Transcript Summer Grant Writing Workshops – Research in the Humanities

Humanities Grants and
Fellowships Workshop
April 15, 2015
Led by Anne Latowsky
World Language Education
College of Arts and Sciences
Supported with Research One funds from the
USF Office of Research and Innovation
Funding Research in the
Humanities
• Competition is fierce
• Funding rates are low
• Preparing compelling proposals is only the
beginning
• The right RFP for your project matters
• Consider your competition
USF is:
Global
Diverse
Metropolitan
Innovative
• USF is one of the nation's top 63 public research universities
• USF is a metropolitan university, founded in 1956 on the central west
coast of Florida and in the short period of little over half a century
has grown to be one of the largest universities in the country (with
more than 48,000 students) and one of the most active in research.
• USF is one of only 25 public research universities nationwide with
very high research activity
Demands on you are increasing…
How should you spend your research
time?
• Curriculum
• Mentoring
• Grants
• Fellowships
• Present
• Network
Teach
Publish
Research
Service
• Committees
• Community
Funding Sources
• Prestigious Faculty Awards
http://www.acad.usf.edu/Faculty/Research/awards.ht
m
• National Endowment for the Humanities
www.neh.gov
• American Council for Learned Societies www.acls.org
• The Foundation Center www.fdncenter.org
• Community of Science www.cos.com
• Grants.gov www.grants.gov
Discussion points for today
• Your goals/Your proposal
• Choosing where to apply
• Structuring your proposal
• Strategies to enhance your application
• Your research resources at USF
• Insight into peer review panels for
humanities scholars
My story
• NEH Summer Stipend
• Foundational work
• Reporting and publication
• NEH Faculty Research Fellowship
• Application process
• Establishing the award
• Reporting and publication
• NEH Summer Stipend judge
Tell us about your project….
•Your project
•Expectations
in your field
•State of your
project
Data
Idea
Pitch
Funding
Where do you find funding?
Tap into your University resources
• USF Division of Sponsored Research
http://www.research.usf.edu/sr/funding_opportunities/
• TRAIN’s Faculty One Stop
http://www.research.usf.edu/TRAIN/facultyOne.asp
• And your College’s Office of Research*
*For the College of Arts & Sciences
http://www.cas.usf.edu/research/about/
Funding Programs
USF Internal Awards Program
• Creative Scholarship
• New Researcher
• Faculty International Travel
Humanities Institute Grants
ACLS Fellowships
Guggenheim Fellowship
NEH Grants and Fellowships
Fulbright Scholars Program
*URL to program provided in slide notes
Keys to enhancing your
application
• Be true to yourself – be sure that your
scholarship fits the grant you’re applying to
• Carefully examine proposal guidelines
• Construct a persuasive argument
• Imagine future return on investment
• The path to the book you ultimately write
• Finding the balance between an out-of-field
peer reviewer and an expert in your field
Borrowed and paraphrased advice
from successful applicants:
1) no work on a narrative about your book is
wasted time--even if you don't win a fellowship,
you should be able to reuse the material (e.g. in
a book's introduction),
2) most humanities fellowships have a similar
structure and require little alteration of your
basic application (i.e. it's easy to apply to
multiple fellowships over multiple years),
Advice continued:
3. given the percentages, one has to be willing to
apply over a number of years.
4. If the application is solid, there is still a lot of
luck involved--getting the right mix of committee
members, for example. Will someone 'bang the
table' in support of your project?
5. The key is to develop a thick skin and apply
continuously, knowing that none of this work on
applications is wasted. Get used to submitting
these proposals pretty regularly and getting
rejected.
Advice continued:
6. It's important to have completed a good
amount of work on your project before applying
for the big grants (NEH, ACLS, etc.). Years ago,
you could get an NEH on a good idea, but that's
no longer sufficient. You need to be pretty far
along in the project. Agencies are now under a
lot of pressure to demonstrate "outcomes," and
they don't want to take a risk investing in a halfbaked project that may never come to
fruition. Instead, they want to push someone
over the goal line. They want to help someone
complete a project.
Advice continued:
7. Well, I’ve been on a bunch of these NEH committees by
now, and my main advice is to read the requirements REALLY
CAREFULLY and if they say they want evidence of A, B, C, and D
(significance, budgetary and logistical feasibility, sustainability,
completion likelihood, etc.), make sure A, B, C, and D are
REALLY OBVIOUS in your proposal, like each one of those
things gets a new paragraph in that order. People on these
committees read so many proposals, and are asked to justify
their rankings for each one using those criteria directly, so
you’re already ahead if you make them easy to find.
8. Recognize that it’s a complete crapshoot and it’s not a
personal condemnation if your project doesn't get funded. The
last NEH committee I was on received something like 300
applications, of which I read 40 and recommended 5 as
superior. They ended up funding 3 out of the 200, only one of
which was one I’d read.
The Peer Reviewer’s Perspective
• 40 proposals?
• Broad field
• Limited time
• Who are they?
• From home or D.C.?
• Why do it?
Major categories of an NEH
proposal
Research and Contribution
Methods and Work Plan
Skills and Materials
Final Product
My experience as a judge
• Number
• Scope
• Competence
• Decisions!
Evaluation Scale for NEH
• A rating is assigned to each application
along with comments.
• E (excellent)
• VG (very good)
• G (good)
• SM (some merit)
• NC (not competitive)
Factors for you:
•Stage of career
•What sort of school are we?
•Stage of project
•Other funding
•Return on investment
Consider This
•Letters
•How to pitch your project
•Finding the right tone
•Shape a compelling narrative
that will resonate with your peer
reviewers
Evaluating the Quality of Applications
1. the intellectual significance of the proposed
project, including its value to humanities
scholars, general audiences, or both;
2. the quality or promise of quality of the
applicant as an interpreter of the humanities;
3. the quality of the conception, definition,
organization, and description of the project and
the applicant’s clarity of expression;
4. the feasibility of the proposed plan of work,
including, when appropriate, the soundness of
the dissemination and access plans; and
5. the likelihood that the applicant will complete
the project.
Whom are you citing????
Anne Latowsky
Bibliography
Berschin, Walter. Biographie und Epochenstil im lateinischen
Mittelalter III: Karolingische Biographie 750-920 n. Chr. Stuttgart:
Anton Hiersemann, 1991.
Blacker, Jean. The Faces of Time: Portrayal of the Past in Old French
and Latin Historical Narrative of the Anglo-Norman Regnum.
Austin: University of Texas Press, 1994.
Brown, Elizabeth A.R. and Michael W. Cothren. “The Twelfthcentury Crusading Window of the Abbey of Saint-Denis:
Praeteritorum enim recordatio futurorum est exhibito.” Journal of
the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 49 (1986): 1-40.
NEH FINAL REPORT questions
What can they tell us?
• What did you do during the tenure of your award,
and how does this compare with what you had
planned to do when you applied?
•Has either your understanding of your subject or
your approach to it changed significantly as a result
of the work conducted under your award? If so, in
what way?
•How has your award-supported work furthered your
scholarly career? What are your publication plans?
Other considerations
•Does your award-supported work have implications
for your teaching?
•To what extent will you be able to continue work on
the project supported by the award? Is this project
sustainable at your institution?
•For Faculty Research Award recipients: are there
other ways in which your award-supported work will
further the educational mission of your institution?
Other considerations
Expressed roughly in percentages, what proportion
of the fellowship period did you spend
(a) at your own institution or home?
(b) at other locations in the U.S.?
(c) at locations abroad?
Did your employer contribute any additional funds for
travel, supplies, research assistance, or other such
ancillary purpose, to help you with your work under
the fellowship? If so, please indicate amounts.
What is the sabbatical or similar leave policy at your
place of employment?
Quick recap…
• Apply appropriately and often
• Read the instructions
• Do everything right
• Be clear
• Jazz up your project with something more than
just sitting and writing at home
• Have as many peers and mentors involved as
you can
• Solicit help from previous winners
• Look at successful proposals from those were
are willing to share
Questions? I’m here to help. [email protected]