Junior Faculty Mentoring Program

AIPS initiated the Junior Faculty Mentoring Program in 2013 with funding from the US Embassy in Pakistan. The program has invited faculty members from Universities in Pakistan to come to the US and spend four months at an AIPS Member Institution. The Pakistani faculty members have come primarily from the institutions that are affiliated with the Inter-University Social Science Consortium (IUCPSS), but we have also accepted nominations from Government agencies, National and Provincial Archives, and other academic institutions.  AIPS has signed an MOU with IUCPSS which includes eight universities, mostly in smaller cities in Pakistan: Gujrat, Sarghoda, Khairpur, Bahawalpur, Faisalabad etc.

The junior faculty members can work with mentors in disciplines such as Library and Information Sciences, Media Studies, Communication Studies, Education, etc. The US mentor at the host institution does not need to be a specialist in the field of Pakistan Studies. The visiting fellow can audit classes, attend lectures, go to talks, work on publishable articles with the mentor, and take advantage of the research and library facilities at the host campus.

So far seven Pakistani junior faculty members have participated in this program:

• Shazia Aziz, Kinnaird College for Women, spent Fall 2013 at Duke and North Carolina Central University (Research Field: Applied Linguistics)
• Farah Naz, Government College University-Faisalabad, spent Fall 2013 at Syracuse University (Research Field: Pakistan Studies)
• Muhammad Shoaib, University of Gujrat, spent Fall 2013 at Arizona State University (Research Field: Sociology)
• Aman-Ullah Khan, Quaid-i-Azam University, spent part of Spring 2014 at Arizona State University (Research Field: Applied Linguistics)
• Ali Nawaz, Ministry of Inter-Provincial Coordination, Islamabad, spent Fall 2014 at UT-Austin (Research Field: Education and Administration)
• Maria Hassan, Institute of Business Administration, Karachi, spent Fall 2014 at UT-Austin (Research Field: Applied Linguistics and Writing Center Management)
• Zahoor Ahmed, Directorate of Archives, Noori Naseer Khan Cultural Complex, Quetta, spent Fall 2014 at UT-Austin (Research Field: Political Science and History)
• Aqsa Ijaz, Government College University - Lahore, spent Fall 2015 at North Carolina Central University and the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill (Research Field: Literature)
• Siraj Ahmed Soomro, Shah Abdul Latif University, spent Fall 2015 at Florida International University (Research Field: Modern Pakistan)
• Mian Yasir Hayat, University of Peshawar, spent Fall 2015 at the University of Oregon (Research Field: International Affairs, Political Science)

One junior faculty will be participating in this program in the Fall 2016/Spring 2017 semester

• Abdul Hameed, Hazara University, will spend Fall 2016/Spring 2017 at the University of Wisconsin - Madison (Research Field: Anthropology)

AIPS anticipates receiving more fellows from Pakistan in the future!