2025 ACNP Career-Spanning Mentorship Award
Open: October 16, 2025
Deadline: November 6, 2025
Award recipients will be notified by email in early-December.
The purpose of this Career-Spanning Mentorship Award is to create and nurture sustained Mentor-Mentee teams while involving the ACNP’s most senior, established members. The award will provide funds ($2,000 for each team member, plus a $100 meal voucher [$4,100 total] to offset costs of attending the ACNP Annual Meeting in-person and enabling one face-to-face meeting for lunch/dinner). For this pilot program, each award will be three years. Applications are intended to offer great latitude with respect to making the case for why a Mentor-Mentee team should be supported.
Requirements:
- Mentor must be an ACNP Fellow or Fellow Emeritus.
- Mentee can be a non-member or ACNP Associate Member.
- The team must be new; existing and/or re-constituted teams will not be considered.
- For the pilot program, each team member must already be registered for the meeting (invitations and/or room guarantees are not provided).
- Each member of the team must express an intention to be present for the whole annual meeting (Sunday-Thursday).
- First Violation: No payment disbursed to individual member of the pair
- Second Violation: Award terminated
- Emergency exceptions considered
- Cannot be held in parallel with another travel award (but can replace existing award).
Eligibility:
All candidates must be eligible in one of the two applicant levels AND meet the training/terminal training limits as described below.
Junior Level
Junior Level applicants are defined as those individuals who are below Assistant Professor level (or equivalent level if in a non-academic institution) , i.e.: non-clinician Ph.D. students, medical residents or fellows, Pharm.D. residents, interns, and post-doctoral fellows. These applicants may be within, but no more than 5 years past their terminal training. Terminal training for clinicians (M.D.’s, D.O.’s, Psy.D.’s, D.V.M.’s, D.N.P.’s, Clinical Psychologists) will be counted from their final year of their residency or fellowship (clinical or postdoctoral), whichever is later. Terminal training for Pharm.D.’s will be counted from completion of Pharm.D. or residency, if completed. Terminal training for non-clinician Ph.D.’s will be counted from the last year of postdoctoral fellowship. Doctoral-level students (e.g., those in school to earn a Ph.D., M.D., D.O., Psy.D., etc.) are permitted to apply as Junior Level applicants; however, most awardees in this category are anticipated to have doctoral degrees.
The terminal training limit of 5 years can be extended by up to one (1) year for significant life events for Junior Level applicants. In this case, please provide background information in the application about the circumstances for the committee to consider (e.g., birth/adoption of a child, eldercare, illness or disability of applicant, care for an ill/disabled family member, military leave, personal or family tragedy, unforeseen obstacles to setting up a research lab, etc.).
Senior Level
Senior Level applicants are defined as those individuals who are at the Assistant Professor level or its equivalent, but have not received an R01 or other large, independent grant (e.g., U01) as PI or multi-PI. Clinicians (M.D., D.O., D.V.M., D.N.P., Psy.D., Pharm.D.) will have completed all research training (e.g. Ph.D., fellowship/post-doc, M.S., or foreign equivalent). Applicants may be no more than 7 years past their terminal training (postdoctoral fellowship or residency). Any person who is an Associate Professor or has already obtained an R01 or other large, independent grant (e.g., U01) as PI or multi-PI is considered too senior to apply for a travel award. Terminal training for clinicians (M.D.’s, D.O.’s, Psy.D.’s, D.V.M.’s, D.N.P.’s, clinical program Ph.D.’s) will be counted from the final year of their residency or fellowship (clinical or postdoctoral), whichever is later. Terminal training for Pharm.D.’s will be counted from completion of Pharm.D. or residency, if completed. Terminal training for non-clinician Ph.D.’s will be counted from the last year of postdoctoral fellowship.