Mentoring Scheme
At Science for Animal Welfare, we are committed to supporting the development of animal welfare science worldwide.
Science for Animal Welfare Student Scholarships:
We support undergraduate students to conduct their own research via our funded student scholarships. Find out more and apply
We are especially keen to ensure that animal welfare science develops in areas where it has yet to become firmly established. One way we do this is by supporting the next generation of animal welfare scientists at the start of their research careers.
Not all students have access to the help and resources needed to plan a scientific research proposal. Guidance in project planning and experimental design is important. Offering this to students will help them ask the right scientific questions and use the appropriate methodology to answer them.
To address this issue, we run a Mentoring Partnership scheme in which mentors are paired with students (mentees) wishing to be mentored.
The student will be paired with a more experienced mentor who can then guide and support the student in the early stages of project planning to ensure that their project (whether experimental, survey, or other) has a solid scientific foundation.
Mentors
Mentors are typically early career researchers (ECRs) with a strong background in animal welfare science who have the capacity, time, and willingness to support the student. Many of our mentors tell us they derive enormous satisfaction from supporting the next generation of animal welfare scientists as well as gaining valuable experience in student support which also benefits their own career.
Students
Students at undergraduate level, who are interested in carrying out animal welfare research (this can be a Science for Animal Welfare student scholarship, but the scheme is not limited to this) are eligible to being mentored. Former mentees tell us they really valued the support of someone from outside their home institution who understands the challenges of starting out in research.
Benefits to mentors:
- Opportunity to gain experience of supervision, a skill they are likely to find highly useful later in their career
- Obtain credit as Science for Animal Welfare mentor for their CV
- Learn about the culture in another country or a different research area/department
- Forge international connections
- Gain experience of an area of research that may differ slightly from their own work
Benefits to student mentees:
- Improve their knowledge on experimental design
- Forge international connection with an ECR from another faculty/country
- May encourage students to become supervisors and mentors themselves, thus further expanding animal welfare science capacity
- Improve likelihood of publication
How to Apply
We invite those who think they may benefit from this scheme, as either a mentor or student, to apply using the appropriate application form below:
The next closing date for mentoring applications is 6 November 2026.
We then aim to inform all applicants about the outcome of their submission within 6 to 8 weeks of this deadline.
Please note
PhD students are not currently eligible to apply – the scheme is still relatively small and consequently limited to BSc level students. Additionally, this scheme is currently only available to students wishing to receive mentoring guidance on how best to undertake an animal welfare research project – not for general mentoring (with no project plans).
Additionally, the mentoring scheme does not supply project funding. You will either need to secure funding from other sources or apply for support separately via one of our grants or a SciFAW Scholarship. Our grants are separate to our mentoring and funding is not guaranteed.