LATEST NEWS » Sponsorship Highlights

Each month we highlight individuals or programs that have received funding from SSE. This month we hear from RADCamp NYC 2019, which received funding through the Early-Career Vocational Opportunities (EVO) Workshops grants:

“Last year we received $1500 from the Society for the Study of Evolution for an Early-Career Vocational Opportunities Workshop and $1500 in ad hoc funding from the Society for Systematic Biology to run the RADCampNYC-2019 workshop. Our goal for this workshop was to teach participants how to generate and analyze RADseq data to understand genetic differences among species/populations. During this workshop, we were able to provide a diverse group of participants with hands-on training across a broad array of techniques from lab work to bioinformatic processing, and statistical inference. Participants arrived for part 1 with extractions in hand from 16 samples, and left at the end of part 2 with an assembled pilot dataset and a phylogeny & PCA plot generated from their real data. The success of this workshop was due in no small part to the financial contributions of SSE and SSB. Look out for RADCamp 2020 hopefully coming this summer.” 

From evALLution organizer Telma Laurentino:

The SSE local and regional outreach grant was the main funding source of our inclusive outreach activity: evALLution. These funds allowed us to acquire materials to bring our multi-sensory tree-of-life to… life! The activity taught more than 100 participants - from 5 to 90 years old - about evolution, including 40 participants with visual disability. The funds allowed us to set up a multi-sensory phylogeny with specimens and materials representative of 20 taxonomic groups for everyone to touch, which allowed the people with visual disability to experience biodiversity like never before, while learning about adaptation, natural selection and common ancestry! Smiles were wide and constant and the data we collected show that when knowledge is made accessible everyone can learn and everyone benefits. For this, we are extremely grateful to SSE for supporting our idea and helping us make the wonders of evolution available to ALL. 

Watch a video of the event here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4o3JLsXH12w

Learn more about the evALLution program in Telma's post on the SSE Community Blog: https://ssecommunityblog.org/evallution-3-lessons-the-blind-community-taught-us-about-inclusive-teaching-of-evolution/

Learn more about the Small Grants program here: http://www.evolutionsociety.org/index.php?module=content&type=user&func=view&pid=19

This month we highlight the 8th Annual Evolution Film Festival/Video Contest. Every year, scientists, science communicators and science film-makers are invited to submit an original, short (three-minute-or-less) video which tells an interesting story of evolution in a creative, engaging, entertaining way. The finalists are screened at the annual Evolution meeting and audience members vote on their favorite. As in previous years, SSE sponsored this year’s event by providing cash prizes for the winner ($1,000) and runner-up ($500).

This year’s winner (“How to Make Humans Sick”) was submitted by Noah Resnick of Arbor Vitae Animations and can be viewed here. The runner up was high school student Josh Mott of Largo, FL, who submitted “Josh’s Evolution Exploration” (view it here).

The SSE Sponsorship Highlights present personal stories from individuals who have received SSE funding. This month we highlight the Diverse Careers Workshop at Evolution 2019. Continue reading to hear more about the workshop from the Diverse Careers Committee.

Due to a budget surplus from the Evolution 2015 meeting in Guarujá, Brazil, this year the tri-societies (SSE, ASN, and SSB) were able to offer US$500 travel stipends to 20 Brazilian researchers to attend Evolution 2019 in Providence, RI. Continue reading to hear from some of the recipients about what this funding meant to them.

The SSE Sponsorship Highlights present personal stories from individuals who have received SSE funding. This month we highlight the Undergraduate Diversity at Evolution (UDE) grants, which provide funding from SSE and the BEACON center for undergraduates to attend the annual Evolution meeting. Recipients are paired with mentors, attend a professional development workshop, and network with program alumni at a UDE social event. Continue reading to hear from Morgan Lloyd, one of this year’s recipients.

The SSE Sponsorship Highlight presents personal stories from individuals who have received SSE funding. This month we highlight the recipients of the 2018 Graduate/Postdoc Travel Supplement, which provided a travel stipend to the Evolution 2018 meeting in Montpellier, France.

The W. D. Hamilton Award for Outstanding Graduate Student Presentation is given to a current or recent graduate student who presents an outstanding talk based on their graduate work at the annual meeting. Finalists present their papers during a day-long symposium of Hamilton Award candidate talks. Continue reading to hear from six of the 2018 finalists about their experiences at the II Joint Congress on Evolutionary Biology in Montpellier, France.

Earlier this year, the SSE Public Policy Committee offered grants to four SSE members to attend science communication and advocacy training held by the American Institute for Biological Sciences (AIBS) on March 25-27 in Washington, DC. In addition to the training, participants spoke with their elected congressional representatives during meetings organized by AIBS. Continue reading to hear from two SSE-funded participants about their experiences.

The GREG R.C. Lewontin Early Awards assist students in the early stages of their Ph.D. programs by enabling them to collect preliminary data or to enhance the scope of their research beyond current funding limits. Last year, 21 students received this award. Continue reading to hear from eight recipients about the impact of receiving this award. 

On December 5-6, 2018, the American Institute of Biological Science (AIBS) held discussions on the challenges facing scientists who work within an international platform. The conference, titled "Next Gen International Biology," had participants from multiple countries, and included people involved in various branches of science, publishing, museums, and political representatives. SSE funded a representative from our Public Policy Committee, Amanda Moehring, to attend. Continue reading to hear more about her experience.

Last year, the SSE Education and Outreach Committee awarded the T.H. Huxley Award to Dr. Katie Grogan and colleagues Dr. Teresa W. Lee and Dr. Justine Liepkalns, who developed an educational activity for teaching evolutionary mechanisms. Winners of this award are provided with support to present on behalf of the Society for the Study of Evolution at the annual meeting of the National Association of Biology Teachers (NABT). Continue reading to hear more from Dr. Grogan.

Earlier this year, SSE Council voted to co-sponsor the European Meeting of Ph.D. Students in Evolutionary Biology (EMPSEB) through the SSE International Committee’s “Co-sponsorship of symposia organized by non-US based evolution societies” award. The goal of this award is to foster communication between scientists from different countries by stimulating scientific dialogue through co-sponsored symposia. Continue reading to hear from the conference organizers Carolina Osuna Mascaró and María Martín Peciña, PhD students at the University of Granada.

Earlier this year, SSE sponsored the third Evolution, Ecology, and Environment National Symposium, held October 1-5, 2018 in Tunja, Colombia through the SSE Evolution International Events Awards. This symposium was presented by the Evolutionary and Epistemological Biology Investigation group (BIEVEP, by its Spanish acronym) and the BIEVEP Foundation. Continue reading for a statement from José Luis Cómbita (Delegate Representative – BIEVEP Study Group and Director of the BIEVEP Foundation, Tunja-Colombia).

This year, the SSE International Committee awarded over $20,000 in travel awards to international researchers to attend the Evolution meeting. Continue reading for statements from four recipients.

SSE was pleased to be able to offer 103 graduate/postdoc travel awards to the Montpellier meeting. We doubled the number of awards this year for the Second Joint Congress, and added three awards that were made possible from donations from members. Thank you! Continue reading to hear from a few of our travel award recipients.

From 2010 to 2017, SSE offered one research award for early career students – the Rosemary Grant Award. SSE has since implemented a new awards program, the Graduate Research Excellence Grants, which include the Rosemary Grant Advanced Award for PhD candidates and the R. C. Lewontin Early Award for students in the first two years of their PhD. Continue reading to hear from past recipients of the original Rosemary Grant Award on how the award helped their graduate research work. 

Last month, SSE funded 4 members to attend the American Institute of Biological Sciences (AIBS) Congressional Visits Day and the AIBS Communications Bootcamp in Washington, DC. The event included an advocacy-training program and congressional meetings with elected officials. Continue reading to hear from participants about their experiences.

SSE sponsors and funds a variety of exciting initiatives to further the study of evolution and engage a diversity of people in research. This month we highlight the Colombian Association for Evolutionary Biology (COLEVOL) Symposium. SSE has contributed funds to this program for several years, including last year’s meeting in Cali, Colombia. Continue reading to hear from Franchesco Molina Henao, who helped organize last year’s meeting, about how SSE funding helped them achieve their goals.