Postdoctoral Position

The Maryland Language Science Center at the University of Maryland, College Park seeks to recruit an outstanding postdoctoral researcher for our inaugural Fellowship for Postdoctoral Scholars. The goal of the fellowship is to support early-career researchers as they establish their own research program, and to develop new, innovative, interdisciplinary connections within our community. Fellows are expected to pursue collaborative relationships with faculty in multiple departments and disciplines at the University of Maryland. These collaborations may take different forms: engaging in research projects with multiple faculty independently, generating new collaborative research that brings multiple faculty together, and/or contributing to interdisciplinary discussion and reading groups.

Target start date is in August 2025. Applications are due by January 6, submitted through this link: https://ejobs.umd.edu/postings/124097.

About language science at UMD
MLSC is home to the largest and most integrated language science community in North America, spanning 7 colleges and nearly 20 different units across the university. Researchers have ready access to relevant resources to support a range of research programs including equipment and facilities (e.g., eye-tracking, EEG, fNIRS, MEG, fMRI), state-of-art computational resources (e.g., Brendan Iribe Center for Computer Science and Engineering’s Nexus GPU cluster), and recruitment databases (e.g., Infant and Child Studies Consortium, established community partnerships). MLSC coordinates a language science research lab at the Planet Word Museum in downtown Washington, DC. UMD language scientists also benefit from close proximity to other universities (e.g. Gallaudet, Georgetown, Howard) and government research labs (e.g. NIH), in the Washington, D.C. metro area.

Benefits
Fellows will receive a salary of $70,000, health insurance, and a modest research budget. Funding is provided in one-year terms renewable for up to two years. This is a campus-based (not remote) position, and participating in the on-campus community is a key benefit and expectation of the fellowship, but the University of Maryland does allow for telework.

Eligibility & Application
The fellowship is open to researchers with a PhD in any relevant field, including: neuroscience, psychology, linguistics, education, communication sciences and disorders, philosophy, computer science, or other cognitive science disciplines. Applicants must have formally completed all requirements of the PhD degree and provide a copy of their diploma at the time of appointment.

Applicants must submit a research statement, CV, and contact information for at least three references. The research statement (3-5 pages, single-spaced) should outline the applicant’s past research, a proposed plan for research during the postdoc, and how the proposed research will contribute to the applicant’s career. The statement should specifically reference at least three faculty at the University of Maryland that the applicant would be interested in working with. Applicants are strongly encouraged to reach out to potential faculty mentors to discuss potential research and collaborations prior to submitting an application. The research statement should be written for a broad audience of language scientists: the selection committee will include researchers from multiple disciplinary backgrounds, which may not include the applicant’s own field.