Seed Grant Funding

The Consortium for Social Movements and Education Research and Practice is accepting proposals for seed funding, up to $2,500, from PIs who will seek external funding on topics central to the mission of the Consortium and that include the participation of at least one investigator affiliated with Penn State. Topics appropriate for requests include, but are not restricted to, the following: social movements’ influence on public education systems, including the impact of student movements and racial justice movements; examination of the role of education and learning in past or contemporary social movements such as today’s climate justice movement; how right-wing social movements have integrated education into their daily activities; educational institutions as sites of contention (e.g. colleges and universities, school boards, state departments of education); the impact of college on longer term patterns of individual social movement activism; differential recruitment of students into campus activism; the functional ecology of college campuses for movement mobilization; social movement schools; organizer training.

Proposals should request support for funds (up to $2,500) to facilitate preparation of a collaborative research proposal writing effort of a proposal for external research support. The content of proposed research should be relevant to the primary focus of the Consortium, the intersection of social movements and pedagogy. A proposal submission to the Consortium should describe 1) a brief outline of the research problem, 2) a brief description of the proposed methodology, 3) Why the proposed research is important and 5) one or more target funders to which a completed proposal will be submitted. A more complete guideline for proposals is attached. Questions about proposal submissions should be sent to John Holst or John McCarthy. Application should be submitted through the online portal. Decisions on proposal funding will be available typically within eight weeks of submission.