APECS International Mentorship Award 2022

If your mentor has provided you with outstanding help throughout your career, then the best way to tell them how grateful you are is to nominate them for the APECS International Mentorship Award 2022. In addition, we specifically encourage APECS members, committees (including national committees), and project groups to nominate a mentor who has made an outstanding contribution to their committees, APECS activities, or the organization as a whole. In 2022, a single award will be awarded.

Nominations are open until 31 May 2022! (extended from 30 April 2022)

• Who can nominate?

  To be considered, a candidate must be nominated by one or more current/former student(s), peer(s) and/or colleague(s), APECS member, committee (e.g. National Committee) or project group. Self-nominations will not be accepted.

• Who can be nominated?

  To be eligible for this award, the candidate must have contributed significantly over a period of several years to the mentoring and fostering of early career researchers involved in research in the Polar regions or the wider Cryosphere. This award may be awarded to mentors from a variety of sectors, including academia, industry, the public sector, etc. Eligibility is not limited to those that are directly connected with APECS.

• Nomination Package
  

  All nomination packages must be provided in English. Nomination packages must be submitted via the online nomination form and must include as attached supplementary material (to be uploaded via the form) a nomination letter and at least two support letters.

  • CV of the nominee (requested, not required)
  • Nomination letter highlighting the nominee’s mentoring of early career researchers addressing categories such as (it is not required that the nomination letter address every question on this list):
    
    1. The time commitment and availability of the mentor. Assess the mentor's time commitment to mentoring (research discussion, motivation, career guidance, discussions, etc.) and their availability to mentees.
    2. What were the additional opportunities that the mentor provides/provided? Please list examples of particular mentoring activities/efforts, such as, fieldwork, conferences, meetings, leadership opportunities, community interactions. Also, provide information on the duration of their collaboration and the particular benefits for yourself and other researchers starting your career.
    3. What was original about the support of the mentor? Please describe as much detail as possible, why you consider the mentor's commitment and approach to mentoring to be original. If possible, try to share specific examples of actions taken by the mentor.
    4. Assess the guidance and professional support offered by the mentor. Please describe in detail how the mentor's support was important to ECRs professional development. Preferably, use examples of particular development/career possibilities presented to you by your mentor.
    5. How does the mentor encourage ECRs to network? Using examples, explain how the mentor helped ECRs to become more involved in the polar research community or other communities. If possible, list the networking possibilities that the mentor has provided and describe how the mentor has helped strengthen the connections between ECRs in polar research.
    6. Describe the variety of mentees that the mentor has supported. Please describe the community surrounding the mentor, focusing on the inclusion of the community to accept new members, as well as the career path and stage of other mentees (i.e. college students, graduates, postdocs, engineers, technicians of laboratory and others).
    7. Describe the mentors' involvement in APECS. Please list specific examples of the mentor's involvement in the APECS community, either as a member of APECS or as a mentor to other members and national committees. 
    8. Include any additional information that you consider important to share. Please provide information about the mentor's activities that you consider important to the overall assessment that do not fall under any of the above categories (including your participation in mentor panels, workshops, webinars, etc.).
  • Minimum of two support letters from another member or colleague (e.g. students/faculty/ colleagues who have also benefited from the support of the nominee).