Call for nominations: 2nd annual Paula Kantor award for excellence in field research (sub-Saharan Africa)

The International Center for Research on Women (ICRW) is soliciting nominations for the second annual Paula Kantor Award for Excellence in Field Research.

The 2016 award will be given to a young female researcher who is a citizen of a sub-Saharan African country in order to recognize and honor outstanding achievement in the fields of gender and empowerment of women and girls. The 2016 Paula Kantor Award for Excellence in Field Research will be conferred to the winner at the launch of ICRW’s Africa Regional Office in December in Kampala, Uganda.

Nominations must be made by a third-party. If you know an outstanding researcher who deserves recognition for her work, please read closely the eligibility and nomination requirements and submit any nominations for the Paula Kantor Award for Excellence in Field Research by midnight EST, October 14, 2016.

Dr. Paula Kantor, Senior Scientist of Gender and Development at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) and former Senior Rural Development Specialist at the International Center for Research on Women (ICRW) died in the aftermath of a terrorist attack in Kabul, Afghanistan on May 13, 2015.

Dr. Kantor was a leading expert on gender issues and international development, with nearly 20 years of experience in executing policy research and programmatic work related to integrating gender into agriculture and rural development. Dr. Kantor’s work was largely driven by her desire and passion to improve lives in the global south, especially those of women and girls. She was a prolific researcher who participated in and worked with several initiatives to better the lives and improve livelihoods for women in conflict-prone and terrorist-affected areas. She worked across Asia, the Middle East and Africa.

The inaugural award was conferred to Dr. Soumya Gupta in January, 2016. Dr. Gupta’s work focused on the linkages between agriculture systems and women's empowerment and in turn, how these affect nutritional outcomes. 

The 2016 award will again be given as part of ICRW’s annual Champions for Change awards, which honors the work of thought-leaders and visionaries. Previous winners of the Champions for Change award include Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Co-Chair Melinda Gates, The Rt Hon William Hague MP, Leader of the House of Commons and Former Foreign Secretary of Great Britain, U.S. Ambassador at Large for Global Women’s Issues Melanne Verveer, and other distinguished leaders.

The award will provide the recipient recognition and bring greater visibility to the researcher’s work and to the populations on which they focus. At the awards ceremony, the recipient of the award will have the opportunity to present in front of an esteemed global audience, comprising those in the development, business, NGO, and government sectors, and will receive opportunities to promote their research on www.icrw.org.

The selection jury for the Paula Kantor Award for Excellence in Field Research will be made up of distinguished professionals in the development, gender, academic, business, policy, civil society and research sectors.