Components, Eligibility, & Application

The National Science Foundation requires that eligible students must be U.S. citizens or legal U.S. residents formally enrolled in an undergraduate or graduate program at a U.S. university. NSF's mission encourages the application of promising and talented students from underrepresented groups, first-generation, and in high-financial-need college students. The application and selection process is competitive. No previous experience or background is required. However, applicants are expected to be motivated, intellectually driven, willing to learn and embrace interdisciplinary research in a remote area in the southern tip of South America, where often conditions are not as those at home in the U.S. Students are also expected to be open-minded, be willing to share and interact with locals, peers, and researchers and learn the challenges of responding complex questions to address environmental issues in remote areas.

Students must submit the following:

1. Online application

2. Statement of intent

3. Curriculum vitae/resumé

4. Two letters of reference.

Due date for 2021 - 2022 program application is October 15, 2021.

​

While the on-site Advanced Studies Institute component of the IRES requires participantes to be a minimum of 21 days (plus travel) in Chile, students must also be willing and able to participate in pre-departure classes, orientation sessions, research meetings, meet with mentors as requested, take Spanish short-course(s), if needed, and to submit required documentation, assignments, and pre- and post- assessments in a timely manner.

​

Airfare, room and board, short language course(s), health insurance, basics expenses to present the results at a professional meeting or conference, and a stipend will be provided to the students selected.

​

Students will be partnered with a U.S. and a Chile based mentor, and based on their thematic research interests and to develop their individual work, however students are expected to participate in course, lessons, and activities from all thematic areas in order to gain an integral training of the host-vector-parasite interactions.