Funding Your Dissertation

Recently, the Office of Graduate Student Fellowships and Grants hosted a "Funding Your Dissertation" talk with a lot of helpful information for funding your program at different stages. It may be that you have department funding for tuition, but there are other great opportunities for funding both pre-ABD and for your dissertation research. Here are the major highlights from the talk along with some helpful links to their Fellowship finding databases (Note: you must be on campus or logged in through the VPN to access them). Start thinking about this now (and over the summer to make the next round of deadlines) because some funding opportunities require a year in advance. Also, make sure you drop by the OGSAF to pick up their handouts - they have helpful lists with funding requirements and deadlines. Feel free to post other resources that you find, or any questions that you have.

I.                   Types of Funding

a)      Tuition (i.e. Phi Delta Gamma, Scottish Rite, D.A.R., Liebmann)

b)      Basic Necessities (like photocopying, travel, equipment): i.e. Cosmos, Economic Club, Consortium Research Fellows Program.

c)      Overseas Research (i.e. Fulbright, Boren) and Language Acquisition (i.e. CLS)

II.                Tips

a)      Look for funding at least one year in advance of when you need it.

b)      Make sure you read the elligability requirements very carefully. Some funding is only for students at a certain stage in their program.

c)      Read the literature supplied by the institution. What is the mission of the agency?

d)     Make sure you have all the necessary documents for each submission

e)      Give Faculty plenty of time for letters of recommendation, and send helpful reminders

f)       Many funding deadlines are in early fall or early spring

g)      Ask people in your department for other funding opportunities

III.             Examples of Support

a)      Travels to Collections (i.e. Loughran-Oxford, Mellon Fellowships for Dissertation Research in Original Sources, The Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library Dissertation Grants)

b)      Pre-Dissertation (i.e. SSRC Dissertation Proposal Development Fellowship)

c)      Dissertation Writing (i.e. Spencer Dissertation Fellowship Program, GW Dissertation Fellowship)

d)     Dissertation Research (i.e. NPSC Dissertation Support Program, Jack Kent Cooke Dissertation Fellowship Award, White House Historical Association Research Grants Program)

IV.             Finding Funding (Note: All of these must be accessed on-campus or through the GW VPN because they are subscriber-only access)

a)      OGSAF (GW’s office) Fellowship Finder

b)      The Illinois Research Information Service (IRIS)

c)      Community of Science Funding Opportunities Database (COS) (Note: This database is for all disciplines, not just science)

V.                Help from OGSAF

a)      They will read drafts of your proposal

b)      Make copies of your application and proposal (as well as scan items)

c)      Consult on specific fellowship questions

d)     Publish your accomplishment on their website