A training session for the 2014-2015 Scientist Mentoring & Diversity Program for Biotech will be held June 21 - 26, 2014 in San Diego.

The year long mentoring program benefits graduate students and post-doctoral researchers from racial and ethnic groups underrepresented in science, including Hispanic Americans, Pacific Islanders, African Americans and American Indians.  Applicants must be interested in careers in the biotechnology industry. 

Scholars are paired with industry mentors who work at biotechnology companies. The 2014-2015 Scholars will be introduced to their mentors during a 6-day training experience in San Diego. During the training, Scholars learn about career opportunities in industry and receive career development coaching.  They also attend a major biotechnology conference.

As part of the program, SMDP Biotech Scholars and their mentors create personalized mentoring plans, which they implement over the course of the year following the training session. The mentor-mentee teams communicate and carry out their mentoring plans by phone, email and virtually, aided by ICPD staff and the Scholars Mentoring Portal, an internet-based tool that supports mentor-mentee collaboration and communication www.mentoringportal.org.

Student selection for the program is carried out by an independent selection committee. Sponsor organizations provide financial and/or in-kind support for the program and their staff participate as mentors.

Benefits to Scholars:

• A six-day learning experience that pairs scholars with industry mentors
• Professional career training
• One year of personalized mentoring
• Travel, lodging, meals and complementary SMDP training sessions
• Registration for a national conference
• Career guidance and mentoring from an industry mentor
• A personalized profile on the Scholars Mentoring Portal www.mentoringportal.org
  
• Ongoing networking opportunities and career tracking

Program Objectives:

• Provide mentoring, professional development and industry networking opportunities for diverse students and early career scientists
• Enable scholars to build relevant skills, gain knowledge about emerging technologies and explore careers in the biotechnology industry
• Promote higher quality science research by encouraging students from underrepresented racial and ethnic groups to consider careers in biotechnology
  
• Identify outstanding students and motivate them to pursue careers in the biotechnology industry
• Increase the diversity of the biotechnology workforce

More information:

To learn more about our programs visit the mentoring portal at www.mentoringportal.org.