The Gerda Henkel Foundation is providing 2.5 million euros for a fellowship programme supporting young humanities scholars from Africa and Southeast Asia. This is the largest international funding initiative for PhD students in the Foundation’s history. With the programme, the Gerda Henkel Foundation wishes to remember its founder Lisa Maskell (1914–1998), who would have turned 100 tomorrow, 30 April. The programme aims to strengthen universities in the partner countries and counter the outflow of qualified young academics. Initially 25 doctoral candidates primarily from Botswana, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia will in the coming years receive a three-year “Lisa Maskell Fellowship” at the renowned Stellenbosch University, South Africa. The Graduate School of Arts and Social Sciences at Stellenbosch University is coordinating the programme. In the coming months the Gerda Henkel Foundation plans to expand the Lisa Maskell Fellowship programme and set up, together with universities in Cambodia, East Timor, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam, a focal point for the support of doctoral students in Southeast Asia. In total, the Foundation is providing funding for “100 scholarship years”.

“Supporting young academics was very important to our founder,” says Dr. Michael Hanssler, Chair of the Executive Board of the Gerda Henkel Foundation. “Unlike most German donors she expressly stated that her legacy was also to be used to support foreign researchers. It is this wish we aim to live up to with the Lisa Maskell Fellowships.” Further information on the programme is available on the Internet at http://www.gerda-henkel-stiftung.de/fellowships_eng/.

Faces of young scholars – the “100 Doctoral Students” initiative
In the almost 40 years of its existence, the Gerda Henkel Foundation has awarded scholarships to over 1,000 doctoral students. In a second initiative in honour of Lisa Maskell the Gerda Henkel Foundation Office has invited 100 former PhD scholarship holders to look back on the time when they were working on their dissertation. For many of them, completing their doctorate marked the start of an academic career. Starting on 30 April, for 100 days one of “100 Doctoral Students” will share their personal experiences every day: http://www.gerda-henkel-stiftung.de/eng.