Undervaluing faculty fellowships is bad for scientists, and science Premium

Govt-supported institutes, private universities, and faculty fellowships are key drivers of advanced scientific research and education in India. Fellowships provide salary, research funds, and access to facilities for a fixed period. Institutes benefit from the funds and teaching contributions of fellows. Despite benefits, fellows face challenges in obtaining office/lab space, access to facilities, and being treated as 'second class' faculty. To address the faculty recruitment crisis, fellowships should be viewed as robust sources of research expertise and talent. Institutes should provide a conducive environment for fellows to build successful research and teaching programmes.

Advanced scientific research and education in India is driven mostly by government-supported institutes such as the IITs, the IISERs, and Central and State universities. Along with private universities, they constitute India’s academic science ecosystem. At these institutes, faculty members conduct research in independently-led groups and teach courses for various academic programmes.

Independent faculty members are usually scientists with PhDs and expertise, including several years of postdoctoral training, in a specific domain. After their doctoral education and training, they can apply to be recruited at institutes and universities. Regular faculty appointments are typically continuous up to the age of retirement, with a salary paid by the institute (usually from government allocations) and possibly a start-up or annual research fund. However, faculty members are also expected to secure funding via external programmes and schemes.

External funding schemes, typically multi-year government-funded grants and fellowships, provide research funds and could also support salary costs for a fixed number of years. Around the world, institutes and universities prize scientists with independent research funding and salary support, and vie for tenure-track individuals with self-earned grants or fellowships.

This is in part due to a competitive selection process, often involving multi-step applications and interviews. The institute also benefits from the funds and the new members’ teaching contributions during the specified period, after which it evaluates them for tenure and/or promotion.

In the last two decades, India has also developed structured fellowships to help scientists establish research programmes at institutes in the country. These government-funded fellowships provide for a salary and annual research funds for at least five years (some programmes offer extensions). Faculty members can seek regular positions at any time during or after the fellowship period, depending on eligibility and available positions, at the host or another institute. Some fellowship programmes also allow fellows to avail only funds for research once they have secured a regular position.

Based on programme award announcements, institutes and universities across India host around 200 new faculty members funded on fellowships each year, of which a large segment includes those without regular positions.

Even after several years, faculty fellowship programmes in India are struggling to find a place within the mainstream scientific enterprise. First, faculty members appointed on fellowships often face challenges in obtaining office and laboratory space and access to common research facilities at the host institute – even though the institute is required to provide these facilities. Second, in spite of a rigorous selection process and access to funds, scientists on fellowships have reported being treated as ‘second class’ faculty members at the host institute, their tenure-based fellowships relegating them to a sub-par status vis-à-vis the permanent faculty.