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Early in his postdoctoral programme at Harvard Medical School (HMS) in Boston, Massachusetts, Frankie Heyward realized how isolated he felt as the only PhD holder in the department who

identified as Black. In 2020, after a chance meeting with another Black postdoc in a lift, Heyward decided to build a community for people like them, and set up the Harvard Black Postdoc

Association (HBPA). Later that year, after the murder of George Floyd, a Black man, by a white police officer, Heyward penned an open letter to an HMS dean on the need to address

institutionalized racism in academia, which the dean then shared with the HMS community. Subsequently, Heyward and a group of seven other Black postdocs at Harvard submitted a proposal for

Black postdoctoral support to the HMS deans. The HBPA, at the time a small mailing list, soon attracted many new members. HMS committed US$5,000 in funding to the organization, and Harvard

Affiliate Hospitals promised future financial support. Wanting a community that transcended institutional boundaries, Heyward founded the National Black Postdoctoral Association (NBPA), a

non-profit organization, in 2021. ACCESS OPTIONS Access Nature and 54 other Nature Portfolio journals Get Nature+, our best-value online-access subscription $29.99 / 30 days cancel any time

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be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout ADDITIONAL ACCESS OPTIONS: _doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-024-02698-7_ This interview has been edited for length and

clarity. If you or someone you know is contemplating suicide, please reach out. You can find help through a suicide-prevention line: see https://findahelpline.com for information. RELATED

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