02 March 2009, No. 07/2009

New Award for Humboldt Alumni

Three times a year up to 25,000 EUR for innovative networking projects

The Alexander von Humboldt Foundation has created a new award for its fellows and award winners to recognise innovative networking initiatives. The Humboldt Alumni Award is valued at 25,000 EUR, and up to three awards will be granted annually. It is designed to support projects, not so far covered by the Foundation’s sponsorship programmes, which promote academic and cultural relations between Germany and the home countries of Humboldt alumni and strengthen their collaboration in the respective countries and regions.

The award is being sponsored by the German Foreign Office and the Stifterverband für die deutsche Wissenschaft (Donors’ Association) and is one of the ways in which the Humboldt Foundation is contributing to the Foreign Office’s 2009 research and academic relations initiative. The award ceremony will be held on 8 June during the Humboldt Foundation’s Annual Meeting in Berlin.

Applications may be submitted until 20 April 2009 by Humboldtians abroad. Visit for the application package and further information.

One of the decisive criteria for the success of an application will be whether the proposed project is genuinely innovative. A further plus will be the extent to which it integrates researchers who are not yet engaged in exchanges with Germany or involved in the Humboldt Network itself. This is one way of gaining new multipliers for cultural and scientific understanding between the individual countries and Germany and of initiating new research collaborations.

The Alexander von Humboldt Foundation

The Alexander von Humboldt Foundation annually enables more than 1800 researchers from all over the world to spend time researching in Germany. The Foundation maintains a network of some 23,000 Humboldtians from all disciplines in 130 countries worldwide - including 41 Nobel Prize winners.