FIAP Career Lectureship Award (FCLA)

The American Physical Society (APS) Committee on Careers and Professional Development (CCPD) and the APS Forum on Industrial and Applied Physics (FIAP) seek to recognize physicists in industrial and other non-academic careers and support them in delivering a series of engaging lectures about their careers.

Winners of the FIAP Career Lectureship Award (FCLA) will be expected to develop a compelling career lecture and deliver it at different venues during their one-year term (as described in the rules below). Winners will be announced on the APS website and in APS News and also recognized at an APS meeting. The FCLA includes a $5,000 cash prize award and a plaque, which will be presented at an APS conference after completion of the term. In addition to the cash prize, APS will provide up to $5,000 in travel support to complete the lecture series.

The purpose of this award is to promote the wide variety of career paths available to physicists and the diversity among people who call themselves physicists. Nominations of early- and mid-career scientists are strongly encouraged. Self nominations are also welcome.

Establishment & Support

The FCLA is a committee award that was established in 2013 by the CCPD and FIAP and was originally known as the Distinguished Lectureship Award on the Applications of Physics. The award serves to stimulate interest and excitement in non-academic career paths in physics, and to expose students, faculty, and physics graduates to the wide variety of cutting-edge problems encountered throughout a successful industrial or other non-academic career. The FCLA is endowed by FIAP.

Rules & Eligibility

This award is given annually to one physicist. The award has a term of one year. Nominees need not be members of the APS or FIAP.

Award recipients agree to give at least three lectures during their term. The lectures should be delivered at a national APS conference, a sectional APS conference, and other venues, such as physics department colloquia, to be arranged by mutual agreement with the recipient and the Selection Committee Chair in consultation with the CCPD and with assistance from APS staff. In accordance with the APS Diversity Statement, at least one lecture should take place at a conference or institution that primarily serves groups that have historically been underrepresented in physics.

Presentations should discuss key aspects of the recipient’s career and professional development in physics, they should be interactive and engaging, and they should be aimed especially at students and postdocs.

Nomination & Selection Process

Deadline: Thursday, June 8, 2023

The awardee, selected in June, will begin their lectureship in September of the same year and will conclude in March of the following year. To start a nomination visit APS Honors Nominations.

The nomination must include:

• A letter of not more than two pages evaluating the nominee’s most significant contributions that qualify the nominee for this award and other related accomplishments. Nomination statements should also address the nominee’s speaking ability. (For self nominations, a personal statement on the same topics).
• The nominee’s resume or curriculum vita of not more than three pages, and/or a brief biographical sketch.

Based on a review of the written applications, the selection committee will identify a shortlist of the strongest candidates that will be evaluated in more detail. These semifinalists will move on to a second round where the final winner(s) will be selected. This second round may include a brief oral interview to evaluate the candidate’s speaking ability, to be held by virtual teleconference.

Nominations will be considered for three review cycles provided the nominator re-certifies the nomination before the next deadline.

To start a new or update a continuing nomination, please see the Prize & Award Nomination Guidelines.

2023 Selection Committee Members: Kathleen Schwarz, Diane Markoff, Deniz Ertas, and Ben Zhu