- Phone: +237 674 62 53 39
- Email: info@profaestem.com
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The Alexander von Humboldt Foundation has presented its 15th Humboldt Alumni Awards recognizing innovative networking ideas abroad. The winning initiatives break new ground in fostering long-term academic and cultural ties between Germany and the home countries of our alumni and in strengthening alumni networks. In 2024, the awards for the best network initiatives by Humboldtians went to Cameroon, Mexico, and the Netherlands.
Georg Forster Research Fellow Rosemary Tonjock Kinge is a professor at the Department of Plant Sciences at the University of Bamenda in Bamenda, Cameroon is the winner. Click here for details.
Although UNESCO, the United Nations organization for education, science, culture and communication, considers gender equality a high priority in all areas of education, there are currently only very few young female researchers in the science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) disciplines in Cameroon, and it is even rarer for female junior researchers to stand out from their colleagues with their publications or research.
Rosemary Tonjock, who is highly dedicated to promoting young scientists, is collaborating with the members of her Initiative Promoting Female Academic Excellence in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) through Innovative Mentoring to address the challenge of advancing female excellence in STEM disciplines in the country. The award comes with up to €30,000 in funding and will be used to support the activity of (PROFAESTEM) during the next three years (2024-2026).
PROFAESTEM is an acronym for Promoting Female Academic Excellence in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) through innovative Mentoring was created in 2024 with the main goal of developing a sustainable virtual and physical platform to project role models, promote and encourage females to pursue careers and excel in STEM.
From the Population Reference Bureau (2016), women represent greater than 51% of the Cameroon population but are underrepresented in the fields of STEM...
The networking will be organized through a number of the relevant associations in which the applicant has already been involved and to which she is going to connect during the project. The applicant is a Humboldtian, a coordinator for the western zone for the Cameroon Professional Research Oriented Women Network (CaPROWN), and president for the Organization for Women in Science for the Developing World North West region (OWSD), Cameroon, so she has a rather wide network of excellent female scientists. Also, the applicant is the technical and logistic secretary of the Cameroon Academy of Young Scientists (CAYS) and the Next Einstein Fellow Ambassador to Cameroon, hence she has all means to enlarge this community of women in STEM.
There is still a wide gap between females and males in STEM fields at postgraduate and early career researchers’ level. This disparity is on the number of scholarships and fellowships won, their mobility, their publications in high impact journals, the grants won and their numbers in leadership positions.
Therefore, the focus is placed on examining the real challenges which females in STEM need to overcome these male dominances in STEM. Role models who have overcome these challenges will continue to play an important part in moving in the right direction. We will develop an electronic book (e-book) and.....
