NEH Summer Stipends
Applications are invited for the National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Stipend Program for summer 2024. The purpose of this program is to stimulate new research in the humanities and its publication.
Internal Limited-Submission Deadline: Friday, August 18, 2023 by 5:00 p.m.
The Summer Stipends program provides $6,000 to support continuous full-time work (research and writing) on research-based projects in the humanities for a period of two consecutive months. NEH funds may support recipients’ compensation, travel, and other costs related to scholarly research. Projects may begin as early as May 1, 2024 and must commence by September 1, 2025. NEH invites research applications from scholars in all disciplines of the humanities and related social sciences, and it encourages submissions from independent scholars and junior scholars. Tenure-line faculty members (unless otherwise exempt) must be nominated by their home institution, and only two nominations from each institution are permissible (see below for Urbana campus Limited Submission process).
NEH WEBINAR
NEH staff hosted a webinar describing the application and nomination processes and offering some tips about writing the application. Watch the webinar recording
Summer Stipends support individuals to pursue projects at any stage of development, but especially early-stage research and late-stage writing in which small awards are most effective. Awardees must work full-time on their project and may hold other non-NEH sources of support (for example, sabbaticals and supplementary funding) or grants for the same project during the period of performance. Applicants may seek funding for projects based on completed dissertations; please see page three of the application guidelines/official notice of funding opportunity (PDF) for specific guidance in this case.
An individual may not hold more than one NEH individual award at the same time, nor may an individual work on a project supported by an NEH institutional award while holding an NEH individual award. (NEH Summer Stipends do not require cost sharing and do not include indirect costs. Summer Stipends are awarded to individual scholars; organizations are not eligible to apply.)
NEH seeks to support projects that respond to the A More Perfect Union: Exploring America's Story and Commemorating its 250th Anniversary initiative. NEH will give all applications equal consideration in accordance with the program’s review criteria.
Please review the NEH Summer Stipend guidelines (page 16) for examples of projects and activities that are not supported by NEH. Full guidelines, application materials, and sample application narratives can be found at the program web page, along with examples of funded projects.
As a taxpayer-supported federal agency, NEH endeavors to make the products of its awards available to the broadest possible audience. The goal is for scholars, educators, students, and the American public to have ready and easy access to the wide range of NEH award products. All other considerations being equal, NEH gives preference to those that provide free access to the public.
Faculty members with tenured or tenure-track positions who teach full-time at (unexempted) institutions of higher education must be nominated by their institutions to apply for a Summer Stipend. Only two nominations (at any rank) may be made to NEH by each university. If you are a full-time tenure-stream University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign faculty member, please do not submit an application directly to NEH; you must apply first to the internal Urbana campus competition (procedures below), and only if you are selected as a campus nominee, can you proceed to apply to NEH. (Emeritus/retired faculty, non-tenure-track faculty, university staff members who are not faculty and who will not be teaching during the academic year prior to the award, as well as independent scholars, community college faculty, and faculty at certain federally recognized minority-serving institutions are all exempt from campus nomination and may apply directly to NEH.)
Application Deadline Date
Eligibility
All applicants must have completed their formal education by the application deadline. U.S. citizens are eligible to apply. Foreign nationals who have been living in the U.S. or its jurisdictions for at least three years immediately prior to the application deadline are also eligible. (Foreign nationals who take up permanent residence outside the United States any time between the application deadline and the end of the period of performance will forfeit their eligibility. Leaving the U.S. on a temporary basis is permitted.) Specialized faculty, academic professionals, and unaffiliated scholars may apply directly to NEH. Applicants who have satisfied all requirements for a degree but are awaiting its conferral may apply, but require additional documentation; see the NEH guidelines (PDF) page three. While applicants need not have advanced degrees, individuals currently enrolled in a degree-granting program are ineligible to apply. Please consult the NEH Notice of Funding Opportunity (PDF) for further eligibility details.
Application Guidelines
Internal Application Procedure (For Tenure-line Urbana Campus Faculty)
One digital copy of the application, consisting of:
- a project narrative (prepared exactly as specified in NEH guidelines pages 12–13 and using NEH’s headings) and not to exceed three single-spaced pages;
- a work plan (prepared a specified in the NEH guidelines, p. 13) not to exceed one page.
- a bibliography, not to exceed one page single-spaced (guidelines page 13–14); and
- a résumé of no more than two single-spaced pages (prepared according to page 14 of NEH guidelines).
must be submitted to the Humanities Research Institute (HRI) by 5:00 p.m. on Friday, August 18, 2023. Send all materials as one pdf attachment to apply-hri@illinois.edu. HRI will review the submissions—with an ad hoc review panel—and make the nominations in early September 2023. N.B.: While letters of recommendation are not required for the internal campus competition, they are part of the NEH application. As the turnaround time for submission to NEH after the campus selection is complete is quite brief, HRI recommends applicants apprise their potential referees of their interest in applying to NEH prior to the internal campus deadline. (Campus nominees’ reference letters must be submitted online to NEH no later than October 13, 2023.)
In the event a UIUC tenure-line applicant is selected as a campus nominee for the NEH Summer Stipends but does not ultimately receive an NEH Summer Stipend award, that nominee will receive an HRI Summer Faculty Fellowship for summer 2024 (without having to resubmit to that HRI competition).
NEH Application Process
Following their selection, U of I nominees must submit their complete applications to NEH via Grants.gov Workspace. If they have not already done so, nominees must create a Login.gov user account to register and log in to Grants.gov. Campus nominees who have never registered as individual applicants on Grants.gov will need to go to the requisite registration page. Once registered at Grants.gov, one must add an “individual applicant” profile in order to submit an application to programs for individuals.
NEH strongly recommends completing the registration at least two weeks before the application deadline. If you fail to allow sufficient time to complete registration with Grants.gov, you will not be eligible for a deadline extension or waiver of the online submission requirement.
Applicants who have already registered at Grants.gov and created an “individual” profile need not re-register to submit their applications. NEH encourages such applicants, however, to check their accounts ahead of the deadline to confirm that it is still active and that the password has not expired. For problems registering with Grants.gov or adding an “individual applicant” profile, contact the Grants.gov help desk at 1-800-518-4726 or support@grants.gov. Please be sure to use a Grants.gov individual profile. Summer Stipend applications may not be submitted through institutional accounts.
Applications are due to NEH by September 20, 2023 at 11:59 p.m. Eastern Time. NEH also recommends submitting by noon Eastern Time on the day of the deadline.
Applicants will be notified of the results of their applications by email in April 2024. Notice will be sent to the email address supplied in the application. All applicants may obtain the evaluations of their applications by sending an email message to stipends@neh.gov.
Information can be found at the NEH website, including examples of previously funded projects and sample application narratives.
Application Deadline Details
Completed applications are due to HRI no later than Friday, August 18, 2023 at 5:00 p.m. Send all materials as a PDF attachment to apply-HRI@illinois.edu. Nominees will be notified by September 9, 2022; and all applicants will be notified when the selection process is concluded. Applicants who are chosen as campus nominees must submit their materials to the NEH by September 20, 2023 (11:59 P.M. Eastern Time).
Contact
Tenure-line U of I faculty members who are planning to apply may contact HRI Deputy Director Nancy Castro with questions regarding the internal application process.
Please be aware, also, that the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research and Innovation, through the Office of Research Advising and Project Development (RAPD), offers summer proposal writing groups for those preparing applications for the fall. They are also glad to meet individually and/or provide feedback on drafts via email. Interested parties may contact Maria Gillombardo, Research Development Manager - RAPD, at gillomba@illinois.edu.
For more information about the NEH Summer Stipends internal Urbana Campus nomination process, please contact Nancy Castro at ncastro@illinois.edu or (217) 244-7913.