The Annenberg Institute supports Seed and Acceleration Funds to launch, support, and accelerate education research on campus. These funds provide opportunities for researchers at Brown to support Annenberg’s broad mission of equalizing and improving educational opportunities for students across the United States, particularly those from historically marginalized groups. This funding can support a range of efforts, including cutting-edge individual research projects, opportunities for scholars to collaborate to address pressing challenges, and direct engagement between researchers and practitioners. We define education broadly and invite proposals from faculty and students across a range of disciplines and methodological approaches.
Awards vary in size and can include any initiatives or efforts designed to further the Annenberg mission. Some potential examples include:
- Smaller seed grants that support specific research needs or early-stage or exploratory projects;
- Working/reading group grants that engage faculty (as well as, perhaps, postdocs and graduate students) across campus in intellectual community around a specific topic to promote research and teaching on these topics;
- Workshop grants that bring leading scholars from across the country together to define the state of knowledge around a specific topic, identify promising directions for research, and summarize knowledge in ways that are useful for policymakers and practitioners;
- Larger launch or acceleration grants that will create a new line of inquiry or rapidly accelerate existing lines of inquiry to create more sustainable research projects or initiatives. This funding will support faculty who want to start a larger project or build a new line of inquiry that will extend beyond a specific product. The idea is that this funding can help launch new major initiatives that can then stand on their own moving forward.
This list is suggestive and not exhaustive. We welcome proposals to fund undergraduate or graduate involvement. We welcome both individual and collaborative projects; we anticipate that larger awards will engage multiple faculty, post-doctoral scholars, staff, and/or graduate students.
We are particularly interested in supporting projects that will seed or launch future efforts, that have direct implications for policy and practice, and that promote collaboration and engagement across campus. In addition, we hope that any grants seeded from this funding will run through Annenberg and staff will be part of the AIB community.
Priority will be given to projects that are directly relevant to the Institute's mission, which is focused on improving education in the United States; however, we will consider proposals examining education internationally as long as the lessons learned are sufficiently generalizable.
Amount and Duration
We will consider awards up to $75,000 per year but anticipate that most awards will be substantially smaller and last one year. We anticipate funding projects with quite different funding levels, ranging (for example) from up to $5,000 to launch a reading group, $10,000-30,000 for seed awards, and up to $75,000 a year for several years to launch a new substantial project. We expect to fund smaller awards each cycle and will consider larger ones.
Dates
- Proposals Due: June 1, 2024
- Announcements Anticipated: June 15, 2024
- Projects Expected to Start: July 1, 2024 or later
Note: We will accept off-cycle applications for smaller award amounts as need arises.
Requirements and Eligibility
Brown faculty whose research is administered through Brown are eligible to apply. We define education broadly and invite proposals that support the learning and development of students at all levels. We invite proposals from faculty and students across a range of disciplines and methodological approaches. Faculty do not need to be Annenberg Affiliates to apply, but we encourage all applicants to become affiliates and expect funded faculty to do so.
Proposals
Submit applications to annenberg@brown.edu with “Annenberg Faculty Seed/Acceleration Funding” in the subject line.
Proposals need not be more detailed than necessary for the amount of funding requested. Larger acceleration grant applications should be more detailed than smaller requests for reading group funding. In all cases, proposals should be brief (i.e., less than 4 pages recommended) and should include (as applicable):
Project Activities, Significance, and Goals
Describe what you will do during the project, the project’s overall goals, and how this grant will help to further these goals. For larger projects, provide a brief discussion of the project’s significance to the field. For all grants, make clear how the work connects to education and how the funding will support education research at Brown.
Project Approach/Activities
Describe what you will do during the project. For larger research grants, include (as applicable) information on research methods/activities, analysis plan, and partnership/dissemination.
Project Team
Describe key personnel and relevant expertise.
Deliverables, Anticipated Outcomes, and Timeline
Provide a clear description of the specific products that you aim to produce and describe the outcomes that should be expected at the conclusion of the research project.
Engagement with Annenberg
One of the Institute’s broader goals is to be a hub for multi-disciplinary education scholarship across campus. For larger grants in particular, explain how you plan to be engaged in the broader Annenberg community. As described below, we expect larger research grant recipients to share their work in our seminar series or other venues. Other potential activities include mentoring students or post-doctoral fellows, supporting students participating in CEDEC projects related to education, etc.
Itemized Budget (not included in the page recommendation)
All use of University funds must comply with University policy. Please note any external funding sources that may support this project.
Funding can be requested to support all activities justified in the budget, including any reasonable and necessary costs for conducting research. Allowable costs include (for example)”
- Time + effort for students, post-doctoral researchers, or research staff
- Travel
- Food and supplies
- Consultants (including funding to support community partners if applicable)
- Costs related to hosting meetings
- Costs related to furthering the partnership (e.g., facilitation or training resources)
- Costs related to planning, collaboration, and the development of joint proposals
- Costs associated with tracking and reporting on activities.
Note: these funds do not support time and effort for Brown faculty except in rare instances
Review
Proposals will be reviewed by an Annenberg Institute committee and potentially other Brown ad hoc reviewers. We expect proposed budgets to be tightly aligned with the resources necessary to complete the research; proposals will be evaluated according to budget.
Requirements and Expectations
Grant awardees will be expected to:
- Provide a brief interim progress report due mid-way through the project and a brief final report due one month after completion of the project.
- Complete a final financial report, if requested.
- Agree to acknowledge this funding opportunity (e.g., “this project was supported by the Annenberg Institute at Brown University” in products),
- Become Annenberg Affiliates.
- (For research projects) Present work in at least one Annenberg-sponsored activity.
- Award recipients may be asked to serve on a proposal review committee in future years.