PhD Career Exploration Fellowship (CEF)

Applications for the 2025 cohort are now closed. Check back in the fall for more details on the 2026 cohort.

The PhD Career Exploration Fellowship (CEF) encourages non-faculty career exploration by facilitating networking experiences and mentorship relationships with advanced degree holding professionals. This unpaid opportunity helps doctoral students to cultivate a stronger professional profile, grow their network, and gain a better understanding of day-to-day life in a number of career fields, including museums, libraries, pharmaceutical and biotech companies, consulting firms, nonprofit research institutes, administrative offices, and more.

This year, the program will feature mentors from the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the EPA, Merck, Genentech, Janssen, Lumanity, Amazon, Google, the Franklin Institute, Penn Press, Bloom Funding, Penn Libraries—and many more! For a complete list of participating employers, click here. 

This fellowship runs from February to May and typically entails a time commitment of approximately 8-10 hours between host meetings and informational interviews. Fellows can choose to dedicate additional time by engaging in projects and/or attending professional development workshops and community-building events. The program allows for in-person, virtual, and hybrid experiences. 

Fellows are required to attend:

  • The CEF program orientation (Wednesday, February 19, 9:30-11:30am—in person)
  • Two professional development sessions organized by Penn Career Services. These sessions are designed to enhance career readiness competencies and the exploration of non-tenure-track careers.
  • One social activity/community-building event

Fellows will begin the program by meeting with their host to both 1) learn about the host’s career path and current position, including specific responsibilities, work culture, challenges, and rewards of the position, and 2) share their own professional interests, values, and short- and long-term career goals so that the host can offer targeted advice and guidance. Following this initial meeting, the host will facilitate additional informational interviews with colleagues and other members of their network whose career paths and interests align with the interests of the fellow. A final debrief meeting between host and fellow will occur at the end of the program. Additional opportunities, like site visits and small projects, may also be available. More information on the specific opportunities and projects offered by each host organization can be found in the 2025 Host Description Packet.

To read about students’ experiences in the 2024 program, please visit the CEF Spotlight Series on the Career Services blog. Interested in hearing what kinds of projects past participants have worked on with their host? View our project database. You can also connect with CEF alumni here.

*Please note: Because this is an unpaid career exploration opportunity, there are no visa restrictions for international students.

Objectives

The PhD Career Exploration Fellowship program has the following aims:

  • Facilitate non-faculty career exploration for PhD students.
  • Educate graduate students about the roles and responsibilities in a specific career field.
  • Allow graduate students to form relationships and create networks with advanced degree holding professionals through one-on-one mentoring.
  • Enhance the professional development and leadership skills of graduate students.
  • Facilitate students’ ability to conduct informational interviews as part of their career exploration and networking.

Participating Employers for 2025

Participating organizations for 2025 represent a range of industries, including higher ed administration, biotech/pharma, federal government, consulting, cloud computing, publishing, museums, and more. Detailed descriptions of this year’s confirmed host offices can be found here. When applying, each student should indicate their first, second, and third choice host.

Schedule

Fellows will attend a mandatory in-person orientation session on February 19th from 9:30–11:30am. Breakfast will be provided. The orientation will include an overview of the program’s goals and expectations, guidance on how to conduct informational interviews, and goal-setting exercises to help fellows make the most of their conversations with their hosts. Fellows will also have the opportunity to meet other PhD students interested in non-faculty careers.

Other professional development sessions and social activities will be offered throughout the spring semester. Attendance at at least two professional development sessions and one social activity will be required, though participation in as many of the sessions as your schedule allows is strongly encouraged. In addition, all fellows who participate in the program must complete the pre- and post-program surveys and write a blog post about their CEF experience to be featured on the Career Services website at the end of the program. 

Career Services will offer a number of professional development sessions throughout the duration of the fellowship. Past topics include:

  • Informational interviews
  • Resumes
  • LinkedIn
  • Job search strategies
  • Panel discussion with CEF alumni
  • Career pathways in humanities/social sciences
  • Career pathways in STEM

Application Deadline

January 14, 2025

Eligibility

Doctoral students in any department or school within the University of Pennsylvania may apply. Note that CEF alumni are not eligible to participate again, though applicants from previous cycles who were not selected are welcome to reapply.

Application Instructions

  1. To apply, complete the following survey detailing your name, department, program start and anticipated end dates, and your top three ranked placement choices: https://upenn.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_byKGRKIsxA7AjBA.
  2. Attach the following documents to the survey:
    • Your resume/CV.
    • A brief statement explaining why you are interested in working with each host office you ranked, detailing how these connections would support your professional and career development and what you hope to gain from the experience. This should be a single document containing three short essays, one for each host you selected (maximum 250 words per essay). Be sure to address any preferred qualifications listed in the Host Description Packet.

If you have any questions about this program, please contact Mayesha Ahmed, PhD Professionalism Fellow, at mayeshaa@sas.upenn.edu.