The Society awarded ten graduate students with $1,000 fellowships in June 2019 to carry out field research in 2019 on their topic area in conservation.
The winners were selected from an applicant pool of 60 students whose projects ranged from understating how human activities affect biodiversity to exploring how human behavior can be changed. A fifth of the projects had an interdisciplinary or social science approach.
"The group of winners represents a cohort of elite early career researchers; their ideas are innovative, sharp, and topical," SCB Board Member and Awards Committee Chair Eduardo Gallo-Cajiao said. "I think this set of projects pushes our boundaries in biological, social, and interdisciplinary dimensions."
The Graduate Student Research Fellowship Program is in its third year and is supported by Wiley, the publisher of SCB journals Conservation Biology, Conservation Letters, and Conservation Science & Practice.
“This cohort represents early career researchers who are well rounded and who have run the extra mile, and have committed to conservation in and outside their own research,” Eduardo said. “Ultimately, SCB would like to foster these young conservation scientists, and encourage many others to follow suit."
Congratulations to the winners:
Amy Vasquez, USA; Benedictus Freeman, Liberia; Christian Osorio, Chile; Frederick Gyasu Damptey, Ghana; Hannah Moon, USA; Jacob Moutouama, Benin; Judicael Fomekong, Cameroon; Rebecca Brunner, USA; Sofia Pastor, Costa Rica; and Tim Kuiper, South Africa.