the final analysis, of peace and war in the
international system. After all is said and done, it is your job to
sort the complexity, make it comprehensible, and make it actionable
in the national interest.... Because of this imperative, I believe
you need cutting edge scientific and technical tools and expertise
available to you to accomplish your mission." This program is
intended to help make available that expertise.
AIP CONGRESSIONAL SCIENCE FELLOWSHIP:
Applications must be postmarked by January 15, 2002; see http://www.aip.org/pubinfo/index.html
for qualifications and application requirements.
AIP has sponsored a Congressional Science Fellow annually since 1988.
The 2001-2002 Fellow, Maureen Mellody, is a member of the Acoustical
Society of America and completed her PhD in Applied Physics from the
University of Michigan in December 2000; her thesis was on recognizing
singer-specific properties in order to identify individual singing voices.
She has also worked with a physician on analyzing vocal problems, and
was involved in a study at the Chicago Board of Trade, seeking a correlation
between the frequency of sound in the trading pit and the trading action.
In May, House Science Committee Chairman Sherwood Boehlert (R-NY) called
on the science community to become more involved, as citizens and constituents,
with Congress:
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