Greetings Colleagues,
The prospective funding opportunities being highlighted for the middle of May are three RFPs from Arnold Ventures and ten grant competitions from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Please contact me for any further clarification or support in applying
for any of these opportunities.
Our gratitude to COEHD Communications for the revitalization of the COEHD Research webpage
https://education.utsa.edu/research/
. Any recommendations or feedback are always welcome.
Thank you.
--Iwan
Arnold Ventures
The following is taken from the Arnold Ventures newsletter:
Building Evidence: Support for Causal Studies to Evaluate Social Programs and Policies
This funding targets research on the causal effects of policies, programs, or interventions in key Arnold Ventures policy areas. Researchers are encouraged to use quasi-experimental methods, such as natural experiments, regression discontinuity, difference-in-differences,
and instrumental variable designs.
Key Policy Areas
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Higher Education: Focus on improving student success and addressing equity gaps. Projects should build evidence
on effective practices for student learning, persistence, degree completion, job placement, earnings, and debt reduction.
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Infrastructure: Support research and policy development to enhance U.S. infrastructure building, including housing,
transportation, climate, and clean energy. Projects should address challenges like supply-side bottlenecks, permitting processes, and state capacity improvement.
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Contraceptive Choice and Access: Evaluate policies affecting contraceptive access and affordability. Projects should
identify barriers to care and focus on contraceptive coverage standards, payment reform, healthcare staffing, delivery channel expansion, and Medicaid.
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Public Finance: Advance tax and budget policies that promote fiscal stability and economic opportunity. Projects
should explore place-based policies and assess how tax and benefit policies improve lives.
Selection Criteria
Research should be relevant, rigorous, and capable of informing policy decisions to improve the lives of American communities. Proposals should address policy relevance, study design, and implementation feasibility.
Strengthening Evidence: Support for RCTs to Evaluate Social Programs and Policies
The Evidence and Evaluation team is dedicated to identifying, evaluating, and scaling solutions for critical social issues. This funding targets rigorous randomized controlled trials (RCTs), considered one of the strongest methods for evaluating social programs.
RCTs compare outcomes between a treatment group and a control group, providing clear evidence on a program’s effectiveness. This solid evidence is crucial for decision-makers and stakeholders to support effective policies and programs.
Key Focus Areas
Randomized Controlled Trials (RCTs): Funded studies should utilize RCTs to evaluate the impact of social policies and programs. RCTs are ideal for determining the true efficacy of interventions by ensuring fair comparisons between groups.
Selection Criteria
Research should be relevant, rigorous, and capable of informing policy decisions to improve the lives of American communities. Proposals should address policy relevance, study design, and implementation feasibility. The team seeks studies that can ultimately
inform decisions and improve outcomes for kids and families. Interested researchers should submit a letter of interest (LOI) addressing these criteria.
Causal Research on Community Safety and the Criminal Justice System (This is included because several COEDH faculty work in the intersection of education and criminal justice.)
The Criminal Justice Initiative (CJI) invites letters of interest for causal research projects on policies, practices, and interventions related to community safety and the criminal justice system. This RFP aims to build credible evidence on effective measures
to improve crime and justice outcomes, with a focus on real-world behaviors such as crime rates and criminal justice involvement.
Eligibility Criteria:
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Strong Causal Research Design: Proposals must use reliable methods to isolate the treatment effect of a policy,
practice, or intervention. Accepted designs include difference-in-differences, regression discontinuity, instrumental variable, and randomization.
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U.S.-Based Interventions: The tested policy, practice, or intervention must be implemented in the United States.
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Real-World Outcome Measures: Outcomes should include measures of real-world behaviors, not controlled lab settings
or perceptions.
Prioritization Criteria:
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Policy Adoption Potential: Focus on interventions with clear paths to federal or state policy adoption or implementation.
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Use of Administrative Data: Prefer projects measuring outcomes using existing administrative data.
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New and Early-Career Researchers: Preference for researchers new to Arnold Ventures funding or early-career researchers
(PhD within the last six years).
Budget and Project Scope:
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Typical Budget and Duration: Projects generally have a 3-4 year period of performance with a median budget of $500,000.
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Flexible Funding: Budgets depend on data acquisition complexity, number of study sites, and study timeline.
Application Process:
National Endowment for the Humanities
NEH Digital Projects for the Public
The Digital Projects for the Public program supports projects that interpret and analyze humanities content in primarily digital platforms and formats, such as websites, mobile applications and tours, interactive touch screens and kiosks, games, and virtual
environments.
All Digital Projects for the Public projects should
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present analysis that deepens public understanding of significant humanities ideas;
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incorporate sound humanities scholarship;
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involve humanities scholars in all phases of development and production;
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include appropriate digital media professionals;
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reach a broad public through a realistic plan for development, marketing, and distribution;
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create appealing digital formats for the general public; and
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demonstrate the capacity to sustain themselves.
All projects should demonstrate the potential to attract a broad, general, nonspecialist audience, either online or in person at venues such as museums, libraries, or other cultural institutions. Applicants may also choose to identify particular communities
and groups, including students, to whom a project may have particular appeal.
Grant Snapshot
Maximum award amount $30,000 (Discovery grants)
$100,000 (Prototyping grants)
$400,000 (Production grants)
Funding Opportunity for Organizations
Expected output Game/Simulation; Mobile App; Virtual/Augmented Reality; Website
Period of performance One to three years
Application available April 2, 2024
Deadline June 12, 2024
Contact the Division of Public Programs Team
NEH Digital Humanities Advancement Grants
The Digital Humanities Advancement Grants program (DHAG) supports innovative, experimental, and/or computationally challenging digital projects, leading to work that can scale to enhance scholarly research, teaching, and public programming in the humanities.
The DHAG program supports projects at different phases of their lifecycles that respond to one or more of these programmatic priorities:
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research and refinement of innovative, experimental, or computationally challenging methods and techniques
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enhancement or design of digital infrastructure that contributes to and supports the humanities, such as open-source
code, tools, or platforms
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evaluative studies that investigate the practices and the impact of digital scholarship on research, pedagogy, scholarly
communication, and public engagement
DHAG is one of many grant programs at the NEH that funds digital humanities projects. Please consult these resources to help find the right program to support your work.
In support of its efforts to advance national information infrastructures in libraries and archives, and subject to the availability of funds and agency discretion, the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) anticipates providing funding through this
program. These funds may support DHAG projects that further the IMLS mission to advance, support, and empower America’s libraries, archives, museums, and related organizations. IMLS funding supports innovative collaborations between library and archives professionals,
humanities professionals, information scientists, and relevant public communities that advance the preservation of, access to, and public engagement with, digital collections and services. IMLS encourages DHAG applicants to work in collaboration, and employ
the expertise of, library and archives staff at your institution or across the country to strengthen knowledge networks, empower community learning, foster civic cohesion, advance research, and support the traditionally underserved.
What’s New for 2024
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Prospective applicants seeking expedited program officer feedback about the fit of their project to the DHAG program
are invited to submit a brief inquiry.
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Applicants at all three funding levels may request funding for sustaining, revitalizing, or recovering digital projects.
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Level III applicants may request up to $100,000 in matching funds.
Reminders:
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Applications will be declared ineligible for review if they do not include all required sections and components
(e.g., Budget form with a Budget Justification, Biographies and not CVs).
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Applications will be declared ineligible for review if they do not comply with all requirements indicated with a
“must” outlined in the NOFO, including page limits.
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Two or more applications for federal funding and/or approved federal award budgets are not permitted to include
overlapping project costs.
We no longer accept letters of support. Any letters submitted by individuals not participating in the project will be removed from the application.
Grant Snapshot
Maximum award amount Level I: $75,000
Level II: $150,000
Level III: $350,000, with an additional $100,000 in matching funds
Funding Opportunity for Organizations
Expected output Article; Digital Infrastructure; Digital Resource or Publication; Report; Software; Teaching Resources; Workshop
Period of performance Up to thirty-six months
Application available August 22, 2023
Deadline June 13, 2024
Contact the Office of Digital Humanities Team
NEH Fellowships Open Book Program
The Fellowships Open Book Program is a limited competition designed to make outstanding humanities books digitally available to a wide audience. By taking advantage of low-cost e-book technology, the program will allow teachers, students, scholars, and the
public to read humanities books that can be downloaded or redistributed for no charge.
This program is open to publishers who have published within the last seven years (or will publish during the period of performance) a book supported by one of the following NEH programs:
Fellowships
Grants
Each e-book will be released under a Creative Commons license, making those books free for anyone to download. The book could be a forthcoming title (to be open access upon first release) or it could be a book that was first released at any time during or after
calendar year 2017.
This program utilizes a greatly streamlined application process and there are three proposal deadlines per year: March 13, 2024, July 10, 2024, and November 13, 2024.
New for 2024
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Increase in amount of award to $6,600
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Inclusion of certain Division of Education grant programs
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Clarification of the payment process for awardees
Grant Snapshot
Maximum award amount $6,600 (fixed amount)
Funding Opportunity for Organizations
Expected output Digital Resource or Publication
Period of performance 12 months
Application available December 22, 2023
Deadline July 10, 2024
Contact the Office of Digital Humanities Team
NEH Media Projects
Updated guidelines will be posted in advance of the next deadline. In the meantime, please use these guidelines to get a sense of what is involved in assembling an application.
The Media Projects program supports the development, production, and distribution of radio programs, podcasts, documentary films, and documentary film series that engage general audiences with humanities ideas in creative and appealing ways. Projects must
be grounded in humanities scholarship and demonstrate an approach that is thoughtful, balanced, and analytical. Media Projects offers two levels of funding: Development and Production.
Grant Snapshot
Maximum award amount $75,000 for Development, $700,000 for Production, $1,000,000 for Chair’s Special Awards
Funding Opportunity for Organizations
Expected output Film/TV/Video; Online Video; Podcast; Radio Broadcast
Period of performance Development: 6-12 months, Production: 1-3 years
Application available (anticipated) May 14, 2024
Next deadline (anticipated) August 14, 2024
Contact the Division of Public Programs Team
NEH Humanities Connections
Updated guidelines will be posted in advance of the next deadline. In the meantime, please use these guidelines to get a sense of what is involved in assembling an application.
New For 2023-2024 Cycle:
Humanities Connections projects no longer require an experiential learning component as part of the proposed curricular initiative.
Implementation projects no longer require a white paper to be submitted at the end of the grant period.
Planning projects are now eligible for up to $50,000.
The program email address has changed from humanitiesconnections@neh.gov to hc@neh.gov.
The Humanities Connections program seeks to expand the role of the humanities in undergraduate education at two- and four-year institutions by encouraging partnerships between humanities faculty and their counterparts in other areas of study. Awards support
the planning or implementation of curricular projects connecting the humanities to the physical and natural sciences; pre-service or professional programs, including law and business; computer science, data science, and other technology-driven fields; or other
non-humanities departments or schools. Projects must incorporate the approaches and learning activities of both the humanities and the non-humanities disciplines involved.
Competitive Humanities Connections proposals will demonstrate:
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how the proposed project expands the role of the humanities in the undergraduate curriculum at the applicant institution(s)
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substantive and purposeful integration of the subject matter, approaches, and learning activities of two or more
disciplines (with a minimum of one in and one outside of the humanities)
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collaboration between faculty from two or more departments or schools (with a minimum of one in and one outside
of the humanities)
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a curricular structure that your institution could sustain over the long term, including interdisciplinary minors
or certificates; curricular pathways such as concentrations within majors or general education programs; and other models appropriate to the institution
The Humanities Connections program includes two funding levels: Planning and Implementation.
Grant Snapshot
Maximum award amount up to $50,000 for Planning; up to $150,000 for Implementation
Funding Opportunity for Organizations
Expected output Curriculum; Faculty Development; Teaching Resources
Period of performance 12 months for Planning; 18-36 months for Implementation
Application available (anticipated) June 5, 2024
Next deadline (anticipated) September 5, 2024
Contact the Division of Education Programs Team
NEH Public Humanities Projects
The Public Humanities Projects program supports projects that bring the ideas of the humanities to life for general audiences through public programming. Projects must engage humanities scholarship to analyze significant themes in disciplines such as history,
literature, ethics, and art history. Awards support projects that are intended to reach broad and diverse public audiences in non-classroom settings in the United States. Projects should engage with ideas that are accessible to the general public and employ
appealing interpretive formats.
Public Humanities Projects supports projects in three categories (Exhibitions, Historic Places, and Humanities Discussions), and at two funding levels (Planning and Implementation). Proposed projects may include complementary components: for example, a museum
exhibition might be accompanied by a website or mobile app.
Projects may be international, national, regional, or local in focus and should reach a broad public audience. We welcome projects tailored to particular groups, such as families, youth (including K-12 students in informal educational settings), underserved
communities, and veterans.
Small and mid-sized organizations are encouraged to apply if their projects address topics of regional or national relevance by drawing connections to broad themes or historical questions. Projects that don’t address issues of concern to wider regional or national
audiences should consider applying to Public Impact Projects at Smaller Organizations or local sources of funding, such as their state humanities councils. Award amounts offered to successful applicants will reflect the project’s scope and the size of its
expected audiences.
Grant Snapshot
Maximum award amount Planning: $60,000
Implementation: $400,000 (+additional $100,000 for Positions in the Public Humanities, if you choose to apply)
Chair’s Special Awards: $1,000,000
Funding Opportunity for Organizations
Expected output Exhibitions; Interpretation Plans; Discussion Series
Period of performance Planning: Up to 24 months Implementation: 12 to 48 months
Application available May 9, 2024
Optional draft due July 10, 2024
Deadline August 14, 2024
Contact the Division of Public Programs Team
NEH Dialogues on the Experience of War
Updated guidelines will be posted in advance of the next deadline. In the meantime, please use these guidelines to get a sense of what is involved in assembling an application.
The Dialogues on the Experience of War program supports the study and discussion of humanities sources that address the experiences of military service and war from a wide variety of perspectives. In recognition of the importance of the humanities in helping
Americans to understand the meaning and experiences of military service and war, Dialogues projects encourage veterans and nonveterans to reflect collectively on such topics as civic engagement, veteran identity, the legacies of war, service, and homecoming.
Project teams should include humanities scholars, military veterans, and individuals with relevant experience.
Dialogues projects may take a wide variety of forms, including:
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Bridge programs for veterans seeking to further or resume their education
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Community discussion series hosted by veterans’ organizations or cultural institutions such as museums or theaters
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Undergraduate or graduate courses that train students to lead discussions on campus or in the local community
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Seminars for members of the public
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Reading and discussion programs for veterans and others in the justice system or in group housing
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Discussion series focused on local historical collections, memorial sites, film series, or exhibitions
Dialogues projects must include:
Discussion programs: The convening (in person or virtual) of at least two sustained discussion series focused on humanities resources and themes that address the experiences of war and military service and that explore at least two different conflicts
in depth. Dialogues discussion groups may comprise military veterans only (including subsets of veterans such as students or residents of a group facility); or any mix of nonveterans, veterans, and military-affiliated persons, and interested members of the
public.
Preparatory programs: The creation of an in person or virtual preparatory program to recruit and train a cohort of individuals, and then to select and mentor some or all of them to serve as facilitators for the discussion programs.
Grant Snapshot
Maximum award amount $100,000
Funding Opportunity for Organizations
Expected output Community and/or Internal Partnerships; Discussion Series; Educational Resources; Facilitator Training
Period of performance Twelve- to twenty-four months
Application available (anticipated) June 5, 2024
Next deadline (anticipated) September 5, 2024
Contact the Division of Education Programs Team
NEH Dangers and Opportunities of Technology: Perspectives from the Humanities
The Dangers and Opportunities of Technology: Perspectives from the Humanities (DOT) program supports research that examines technology and its relationship to society through the lens of the humanities, with a focus on the dangers and/or opportunities presented
by technology. NEH is particularly interested in projects that examine the role of technology in shaping current social and cultural issues. The DOT program is part of the NEH’s American Tapestry initiative. The program supports projects led individual researchers
(up to $75K) and by collaborative teams (up to $150K).
Note about Humanities Perspectives on Artificial Intelligence
This grant program is one of ten NEH programs that are part of NEH’s Humanities Perspectives on Artificial Intelligence initiative, which is encouraging research on the ethical, legal, and societal implications of AI. To learn more about the initiative, please
see our page about the AI initiative.
What’s new for 2023-24:
A special encouragement for research projects that seek to understand and address the ethical, legal, and societal implications of artificial intelligence (A.I.).
Improved guidance for applicants proposing to conduct surveys, interviews, or digital ethnographic studies.
Reminders:
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Applicants to this program are institutions.
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Applications will be declared ineligible for review if they do not include all required sections and components
(e.g., Budget form with a Budget Justification, Biographies and not CVs).
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Applications will be declared ineligible for review if they do not comply with all requirements indicated with a
“must” outlined in the NOFO, including page limits.
-
Two or more applications for federal funding and/or approved federal award budgets are not permitted to include
overlapping project costs.
Grant Snapshot
Maximum award amount $150,000
Funding Opportunity for Organizations
Expected output Article; Book; Digital Resource or Publication; Online Video; Podcast; Report; Software; Website; Workshop
Period of performance Up to 24 months
Application available July 25, 2023
Deadline September 12, 2024
Contact the Office of Digital Humanities Team
NEH Climate Smart Humanities Organizations
As energy costs rise and natural disasters become more frequent, humanities organizations - such as museums, libraries, archives, historic sites, and colleges and universities - face an enormous task: to anticipate operational, physical, and financial impacts
of climate-related events on their institutions, while also reducing their own impact on the environment. Climate Smart Humanities Organizations supports these efforts by offering federal matching funds for comprehensive organizational assessments that lead
to strategic climate action and adaptation plans.
Through the Climate Smart program, your humanities organization can undertake activities such as energy audits, risk assessments, and meetings with consultants. The resulting climate smart plan helps you establish goals and prioritize actions that reduce your
organization’s impacts on the environment through mitigation and vulnerability from extreme events through adaptation. Together, mitigation and adaptation can inform a robust road map that addresses climate challenges, protects assets, and facilitates collaboration
between internal and external stakeholders. Strategic planning for climate change is an essential part of sustaining humanities organizations’ operations and activities—becoming climate smart.
Individual organizations can apply for themselves or lead a consortium of organizations collaborating on strategic climate smart planning.
Awards in this program are made with federal matching funds and require fundraising of third-party, non-federal gifts at a ratio of one to one.
Grant Snapshot
Maximum award amount $300,000
Matching required: Yes, 1:1 non-federal, third-party gifts must be raised by March 31, 2025
Funding Opportunity for Organizations
Expected output Climate action and adaptation planning document
Period of performance Up to 24 months
Application available (anticipated) June 12, 2024
Next deadline (anticipated) September 12, 2024
Contact the Office of Challenge Programs Team (202) 606-8309
NEH Institutes for Advanced Topics in the Digital Humanities
Updated guidelines will be posted in advance of the next deadline. In the meantime, please use these guidelines to get a sense of what is involved in assembling an application.
The Institutes for Advanced Topics in the Digital Humanities (IATDH) program supports national or regional (multistate) training programs for scholars, humanities professionals, and advanced graduate students to broaden and extend their knowledge of digital
humanities. Through this program, NEH seeks to increase the number of humanities scholars and practitioners using digital technology in their research and to broadly disseminate knowledge about advanced technology tools and methodologies relevant to the humanities.
This program aims to bring together humanities scholars, advanced graduate students, librarians, archivists, museum staff, computer scientists, information specialists, and others to learn about new tools, approaches, and technologies, and to foster relationships
for future collaborations in the humanities. NEH encourages you to develop proposals for multidisciplinary teams that include the necessary range of intellectual, technical, and practical expertise. You may draw partners and collaborators from the private
and public sectors and may include appropriate specialists from within and outside the United States. You should consider not only the practical applications of the institute topic, but also address ethical implications of its subject for humanities research,
teaching, or public programming.
There is wide latitude in the form and content of institutes. They may focus on a particular computational method, such as network or spatial analysis, or target the needs of a particular humanities discipline or audience. You could offer it only once or multiple
times to different audiences or cohorts. They may be as short as a few days or as long as six weeks. You may host it at a single site, multiples sites, or virtually, but the format and duration should allow for full and thorough treatment of the topic and
be appropriate for the intended audience and all participants must be engaged in the same format simultaneously unless modifications are needed for accessibility accommodations.
Note about Humanities Perspectives on Artificial Intelligence
This grant program is one of ten NEH programs that are part of NEH’s Humanities Perspectives on Artificial Intelligence initiative, which is encouraging research on the ethical, legal, and societal implications of AI. To learn more about the initiative, please
see our page about the AI initiative.
What’s New for 2023 and 2024
This Notice of Funding Opportunity will apply to the 2023 and 2024 deadlines.
We have provided more guidance on faculty and participant compensation and project evaluation.
Reminders
Applications will be declared ineligible for review if they do not include all required sections and components
Applications will be declared ineligible for review if they do not comply with all requirements indicated with a “must” outlined in the NOFO, including page limits.
Grant Snapshot
Maximum award amount $250,000
Funding Opportunity for Organizations
Expected output Conference/Institute/Seminar
Period of performance Up to 36 months
Application available (anticipated) November 15, 2024
Next deadline (anticipated) February 13, 2025
Contact the Office of Digital Humanities Team
Mr. Iwan Notowidigdo
Senior Grant Development Manager
The University of Texas at San Antonio
College of Education & Human Development (COEHD)
iwan.notowidigdo@utsa.edu
Mobile: 347-231-5931