The Society of Hellman Fellows is marking its 30th anniversary, celebrating three decades of support for junior faculty across the University of California’s ten campuses. Since its founding, the fellowship has provided early-career funding to thousands of assistant professors in a range of fields, including arts, humanities, social sciences, and STEM disciplines.
The program was established by Warren and Chris Hellman and their family with an endowment from the Hellman Fellows Fund totaling $125 million. Their inspiration came from Frances Hellman’s experience as a young physicist at UC San Diego. She recounted her early challenges: “I came into UC San Diego as an assistant professor in 1987 and had a certain level of startup funds, and spent those on getting my lab built,” Hellman said. “I then went through this period of time almost all young faculty go through where you’ve used up your startup funds but you haven’t yet gotten the major funding you need to get tenure.”
After discussing these challenges with her father, Warren Hellman proposed creating a fellowship for second- and third-year faculty members. The pilot programs began in 1995 at UC San Diego and UC Berkeley before expanding systemwide.
Former UCSF chancellor Michael Bishop commented on the impact in a 2014 interview: “Warren made it possible for many people who otherwise might not have made it to have thrived. Some of the things they [young faculty] were doing really stretched the boundaries of what I would consider academia in a way that I thought was admirable, terrific.”
In 2020, after supporting the program for 25 years, the Hellman family created an endowment to ensure continued funding for junior faculty across all ten campuses.
University of California Provost and Executive Vice President Katherine Newman stated: “Hellman fellowships have been instrumental in supporting thousands of our junior faculty as they become leaders in their fields, shaping scholarship across the arts, medicine and sciences. 30 years on, we can see clearly the enormous impact of the Hellman family’s gift not only to UC, but to the nation. We are eternally grateful to the Hellmans and excited to witness the transformational research contributed by these fellows.”
Each awardee can receive up to $70,000 from the fellowship program. Past recipients include Asmeret Asefaw Berhe from UC Merced. She explained how essential this support was: “The Hellman award allowed my lab to collect essential preliminary data that we used to demonstrate the significance of our proposed work for a major federal grant,” Berhe said. “This kind of funding enables early career researchers to conduct the foundational work that sets our research programs up for long-term success.” Berhe now holds several leadership positions within her field.
Other notable alumni include Peidong Yang (UC Berkeley), Dan Choe (UC Davis), Steve Mahler (UC Irvine), Yvonne Chen (UCLA), Victoria Reyes (UC Riverside), Lei Liang (UC San Diego), Dr. Kirsten Bibbings-Domingo (UCSF), Michelle O’Malley (UC Santa Barbara), and Rebecca Covarrubias (UC Santa Cruz). These former fellows have gone on to earn recognition such as MacArthur Fellowships or lead significant research projects funded by national agencies.
More information about campus-specific achievements can be found through resources like UC Berkeley, UC Davis, UCLA, UC Irvine, UC Merced, UC Riverside, UC San Diego, UC Santa Barbara.
The Society of Hellman Fellows continues its mission by providing critical support at pivotal moments in academic careers throughout California’s public university system.
