Antoinette Foster, Ph.D., is the recipient of the inaugural Elevate Award from the Alliance for Visible Diversity in Science at OHSU.
Foster was nominated and selected independently by members of the AVDS Board for her critical role in founding and shaping AVDS structure and function, as well as her tireless effort to catalyze positive change toward a more equitable and inclusive community at OHSU.
This annual award recognizes an OHSU community member who has contributed significantly to racial equity and inclusion, and provides $500 in recognition of their service. AVDS acknowledges the emotional labor and personal sacrifice, often without compensation, that all too often falls on the shoulders of minoritized and oppressed individuals in order to actualize racial equity in our institutions.
“We established this advocacy group to focus on one central mission — to increase racial and ethnic equity within the research programs at Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU) by recruiting, retaining, and most importantly, supporting graduate students, postdoctoral scholars, staff, and faculty members from underrepresented backgrounds,” said Foster.
Foster joined the Vollum Institute/OHSU Neuroscience Graduate Program in 2014 and defended her dissertation in 2020. As a neuroscience graduate student, her scholarship was recognized by awards including a Howard Hughes Medical Institute 2016 Gilliam Fellowship for Advanced Study.
- Watch “Creating Space for Inclusive Practices in Academia”
(Presentation by Dr. Foster and Lucille Moore, PhD., also an AVDS founding member) - Read Foster’s blog post “What remains invisible controls us the most: What really drives research?”
(Written for 2020 Open Access Week: Open for Whom? Equity in Open Knowledge)
To learn more about the work that AVDS does, or to make a contribution to support the Elevate Award, visit a4vdis.weebly.com.
(This article first appeared in OHSU Now, 2020-10-29.)