External Funding Opportunities

Graduate students should explore the resources below and talk with their faculty advisors about how to best seek funding.

Financial support from sources external to the university will not count toward the department's five years. If a student to whom the department has offered funding receives and accepts an award that does not count toward the departmental limit, their departmental award can be deferred as long as they continue to make satisfactory progress.

  • Adam Smith Fellowship
    • A one-year program for doctoral students from any university and in any discipline who are interested in political economy.
  • ACUNS Dissertation Fellowship Award
    • The ACUNS Dissertation Fellowship Award recognizes emerging students of extraordinary potential who have reached the stage of writing an advanced graduate-level dissertation on a topic of direct and demonstrable relevance to the United Nations and/or the UN system. Applications not thus related to the UN and/or UN system will not be considered.
  • Carl Albert Center Visiting Scholars Program
    • The Carl Albert Congressional Research and Studies Center at the University of Oklahoma seeks applicants for its Visiting Scholars Program, which provides financial assistance to researchers working at the Center's archives. Awards of $500-$1000 are normally granted as reimbursement for travel and lodging. Applications are accepted at any time.
  • Carrie Chapman Catt Prize for Research on Women and Politics
    • This annual competition is designed to encourage and reward scholars embarking on significant research in the area of women and politics. The prize includes a $1,000 cash award for each project selected. Honorable mention prizes of $500 per project are sometimes given. In addition to the cash prize, recipients may be invited to Iowa State University to present an overview of their research. 
  • Center for Holocaust Studies Summer Graduate Students Research Fellowship
    • The Center is accepting applications for graduate student summer research assistant fellowships. Recipients will participate in special research projects. Each fellowship will last for three months. Awardees will receive a stipend of $2,000/month. The Center will provide one roundtrip airline ticket to and from Washington, D.C. for travel within North America.
  • Centennial Center Research Grants
    • The Centennial Center offers thirteen grants to assist APSA members with the costs of research. Examples of supported activities include: Research, including travel, interviews, access to archives, or costs for a research assistant; Auxiliary devices or services uniquely necessary for scholars with disabilities to conduct their research; Assisting scholars in publishing their research, including holding manuscript workshops; Supporting workshops, events, or projects that support or advance the discipline.
  • Deborah “Misty” Gerner Grant for Professional Development
    • The Deborah “Misty” Gerner Grant for Professional Development (“Gerner Award”) is awarded by the Women’s Caucus (WCIS) and sponsored by Lynne Rienner Publishing. Deborah Gerner (1956-2006) was a much-loved and inspirational scholar who worked extensively on contributing to conflict resolution and peace in the Middle East. She was also a great advocate for women scholars in the international relations discipline. Funds from this grant may be used to support any legitimate professional development identified by the candidate. Some examples of possible uses include the following: (a) Travel to a professional meeting, (b) travel to conduct interviews, work with a colleague on a collaborative project, or field research, (c) purchase of databases, software, books, or other materials needed for research, or (d) participation in an appropriate pedagogy workshop or institute.
  • Emerging Leaders International Fellows Program - Center on Philanthropy and Civil Society
    • The program is open to scholars and practitioners under the age of 36 interested in building third-sector capacity in the United States and overseas. Fellows will be selected from abroad and also from communities of color under-represented in the U.S. grantmaking sector. Fellows are based at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, where they design and pursue an individualized research project and participate in a three-month seminar on the U.S. and international voluntary sectors. The research topic for applicants to the Emerging Leaders Program is community foundations. In addition, a limited number of fellowships for research on diaspora philanthropy, as well as other topics, may also be available for applicants based outside the United States. Each fellowship covers the cost of tuition and includes a $1,300-per month stipend to cover living expenses. The center will also provide accommodations and round-trip air travel to and from the United States.
  • Frédéric Bastiat Fellowship
    • The Frédéric Bastiat Fellowship at George Mason University is a one-year, competitive fellowship program awarded to graduate students attending master’s, juris doctoral, and doctoral programs in a variety of fields including economics, law, political science, and public policy. The aim of this fellowship is to introduce students to the Austrian, Virginia, and Bloomington schools of political economy as academic foundations for pursuing contemporary policy analysis.
  • German Chancellor Scholarship Program
    • The scholarship provides for a stay of one year in Germany for professional development, study, or research. Applicants design individual projects specific to Germany and decide at which institutions to pursue them. The program begins September 1 and lasts twelve months. It is preceded by language classes taught in Germany. Monthly stipends range from EUR 2,000 to 3,000 and allowances are available for accompanying family members, travel expenses, and German language instruction. Candidates must be citizens of the United States or the Russian Federation, have a bachelor's degree, and be under 35 years of age by the start of the award. Prior knowledge of German is not a prerequisite.
  • Hayek Fund for Scholars
    • The Hayek Fund for Scholars makes strategic awards of up to $1,000 to graduate students and untenured faculty members for career-enhancing activities such as: Presentations at academic or professional conferences, Travel to academic job interviews, Travel to and research at archives or libraries, Participation in career development or enhancing seminars, Distribution of a published article to colleagues in your field, Submission of unpublished manuscripts to journals or book publishers.
  • William Randolph Hearst Endowed Scholarship for Minority Students
    • A scholarship is offered to members of minority groups to serve as a summer intern with the Fund. Through this program, the Fund seeks to introduce a diverse group of students to issues relating to philanthropy, voluntarism, and nonprofit organizations. The scholarship grant is between $2,500 and $5,000 will be awarded, depending on the recipient's educational level, financial need, and time commitment.
  • Institute for Humane Studies Humane Studies Fellowships
    • The Institute for Humane Studies awards scholarships up to $12,000 for undergraduate or graduate study in the United States or abroad. Last year IHS awarded more than 90 scholarships to outstanding undergraduates, graduate students, law students, and professional students who are interested in the classical liberal tradition.
  • International Dissertation Research Fellowship Program
    • The IDRF program is committed to scholarship that advances knowledge about non-U.S. cultures and societies grounded in empirical and site-specific research (involving fieldwork, research in archival or manuscript collections, or quantitative data collection). The program promotes research that is located in a specific discipline and geographical region and is engaged with interdisciplinary and cross-regional perspectives. Fellowships will provide support for nine to twelve months of dissertation research. Fifty fellowships of approximately $20,000 each were awarded in 2007.
  • International Dissertation Field Research Fellowships
    • The IDRF awards enable doctoral candidates of proven achievement and outstanding potential to use their knowledge of distinctive cultures, societies, languages, economies, polities, and histories, in combination with their disciplinary training, to address issues that transcend their disciplines or area specializations. The program supports scholarship that treats place and setting in relation to broader phenomena as well as in particular historical and cultural contexts.
  • IREX Individual Advanced Research Opportunities (IARO) Program
    • The IARO Program provides fellowships to US scholars and professionals for overseas research on contemporary political, economic, historical, or cultural developments relevant to US foreign policy. Eligible countries of research focus are Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Kosovo, Macedonia, Moldova, Romania, Russia, Serbia and Montenegro, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan.
  • National Institute of Justice Graduate Research Fellowship
    • The Graduate Research Fellowship provides dissertation research support to outstanding doctoral students undertaking independent research on issues related to crime and justice. 
  • Oskar Morgenstern Fellowship
    • The Oskar Morgenstern Fellowship is a one-year, competitive fellowship program awarded to graduate students with training in quantitative methods who are attending PhD programs from any university in a variety of fields including economics, political science and sociology.
  • Rotary World Peace Fellowship
    • Each year, Rotary will select up to 70 Fellows to study at one of the seven Rotary Centers worldwide. The Rotary World Peace Fellows will begin two-year master's-level degree programs in conflict resolution, peace studies, and international relations at one of the seven Rotary Centers. Each Rotary district may nominate one candidate for a world-competitive selection process.
  • Smith Richardson Foundation Fellowship
    • The Smith Richardson Foundation sponsors an annual “World Politics and Statecraft Fellowship” program, its annual grant competition to support Ph.D. dissertation research on American foreign policy, international relations, international security, strategic studies, area studies, and diplomatic and military history. The purpose of the program is to strengthen the U.S. community of young scholars and researchers conducting policy analysis in these fields by supporting the research and writing of policy-relevant dissertations through funding of field work, archival research, and language training. In evaluating applications, the Foundation will give preference to projects that could directly inform U.S. policy debates and thinking, rather than dissertations that are principally focused on abstract theory or debates within a scholarly discipline.
  • Stanford University, The Bill Lane Center for the Study of the North American West
    • Fellows are in residence at Stanford for periods ranging from between two weeks to and two academic quarters (or one semester). Fellowships are designed to facilitate research toward an article or book length study on a topic related to the politics and governance of the United States west of the Mississippi, western Canada, and/or northwestern Mexico. Each fellow will receive a stipend of $3,000-$20,000, depending on rank and on length of stay. 
  • Social Science Research Council (SSRC) Opportunities
    • Most support from the Council goes to pre-dissertation, dissertation, and postdoctoral fellowships, offered through annual, peer-reviewed competitions. Some programs offer summer institutes, advanced research grants, and grants for professionals and practitioners to conduct research. Most support individual researchers, rather than groups or institutions. Although SSRC fellowship and grant programs take a variety of forms, they share the goals of supporting innovative knowledge production and of building research capacity in areas of critical social importance.
  • AAUW International Fellowships
    • International Fellowships are awarded for full-time study or research in the United States to women who are not U.S. citizens or permanent residents. Both graduate and postgraduate studies at accredited U.S. institutions are supported.
  • American Council of Learned Societies Dissertation Fellowships in Southeast European Studies:
    • The American Council of Learned Societies will offer support for writing dissertations in Southeast European studies in all disciplines of the humanities and the social sciences. Amount: up to $17,000. 
  • American Antiquarian Society Research Fellowship Program
    • The American Antiquarian Society (AAS) awards a number of short-term and long-term visiting research fellowships to qualified scholars during the year (June 1 - May 31). Several categories of awards are offered, and funding is available from the National Endowment for the Humanities for four to twelve months' residency at the Society. 
  • American Institute of Indian Studies Fellowships
    • The American Institute of Indian Studies invites applications from scholars from all disciplines who wish to conduct their research in India. Junior fellowships are given to doctoral candidates to conduct research for their dissertations in India for up to eleven months.
  • American Philosophical Society Fellowships & Research Grants
    • The society maintains seven grant or fellowship programs in a wide range of fields. Our Franklin, Lewis and Clark, Library Fellowship, and Phillips programs award small grants ($1000 to $6000) for modest research purposes. Our Daland, John Hope Franklin, and Sabbatical Fellowship programs award larger grants ($25,000 to $50,000) in highly selective competitions.
  • Ann Plato Fellowship
    • This fellowship supports a doctoral student who is engaged in writing his or her dissertation. Applicants from historically underrepresented groups, including African Americans, Asian Americans, Native Americans, Pacific Islanders, and U.S. Latinos, are especially encouraged to apply. The Fellow enjoys faculty status, delivers a formal, public lecture in the fall semester, and teaches one course in the spring semester. The fellow is expected to be in residence during the fellowship tenure. The Fellowship provides a $35,000 stipend; a campus apartment; an office; use of a computer; library privileges at Trinity.
  • APSA Diversity Fellows Program
    • The APSA Diversity Fellowship Program (DFP) awards between 12 and 14 funded fellowships in the amount of $5,000 over two years to students applying to doctoral programs in political science.
  • APSA Research & Training Support
    • The association offers a wide array of grants, fellowships, and supplemental research support. 
  • Berlin Program for Advanced German and European Studies
    • The Berlin Program for Advanced German and European Studies offers up to one-year of research support at the Freie Universitat Berlin. It is open to scholars in all social science and humanities disciplines, including historians working on the period since the mid-19th century. 
  • Brookings Institution Fellowships
    • The Brookings Institution offers pre-doctoral research fellowships. 
  • Carl Albert Center Congressional Fellowship
    • The program offers graduate students a dual perspective on the workings of Congress by affording them opportunities to study the institution both on campus and in Washington, D.C., as a member of a congressional staff. Each Carl Albert Fellow receives a fully financed, five-year fellowship package that includes a three-year teaching or research assistantship at the university, a congressional fellowship year in Washington, and a final year of dissertation support at the university.
  • Charlotte W. Newcombe Doctoral Dissertation Fellowships
    • The Charlotte W. Newcombe Doctoral Dissertation Fellowships are designed to encourage original and significant study of ethical or religious values in all fields of the humanities and social sciences, and particularly to help Ph.D. candidates in these fields complete their dissertation work in a timely manner. 
  • Council for European Studies Fellowship
    • By funding young scholar’s first major research projects in Europe, the Fellowship Program encourages these scholars to develop the skills required to research, analyze, and teach European studies. Fellowships provide students with unique opportunities to conduct extensive library research, field-site investigations, and interviews with policymakers and government leaders and foster original and noteworthy research that crosses disciplinary, national, and cultural boundaries. 
  • Dirksen Congressional Center Research Awards
    • The Dirksen Congressional Center invites applications for grants to fund research on congressional leadership and the U.S. Congress.
  • The Elliott School of International Affairs Visiting Scholars
    • The Elliott School of International Affairs welcomes applications for Visiting Scholars for short or long stays at any of our four research centers and institutes: the Center for International Science and Technology Policy (www.gwu.edu/~cistp), the Institute for European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies (www.gwu.edu/~ieresgwu), the Institute for Global and International Studies (www.gwu.edu/~igis), or the Sigur Center for Asian Studies (http://www.gwu.edu/~sigur).
  • Gerald R. Ford Library Research Grants
    • The Gerald R. Ford Foundation awards grants of up $2,000 each in support of research in the archival collections of the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library, part of the system of presidential libraries administered by the National Archives and Records Administration.
  • Hackman Research Residency Awards
    • For advanced research in New York history, government, or public policy. 
  • Horowitz Foundation for Social Policy Grants
    • The Foundation makes targeted grants for work in major areas of the social sciences. Preference will be given to projects that deal with contemporary issues in the social sciences and issues of policy relevance and to scholars in the initial stages of research. 
  • John Carter Brown Library Research Fellowships
    • Recipients of all Fellowships are expected to relocate to Providence and to be in continuous residence at the John Carter Brown Library for the entire term of the award. Short-Term Fellowships: Regular John Carter Brown Library Fellowships are available for periods of two to four months and carry a stipend of $1,800 per month. Long-Term Fellowships: The Library will also receive applications for Long-Term Fellowships for five to nine months (with a stipend of $4,000 per month). 
  • Mellon Fellowships for Dissertation Research
    • The Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) is pleased to offer fellowships generously funded by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation for dissertation research in the humanities or related social sciences using original sources. The program offers about fifteen competitively awarded fellowships a year in amounts up to $25,000. Each provides a stipend of $2,000 per month for periods ranging from 9-12 months. Each fellow receives an additional $1,000 upon participating in a symposium on research in original sources and submitting a report acceptable to CLIR on the research experience.
  • Mellon International Dissertation Research Fellowship (IDRF)
    • The Mellon International Dissertation Research Fellowship (IDRF) offers nine to twelve months of support to graduate students in the humanities and humanistic social sciences who are enrolled in PhD programs in the United States and conducting dissertation research on non-US topics. Seventy fellowships are awarded annually. Fellowship amounts vary depending on the research plan, with a per-fellowship average of $22,000. The fellowship includes participation in an SSRC-funded interdisciplinary workshop upon the completion of IDRF-funded research.
  • National Fellowship Program
    • The National Fellowship Program supports outstanding scholars at top institutions across the country who are completing dissertations in American history, politics, public policy and foreign relations. National Fellows have the opportunity to connect with and be a part of the Jefferson Scholars Foundation’s interdisciplinary community of world-class Scholars and Fellows at the University of Virginia.
  • Newberry Library Short-Term Resident Fellowships
    • Short-term fellowships are generally restricted to post-doctoral scholars or Ph.D. candidates from outside of the Chicago area who have a specific need for Newberry collections. The tenure of short-term fellowships varies from one week to two months. Unless otherwise noted, the amount of the award is $1200 per month, pro-rated for shorter periods. 
  • Peace Scholar Dissertation Fellowship
    • The Peace Scholar program supports doctoral dissertations that explore the sources and nature of international conflict, and strategies to prevent or end conflict and to sustain peace. Dissertations from a broad range of disciplines and interdisciplinary fields are eligible.
  • Time-sharing Experiments for the Social Sciences (TESS)
    • Time-sharing Experiments for the Social Sciences (TESS) offers researchers the opportunity to capture the internal validity of experiments while also realizing the benefits of working with a large, diverse population of research participants. Investigators submit proposals for experiments, and TESS fields successful proposals for free on a representative sample of adults in the United States using NORC's AmeriSpeak® Panel, a probability-based and highly-respected representative survey platform.
  • Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars Fellowships
    • The Woodrow Wilson Center awards approximately 20-25 residential fellowships annually in an international competition. Topics and scholarship should relate to key public policy challenges or provide the historical and/or cultural framework to illuminate policy issues of contemporary importance. Fellows should be prepared to interact with policymakers in Washington and with Wilson Center staff who are working on similar topics.