Paula V. Welander has been named associate vice provost for graduate education and postdoctoral affairs, beginning in the 2024-25 academic year. Welander brings a wealth of experience in both cross-disciplinary work and diversity, equity, and inclusion to the position. In her new role, she will be involved in various efforts and initiatives, one focus of which is helping graduate students and postdoctoral scholars prepare for and find academic jobs.

“I want to help students understand that there are multiple roles in the professoriate, and that all levels are valuable,” said Welander, a microbiologist who currently serves at the Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability as associate dean for integrative initiatives in DEI, professor of Earth system science and, by courtesy, of biology and of Earth and planetary sciences.

Paula Welander shares her journey to leadership and offers advice to graduate students. | Office of the Vice Provost for Graduate Education

She also wants to help prospective professors understand the wide range of academic positions available, including teaching at a liberal arts college, doing research at a university with a large graduate student population, and working at institutions with large populations of underrepresented students.

“Dr. Welander is a respected scholar and academic leader who has a proven track record of supporting graduate students and postdocs,” said Stacey Bent, vice provost for graduate education and postdoctoral affairs. “Her deep experience will be invaluable for the work she will support as associate vice provost, including mentoring and advising initiatives, postdoc professional development, and academic career preparation for students and postdocs.”

Welander’s research focuses on lipid compounds produced by microbes, which geomicrobiologists use to study early life on Earth.

“These molecules are preserved in the rock record and we can use them to understand past climate events or to inform models of the climate that is happening now – and potentially predict the impacts of climate change in the future,” Welander said.

Working at the intersection of microbiology and geology, which she has done since her postdoctoral work, has taught Welander about cross-disciplinary communication and about how graduate education differs across disciplines. The experience has helped her advise students studying topics related to sustainability, which often draws on fields like economics and public policy in addition to science.

“I understand how it can be hard to merge two disciplines,” she said. “One of the hardest things was learning how to communicate with scientists outside my field, learning to understand what they are trying to gain from the studies that I do.”

Welander is also familiar with the challenges students face as they search for jobs in academia and make the transition to being professors.

“When you’re a grad student and a postdoc, you’re focused on your own projects, and you’re part of a group,” she said. “When you become faculty, you’re leading a group. It’s very lonely sometimes. But also, you’re in charge of a lot of things. You’re basically managing a little business. How do you build a lab? How do you budget? How do you mentor people? How do you grow a diverse, thriving group of people when you have so many different personalities?”

In addition to these challenges, students in some disciplines who want to become professors can face a difficult hiring environment.

“It feels like the number of faculty positions is going down and the standards to get a faculty position are getting higher. That’s a huge challenge,” Welander said. “That is part of the reason students really need to consider not just whether they want to do the job, but does it fit into who they are?”

Welander said she wants to build on Stanford’s current programs that support graduate students as they make this transition. “How can we make this institution better? How can we make life for our students and postdocs better?”