PROGRAM OVERVIEW

Benefits: Integrative leadership development, personal growth through a whole-person approach that emphasizes empowerment, resilience, and alignment across personal and professional domains, greater self-awareness and clarity of values and purpose, a lasting network of peer mentors and collaborators.

Program Details

PLS offers two parallel groups within each cohort to reﬂect the diverse experiences of parenting in academia— the Researcher Moms Group centers on traditionally motherhood-associated experiences, and the Researcher Dads Group centers on traditionally fatherhood-associated ones. This structure honors the different challenges shaped by caregiving roles, identity, and social context. Most sessions are held separately to support honest, focused dialogue, with occasional joint sessions to address shared barriers and explore institutional change. While applicants may choose only one group to apply to per cycle, both are open to all eligible faculty. This RFA is for the Researcher Moms Group only.

The RFA for the Researcher Dads Group will be released separately in July. If you are interested in applying for the Researcher Dads Group, please fill out this Interest List: Parents Leading Science 2027 RFA.

Applicants are limited to one group per calendar year, i.e., either apply to the Researcher Mom Group or the Researcher Dad Group.

Group size: Researcher Moms Group - up to 12 participants.
Length: 1-year formal programming, followed by an annual retreat.
Curriculum: Grounded in Stewart Friedman’s Total Leadership and Brené Brown’s research on vulnerability and worthiness, PLS empowers faculty to lead with courage and self-awareness. We embrace Krista Tippett’s insight that “we create transformed, resilient new realities by becoming transformed, resilient people,” believing that personal transformation is the foundation for meaningful, sustainable leadership.

Program Schedule

Year-long Cohort 8 - Researcher Moms Group

(Hybrid, in-person strongly encouraged)

January
- - Half-day orientation: January 14, 2027, 9:00 am - 12:30 pm
  - First monthly seminar: January 28, 2027, 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm
February - December (Two meetings monthly on Thursdays)
- - 2nd Thursday = 90 minutes, 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm
  - 4th Thursday = 60 minutes, 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm
May (Two day leadership retreat)
- - Thursday, May 13, 2027, 8:00 am - 5:00 pm
  - Friday, May 14, 2027, 8:00 am - 5:00 pm
December
- - Annual retreat: TBD

Evaluation and self-assessment throughout.

Page updated

Report abuse