The Committees of the Membership, along with the International and Diversity Officers, are at the core of the NPA. They work to develop events and resources that support the postdoctoral community, and their work would not be possible without volunteers. Volunteering with an NPA committee is a great way to gain professional experience at the national level, while giving back to the postdoctoral community. Here are some highlights of what committees and officers have been up to and how you can get involved.

Advocacy:

Advocacy Committee has been very active in the past couple months preparing the NPA response to the NPA response to NIH announced increase stipend levels, and published an article in The POSTDOCket entitled “As NIH Raises Stipends, NPA Advocates Sustainable, Consistent Annual Increases.”

Furthermore, Advocacy published an article in The POSTDOCket in July entitled “Pervasive Sexual Harassment in Academia: the Call For Diversity, Inclusion, and Respect” that reviews the long awaited National Academies of Science Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) report on sexual harassment in academia.

Outreach:

We are introducing bimonthly features in The POSTDOCket celebrating NPA members who have benefitted from their volunteerism and connections within NPA in their career development and providing examples of how best to leverage your NPA experience in your future endeavors.

We have announced the ninth annual celebration of National Postdoc Appreciation Week (NPAW): September 17-21, 2018! Submit your 2018 events to contact@nationalpostdoc.org. Continue here to see the events planned for this year!

Meetings:

We are pleased to announce that Bahija Jallal, PhD, president of MedImmune, the global biologics research and development unit of AstraZeneca, has been confirmed as keynote speaker at the 2019 NPA Annual Conference. The conference will take place April 12 - 14, 2019, at the Rosen Centre Hotel in Orlando, FL.

In addition, we have confirmed our first plenary speaker, Joshua Weiss, PhD, co-founder, with William Ury, of the Global Negotiation Initiative at Harvard University and a senior fellow at the Harvard Negotiation Project.

The 2018 - 2019 Meetings Committee is recruiting for volunteers for the 2019 Annual Conference. Sign up here and view this document to see the ways you can help with the 17th Annual Conference.

Resource Development:

The Career Resources subcommittee is working on updates for the NPA Career Planning Resources website.

We have created a new logo for MyPostdoc monthly webinar. We have some exciting content coming up in the next webinars! MyPostdoc webinars are held at 1pm eastern time on the first Wednesday of the month.

Diversity Officers:

Diversity has published articles in The POSTDOCket in June and July that address barriers facing LGBTQ students and trainees in academic research.

We are currently compiling an updated database of external fellowship opportunities geared toward postdoctoral applicants from diverse populations.

We are also continuing out Amplifying Voices Campaign as our national platform for postdocs to share aspects of their training experiences and their professional passions. The NPA Diversity Officers have been sharing quotes from our Amplifying Voices virtual interview and those quotes have been getting re-shared by other trainees via social media (@nationalpostdoc). We are thrilled that postdocs can utilize our platform to build community and find camaraderie with each other. We are continuing to accept new submissions and we will continue to share quotes in select POSTDOCKet articles and on social media throughout the year, particularly during monthly heritage celebrations.

International Officers:

The NPA Board of Directors has appointed Sudha Krishnamurthy, BDS, PhD, and Juliana Vasco-Correa, PhD, as International Officers. International Officers are tasked with addressing the issues and special needs of the international postdoc community.

NPA in the Community:

The NPA announces partnership with the Canadian Association of Postdoctoral Scholars (CAPS). As part of this partnership, CAPS and the NPA will promote each other’s events, initiatives, and resources, helping to create a larger postdoctoral community and draw attention to the common issues facing postdocs in Canada and the United States.

Sustaining Members: Use your 10 free job posts on the NPA Career Center by December 31, 2018!