February 2018
Funding Opportunities in the Social Sciences

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Unless otherwise noted, all proposals to funders outside of Harvard must be submitted to the Office of Sponsored Programs (OSP) five business days prior to the sponsor deadline. We can help you navigate the routing process for your proposal.

Questions? Please contact Erin Hale, Senior Research Development Officer at 
erin_hale@fas.harvard.edu or 617-496-5252.
Internal Opportunities
For a more comprehensive list of Harvard internal funding opportunities, please see  here .
External Opportunities
Non-Federal Opportunities:
Federal Opportunities:
Internal Funding Opportunities
pfic
Deadline: May 18, 2018
Award Amount: Up to $20,000
Eligible Applicants: The designated faculty leader(s) must hold primary Harvard faculty appointments at the rank of Assistant, Associate, or Full Professor or senior non-ladder faculty appointments including Senior Lecturer, Senior Preceptor, and Professor of Practice.
 
The Provost Fund for Interfaculty Collaboration (PFIC) was developed to promote faculty collaboration across multiple Harvard Schools. This fund can be used to support a variety of projects, including but not limited to cross-School interdisciplinary course support, research working groups, and small-scale conferences. The Fund will occasionally prioritize particular forms of collaboration, and during the 2017-2018 academic year, funding priority will be given to proposals intended to advance cross-School teaching. 
 
To be eligible for support, the designated faculty leader(s) must hold primary Harvard faculty appointments at the rank of Assistant, Associate, or Full Professor or senior non-ladder faculty appointments including Senior Lecturer, Senior Preceptor, and Professor of Practice, and the project must engage faculty and/or students from at least two Harvard Schools. Priority will be given to applicants who have not previously received funding from the grant. Colleagues from outside Harvard may be included as well.
 
These one-year grants should be considered seed money rather than continuing support. Funding should be expended within a year of the award. Preference will be given to proposals that illustrate the potential cross-School impact of funding (e.g., cross-listed courses, sponsored research opportunities, resulting scholarly products) as well as to proposals that leverage other resources (e.g., cost-sharing with a Department, School, or outside funder).
milton
Deadline: April 3, 2018
Award Amount: Up to $50,000
Eligible Applicants: Applications are invited from individuals who hold a junior faculty appointment. This includes Assistant Professors, Associate Professors, and Junior Fellows of the Harvard Society of Fellows.
 
The Milton Fund supports research projects in the fields of medicine, geography, history and science that promote the physical and material welfare and prosperity of the human race, investigate and determine the value and importance of any discovery or invention, or assist in the discovery and perfecting of any special means of alleviating or curing human disease. Funds awarded through the Milton Fund support research to explore new ideas, to act as the catalyst between ideas and more definitive directions, and to consider new methods of approaching solutions. 
elson
Deadline: March 30, 2018
Award Amount: Up to $5,000
 
The Elson Family Arts Initiative fund supports undergraduate education in the arts and humanities and the integration of the arts into the curriculum within the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. This initiative is one of many activities created in response to the recommendations of the Harvard Task Force on the Arts. Course proposals may (but need not) involve collaborations across departments and divisions of the FAS. The Committee will only consider proposals that have a curricular connection and that show the prudent use of funds. As a general rule, priority will be given to proposals for art-making in courses where art-making has not traditionally been inserted. 
hilt
Deadline: March 21, 2018
Award Amount: Up to $15,000
Eligible Applicants: Harvard University benefits-eligible faculty, staff, and postdoctoral researchers are eligible to apply for funding, individually or as groups. 
 
Grants are designed to help "spark" promising teaching and learning projects from idea to reality and position innovations for future success. Funding can be used in various ways; for example, to pay for a research assistant, hire a graduate student with academic technology expertise, or convene collaborative groups. Through Spark Grants, awardees will receive resources, feedback, and community support to help them develop their ideas into prototypes, pilots, and small-scale innovations. HILT will also strive to support any future scaling-up of Spark Grant projects by increasing their visibility and connecting awardees and project outcomes with others in the broader Harvard community. In general, grant proposals should align with HILT's mission to catalyze innovation and excellence in teaching and learning at Harvard University.
dcf 
Deadline: March 8, 2018 by 5:00PM
Award Amount: Up to $50,000
Eligible Applicants: FAS and SEAS assistant, associate and tenured faculty; professors in residence and professors of the practice are also eligible.
 
The Dean's Competitive Fund for Promising Scholarship is a targeted program that provides funding in the following categories:
  1. Bridge funding, to allow faculty to continue work on previously funded research, scholarship, or creative activity that does not currently have external funding. Faculty who apply in this category should demonstrate that efforts have been made or will be made to obtain new external funding.
  2. Seed funding, to encourage faculty to launch exciting new scholarship or research directions that might not yet be ready to compete in traditional funding programs.
  3. Enabling subventions, to provide small funds to purchase (or upgrade) critical equipment. Applicants for such funds must have no existing startup funds on which they could draw for this purpose.
For this spring, the  Inequality in America Initiative will provide an additional increment of bridge and seed funding to support research that will advance our understanding of the causes and consequences of inequality, including its implications for a range of outcomes from economic growth and political stability to crime, public health, family well being, and social trust. 

For all categories, applicants should clearly explain in non-specialist language the critical need, make a compelling case for large marginal gain, and justify the need for support from this fund rather than traditional sources.
  
dsi
Deadline: March 6, 2018 by 5:00PM
Award Amount: Up to $100,000
Eligible Applicants: Individuals who hold a faculty appointment at a Harvard school and who have principal investigator rights at that school
 
The goal of the Data Science Initiative Competitive Research Fund is to support research that advances data science at Harvard in new ways. In 2018, funds will be used to support planning grants within and across each of five themes:
  • Data-Driven Scientific Discovery (includes discovery of new materials, drug and gene discovery, environment, astronomy, neuroscience)
  • Markets and Networks (includes networks and influence, innovation and crowds, digital economy, jobs, fairness, privacy, accountability, crowdsourcing)
  • Personalized Health (includes precision medicine, precision public health, medical informatics, diagnostics, personal devices)
  • Evidence-Based Policy (includes equality of opportunity, healthcare economics, democracy and governance, climate change - resilience and mitigation)
  • Advanced Methodologies (includes causal inference, deep learning, visualization, Monte Carlo methods, experimental design, interpretability, non-parametric Bayesian, high-dimensional inference, robust machine learning, control of false discovery, human-in-the-loop, reinforcement learning, data systems, reproducibility, data sharing)
This call invites innovative ideas for projects that will be foundational to longer-term research programs in any of the five themes listed above. Projects that span two or more themes are also encouraged.
star
Deadline: February 28, 2018
Award Amount: $20,000-$200,000 in direct costs (project budgets should not include indirect costs). In 2017, the average award size was $106,250. Up to five awards will be made annually.
Eligible Applicants: This competition is open to ladder faculty members in FAS and SEAS. Collaborative proposals are welcome but the lead investigator on the application must hold a faculty appointment in FAS or SEAS.
 
Established in 2013 by a generous gift to Harvard University at the suggestion of James A. Star, AB (1983), the Star Family Challenge for Promising Scientific Research provides seed funding to interdisciplinary high-risk, high-impact projects in the natural or social sciences. Early stage projects which are unlikely to receive funding from traditional grant-making agencies are encouraged. Award recipients will present and discuss their projects with a range of scholars in multiple disciplines at a Challenge event on April 9, 2018, prior to receipt of funding.
canada
Deadline: Rolling
Award Amount: No specified funding limit

The Canada Program at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs invites proposals from Harvard faculty, departments, and schools across the University, for research funding, or for supporting the hosting of short-term visiting scholars, policy practitioners, and public figures who are engaged in Canadian comparative topics. Visiting Canadianists are welcome to present at Harvard faculty workshops and conferences, or to offer guest lectures for Harvard undergraduate and graduate students. 

Requests for funding should include a proposal with a brief description of the intellectual goals of the short-term visit, and a budget, and should be submitted to:  Canada@wcfia.harvard.edu
fhb
Deadline: Last day of February, May, August and November
Award Amount: $40,000 for ladder faculty; $5,000 for doctoral students and post-docs
Eligible Applicants: Harvard University full time doctoral students, post-doctoral fellows, and ladder faculty.

The FHBI provides seed grants to support transformative research in the social and behavioral sciences. Successful proposals will be those that promise to advance understanding of the social, institutional and biological mechanisms shaping human beliefs and behavior. Funds will be used to support interdisciplinary social science research projects based on innovative experimental or observational designs that make use of sophisticated quantitative methods. The Fund also supports seminars, conferences, and other research-related activities.
External Funding Opportunities
rsf
OSP review not required for letter of inquiry
Sponsor Letter of Inquiry Deadline: May 24, 2018
Award Amount: Up to $150,000

The Russell Sage Foundation dedicates itself exclusively to strengthening the methods, data, and theoretical core of the social sciences as a means of diagnosing social problems and improving social policies. For the May 2018 letter of inquiry deadline, Project and Presidential Awards will support social science research in the following program areas:
  • Race, Ethnicity, and Immigration: This program is concerned with the social, economic, and political effects of the changing racial and ethnic composition of the U.S. population, including the transformation of communities and ideas about what it means to be American.
  • Behavioral Economics: This program focuses on research that uses behavioral insights from psychology and other social sciences to examine and improve social and living conditions in the United States.
Letters of inquiry for the foundation's other regular programs, Future of Work and Social Inequality, will be accepted in August.
rsf_immigration
OSP review not required for letter of inquiry
Sponsor Letter of Inquiry Deadline: May 24, 2018
Award Amount: Up to $150,000

The Russell Sage Foundation/Carnegie Corporation Initiative on Immigration and Immigrant Integration seeks to support innovative research on the effects of race, citizenship, legal status and politics, political culture and public policy on outcomes for immigrants and for the native-born of different racial and ethnic groups and generations. This initiative falls under RSF's Race, Ethnicity, and Immigration Program and represents a special area of interest within the core program, which continues to encourage proposals on a broader set of issues.

The Foundation is especially interested in novel uses of under-utilized data and the development of new methods for analyzing these data. Proposals to conduct laboratory or field experiments, in-depth qualitative interviews, and ethnographies are also encouraged. Smaller projects might include exploratory fieldwork, a pilot study, or the analysis of existing data. RSF encourages methodological variety and inter-disciplinary collaboration.  Proposals for comparative, cross-national work will be considered only if they have strong implications for U.S.-centered issues.
rss_bioss
OSP review not required for letter of inquiry
Sponsor Letter of Inquiry Deadline: May 24, 2018
Award Amount: Up to $150,000
 
This initiative will support innovative social science research on social and economic outcomes that improves our understanding of the interactive mechanisms by which environmental influences affect biological mechanisms, and vice versa. This includes research that: (1) estimates how the structured nature of the social environment and intra- and intergenerational social inequalities affect biological processes, (2) identifies which indicators of biological processes interact with the social environment to affect different life domains and how, and (3) yields new conceptual frameworks that holistically characterize the complex relationships among biological, psychological and environmental factors to predict a range of behavioral and social outcomes. The foundation is primarily interested in research that explores and improves our understanding of social and economic predictors and outcomes.  

rsf_css 
OSP review not required for letters of inquiry
Sponsor Letter of Inquiry Deadline: May 24, 2018
Award Amount: Up to $150,000

The Russell Sage Foundation's initiative on Computational Social Science (CSS) supports innovative social science research that brings new data and methods to bear on questions of interest in its core programs in Behavioral Economics, Future of Work, Race, Ethnicity and Immigration, and Social Inequality. Limited consideration will be given to questions that pertain to core methodologies, such as causal inference and innovations in data collection. 
ghs
Harvard OSP Deadline: May 16, 2018
Sponsor Deadline: May 9, 2018
Award Amount: Limit not specified. Applicants may request costs for personnel, travel, materials and/or other costs.

The special programme "Islam, the Modern Nation State and Transnational Movements" is aimed at researchers who, with an eye to current developments, are examining the emergence of political movements in the Islamic world at the national and/or transnational level. Historical studies are encouraged and supported, together with projects in the areas of religious, cultural or political science. Proposals will be supported that address the particularities and contexts of cultural and historical environments and relationships. The projects' deliverables should be able to make a contribution to diverse and expert discussions in public and political circles.
whiting
OSP review not required
Sponsor Deadline: May 2, 2018
Award Amount: $40,000

The Whiting Foundation supports works in progress to enable authors to complete their books. Its chief objective is to foster original, ambitious projects that bring writing to the highest possible standard. This grant is intended to support multiyear book projects requiring large amounts of deep and focused research, thinking, and writing at a crucial point mid-process, after significant work has been accomplished but where an extra infusion of support can make a difference in the ultimate shape and quality of the work. Whiting welcomes submissions for works of history, cultural or political reportage, biography, memoir, the sciences, philosophy, criticism, food or travel writing, and personal essays, among other categories. Applicants must be US citizens or residents and must be under contract with a publisher and at least two years into their contract as of the May 2 application deadline. 
wtgrant
OSP review not required for letters of inquiry
Sponsor Letter of Inquiry Deadline: May 2, 2018
Award Amount: $100,000 to $600,000 over 2-3 years for reducing inequality research grants; $100,000 to $1,000,000 over 2-4 years for improving the use of research evidence grants 

The W.T. Grant Foundation is focused on youth ages 5 to 25 in the United States, funding research that increases our understanding of:
  • programs, policies, and practices that reduce inequality in youth outcomes, and
  • strategies to improve the use of research evidence in ways that beneit youth. 
The foundation seeks research that builds stronger theory and empirical evidence in these two areas and informs change. While it is not expected that any one study will create that change, the research should contribute to a body of useful knowledge to improve the lives of young people.
searle
Harvard OSP Deadline: April 9, 2018
Sponsor Deadline: April 16, 2018
Award Amount: Recent grants have ranged from $20,000 to $1,000,000, with the majority of grants under $100,000

The Searle Freedom Trust fosters research and education on public policy issues that affect individual freedom and economic liberty. Through its grant-making, the foundation seeks to develop solutions to the country's most important and challenging domestic policy issues.  The foundation invests primarily in scholarship that results in the publication of books, journal articles, and policy papers. Funding is typically provided in the form of research grants, fellowships, and other types of targeted project support. The Searle Freedom Trust also provides funding for public interest litigation and supports outreach to the public through a variety of forums, including sponsorship of research conferences and seminars, film and journalism projects, and new media initiatives.
ssrc
Harvard OSP Deadline: April 8, 2018
Sponsor Deadline: April 15, 2018
Award Amount: Up to £17,000 (~$23,760)

The Conflict Research Fellowship (CRF) offers yearlong support for experienced scholars based at a university or NGO. The CRF is part of the Conflict Research Programme, a four year, UK Department of International Development funded research program based at the London School of Economics and Political Science that investigates the drivers of violent conflict in five cases: Somalia, South Sudan, Democratic Republic of Congo, Iraq, and Syria. The program focuses on ways in which the political economy of public authority helps to explain the persistence and spread of violence. Successful fellowship candidates will need to examine how different interventions affect violent conflict and/or the risk of renewed violent conflict; analyze "what works" to counter drivers of conflict; and explore the contextual factors that affect the efficacy of such interventions, including the linkages among international, national, state, and local level dynamics. 

Candidates must be postdoctoral scholars with at least three years of field-based experience since the completion of the PhD (or researchers with equivalent experience who have published one book or three peer-reviewed academic articles). Applications will be considered for to support fieldwork, teaching buy-out at your home institution, or a visiting appointment at a US or European university. Research projects must focus on the core countries of the CRF: Somalia, South Sudan, DRC, Iraq, or Syria. Applicants must also be available to attend a preparatory workshop in New York within the first two months of their fellowship period, and a capstone workshop towards the end of the year-long fellowship. At the end of the fellowship period, recipients must produce an original research output that is suitable for publication in a peer-reviewed academic journal.
ibm
OSP review not required
Sponsor Deadline: April 2, 2018
Award Amount: $20,000 stipend 
 
The aim of the IBM Center for the Business of Government is to tap into the best minds in academe and the nonprofit sector who can use rigorous public management research and analytic techniques to help public sector executives and managers improve the effectiveness of government. The Center is looking for very practical findings and actionable recommendations - not just theory or concepts - in order to assist executives and managers to more effectively respond to mission and management challenges.  Individuals receiving a stipend should produce a 10,000- to 12,000-word report written for government leaders and public managers, providing very practical knowledge and insight. 
aha
Sponsor Deadline: April 1, 2018
Award Amount: $5,000 stipend over 2-3 months

The J. Franklin Jameson Fellowship in American History is offered annually by the Library of Congress and the American Historical Association to support significant scholarly research in the collections of the Library of Congress by scholars at an early stage in their careers in history. At the time of application, applicants must hold a PhD or equivalent and must have received this degree within the past seven years. The fellowship will be awarded for at least two, but no more than three months, to spend in full-time residence at the Library of Congress.
clir 
Harvard OSP Deadline: March 27, 2018
Sponsor Initial Proposal Deadline: April 3, 2018
Award Amount: $50,000-$250,000 for single institution applications; $50,000-$500,000 for multi-institution applications
 
The Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) is now accepting applications to support digitizing collections of rare and unique content in collecting institutions.  The Digitizing Hidden Collections program coheres around six core values:
  • Scholarship: The program is designed to maximize its impact on the creation and dissemination of new knowledge.
  • Comprehensiveness: The program supports digitization projects that will provide thorough coverage of an important topic or topics of high interest to scholars, in ways that help those scholars understand digitized sources' provenance and context.
  • Connectedness: The program supports projects that make digitized sources easily discoverable and accessible alongside related materials, including materials held by other collecting institutions as well as those held within the home institution.
  • Collaboration: The program promotes strategic partnerships rather than duplication of capacity and effort.
  • Sustainability: The program promotes best practices for ensuring the long-term availability and discoverability of digital files created through digitization.
  • Openness: The program ensures that digitized content will be made available to the public as easily and completely as possible, given ethical and legal constraints.
CLIR will hold a webinar for prospective applicants on Wednesday, February 28, from 2:00-3:00 pm Eastern time. 

More information, including webinar links, frequently asked questions, and sample proposals, is available at https://www.clir.org/hiddencollections/applicant-resources/
jacobs
Sponsor Pre-Proposal Deadline: March 18, 2018
Harvard OSP Deadline (if invited to submit full proposal): June 22, 2018
Sponsor Full Proposal Deadline (if invited): July 1, 2018
Award Amount:  Early career scholars receive 150,000 CHF (~$160,358) and mid-career researchers receive 400,000 CHF (~$427,640) plus 10% overhead. This overhead amount falls short of the 15% overhead required by FAS policy. Please discuss with your grants administrator before preparing an application.

The  Jacobs Foundation Research Fellowship Program is a globally competitive fellowship program for early and mid-career researchers aiming at improving the learning, development and living conditions of children and youth or contributing to one of the Jacobs Foundation's  thematic priorities. This includes, but is not limited to educational sciences, psychology, economics, sociology, family studies, media studies, political sciences, linguistics, neurosciences, and medical sciences.

Fellowships are awarded to the most highly talented and innovative young scholars and mid-career researchers. Funds from Jacobs Foundation Research Fellowships are awarded directly to the fellow's institution and may be used over a three-year period by the fellow to partially cover the fellow's salary and for any activity supporting the fellow's research, such as assistant salaries, equipment, technical assistance, professional travel, or trainee support.
Scholars who engage in interdisciplinary work on individual development and learning of children and youth, and who seek to combine genetic, epigenetic, neurobiological, behavioral and social levels of analysis, are particularly encouraged to apply.
Federal Funding Opportunities
nhprc
Deadline to submit draft proposal for feedback (optional): April 4, 2018
Harvard OSP Deadline: June 6, 2018
Sponsor Deadline: June 13, 2018
Award Amount: Up to $200,000. The Commission provides no more than 50 per cent of total direct project costs so cost sharing is required.

The National Historical Publications and Records Commission seeks proposals to publish documentary editions of historical records.  The goal of this program is to provide access to, and editorial context for, the historical documents and records that tell the American story. Projects may focus on the papers of major figures from American history or cover broad historical movements in politics, social reform, business, military, the arts, and other aspects of the national experience. The historical value of the records and their expected usefulness to broad audiences must justify the costs of the project.  Applicants should demonstrate familiarity with the best practices recommended by the  Association for Documentary Editing  or the  Modern Language Association Committee on Scholarly Editions. 

All new projects must publish a digital edition which provides online access to a searchable collection of all documents. (Ebooks or volumes in PDF do not qualify for the purposes of this grant program.) New projects may also prepare print editions as part of their overall publishing plan, but the contents of those volumes must be published online within a reasonable period of time following print publication.  

otherfederal

Agency for International Development (USAID)
Department of State
National Institutes of Health


National Endowment for the Humanities
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For assistance, please contact:
Erin Hale
Senior Research Development Officer
erin_hale@fas.harvard.edu | 617-496-5252
 
To see previous Social Science Funding Newsletters, please visit our email archive.

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