Twelve graduate students and early career scientists have been selected as winners of the 2012 Interdivisional Mentoring Award. The winners, who will participate in mentoring and networking programs at this year’s Convention of the American Psychological Association (APA), are: 

• Benjamin Basile, Emory University (Graduate Student) 

• Levi Bolin, University of Kentucky (Graduate Student) 

• Katy Burgess, Cardiff University (Graduate Student) 

• Sherecce Fields, Texas A&M (Assistant Professor) 

• Nathan Holtz, University of Minnesota (Graduate Student) 

• Regina Paxton, Emory University (Graduate Student) 

• Bonnie Perdue, Georgia State University (Postdoctoral Fellow) 

• David Piekarski, UC Berkeley (Graduate Student) 

• Michael Scullin, Emory University (Postdoctoral Fellow) 

• Nicholas Soderstrom, Colorado State University (Graduate Student) 

• Victoria Templer, Emory University (Graduate Student) 

• Hsiao-Wei (Vicky) Tu, Emory University (Postdoctoral Fellow)

In addition to attending regular Convention sessions, award winners will participate in planned activities, including a breakfast with mentors, a poster session and an advocacy workshop. These activities will help the advanced graduate students and early career scientists to develop meaningful contacts with one another, with senior scientists in their fields, and with funding agency officials; to navigate the increasingly diverse professional settings that they will encounter in their research careers; and to identify with APA as a professional home. The award includes a travel stipend of $1,000 to attend the Convention.

The award is intended to support promising new scientists in the fields of behavioral neuroscience, comparative psychology, experimental psychology and psychopharmacology. It is sponsored by APA Divisions 3, 6 and 28, and the APA Committee on Animal Research and Ethics (CARE), with support from the APA Committee on Division/APA Relations (CODAPAR), Mount Holyoke College, the National Institute on Drug Abuse and the APA Science Directorate. 

The award competition, announced in November 2011, was open to scientists who were graduate students or postdoctoral fellows at the time of their application.