Hall Center for the Humanities

Collaborative Research Workshop: Grants for Collaborative Research

in the Humanities

Sally Utech, Grant Development and Management Specialist

sutech@ku.edu

Why Collaborate?

•The viewpoint of funders

•The viewpoint of applicants

American Council of Learned Societies 2008 press release announcing Collaborative Research Fellowships:

This program emerged from discussions among the ACLS Board of Directors, who noted that while collaborative research always has been an important element of research in the humanities, the practice was not well-acknowledged or valued in the academic marketplace. In this program ACLS will now explicitly seek out those research projects where collaboration adds intellectual value. “Collaborative work is increasingly important in the humanities and the arts as well as in the sciences and social sciences,” said Marjorie Garber, William R. Kenan, Jr., Professor of English and American Literature and Language and of Visual and Environmental Studies at Harvard University and a member of the ACLS Board. “One of the objectives of the ACLS-Mellon program is to make such work visible, acknowledged, and valued in fields where research and creativity have often been linked to the image of the individual rather than to clusters of scholars—or artists—working together. At a time when digital and global initiatives are changing both scholarship and the arts, this is an enormously exciting opportunity to encourage projects that will benefit from the context of creative collaboration.”

National Endowment for the Humanities Strategic Plan, FY 2007-FY 2012 http://www.neh.gov/whoweare/strategicplan.html

Objective 1: Facilitate basic research and original scholarship in the humanities.

Strategy 3: Encourage collaborative research projects that develop significant intellectual advances and resources for scholars, teachers, students, and the general public.

Challenges for humanities and humanities-oriented social sciences faculty

• Collaboration is not the norm; a new concept for many scholars

• Few appropriate collaborative models exist• Interdisciplinary and digital projects involve working with

outside fields• Humanists can find it difficult to describe what they “do”• Team logistics/communications require coordination/effort• Partners may have divided priorities and varying commitment

levels• Promotion and tenure issues

Portraying Collaboration in the proposal

These issues make explaining/portraying the collaboration difficult

• Anything else?

Portraying Collaboration in the proposal

• Avoid “parallel tracks”• What value does the collaboration add? Why use

this tool in the research?• What is the reason/justification for the

collaboration and for including each team member?

• What are the logistics of the collaboration?– Intellectual/methodological– Practical

Audience and Impacts

• Think about the project’s potential audience and the outcomes of the project– Does the collaborative (and perhaps interdisciplinary)

nature of the project expand the audience?– Does the project have outcomes beyond traditional

single-authored publications?• Conferences, workshops• Student training• Public programs• Modeling collaborations

Characteristics of Successful Collaborative Proposals

• Two good examples from NEH– The Roots of Creole New Orleans: Archaeological

Investigations at St. Louis Cathedral and Ursuline Convent, Project Director Dr. Shannon Lee Dawdy (University of Chicago)

– What Middletown Read: Print Culture and Cosmopolitanism in an American City, Project Director Dr. James John Connolly (Ball State University)

The Roots of Creole New Orleans

• 3-year archaeological project• Central question: What are the material

dynamics—both ecological and economic—of the creolization process in New Orleans?– Study of archeological, botanical, zoological,

artifactual, and historical influences on Ursuline convent and surrounding buildings/gardens of 18th century New Orleans

The Roots of Creole New Orleans

• By nature, project is interdisciplinary and covers more topics than one person could be an expert in

• Project participants– Director: Archaeologist/Historian– Historian (archival work)– Archaeobotanist – Zooarchaeologist– Phytolith analyst– Three graduate student field and laboratory assistants– Field supervisor and laboratory supervisor

The Roots of Creole New Orleans• In the project application:

– Each participant’s background/expertise and role in the project is clearly explained

– The interdisciplinary nature of the project and scale of the project is introduced from the beginning

– Before reading the detailed “staff” section, based only on the list of project participants, it is easy to anticipate who will be doing what by reading the project description

– Transitions from description of significance to methods/collaboration seamless– Description of what the humanist (historian) will do is shown as being integral

to a more science-based project:• “Her role will be to flesh out the property history of the Ursuline Convent,

locate documents related to the herb garden, and provide contextual historical narratives.” [How this is important to the overall project was explained earlier in the narrative]

What Middletown Read

• 2-year American History project with a digital database component (also developing traditional print publication)

• Using a recently discovered cache of library records for residents of Muncie, IN, between 1891 and 1902, the project will identify who read what and offer a wider assessment of the reading experience and the role of the library and print culture in a rapidly industrializing city.

What Middletown Read• This project is interdisciplinary within the humanities, as it touches on aspects

of political history, social class, reading habits, urbanization, industrialization, immigration, genealogy, intellectual history

• The amount of data (the found library patron and check-out records) is significant– 6,300 patrons– 13,700 books– More than 19,000 individual transactions– Too much for 1 scholar to analyze completely

• Project creates socioeconomic profiles of all patrons, tracks their reading habits, tracks popularity of certain books

– Additional need for technical assistance for the online database element, which is intended for widespread public use via library website

What Middletown Read

• Project participants:– Historian of US cultural, political, social history (project director)– Historian books and textual editing in the US and Great Britain

(project co-director)– Librarian, specializing in construction of electronic databases

(project co-director)– Librarian, specializing in web interface design– Librarian, specializing in metadata and coding– Staff: book cataloging– Staff: programmer to implement web design– Staff: graduate assistant to serve as “project coordinator” to

liaise with tech staff

What Middletown Read

• Outcomes:– Traditional print book published by scholarly press – Online searchable database of all library transaction

records for public use, to be implemented and maintained by Ball State Library

• This project is not at its beginning stage– Statement of past funding explains how small

internal seed funds and smaller external funds have supported initial stages; the NEH grant is for the big push of a second stage

Collaboration as a natural tool/method

• Both of these projects lend themselves naturally to collaboration• Both proposals explain the why and the how of the collaboration• If you are struggling to explain the need for collaboration as a tool in your

project, why?– Is it not the most effective tool to accomplish what you want?– Are the project’s scope and outcomes too limited?– Have you not discussed what each participant will contribute and do?– Are you seeking out collaboration for a reason other than it is the best method

for your project?• If you are interested in collaboration but don’t have a project:

– Apply for seed money or collaborative money to hold a conference/workshop– Get involved as a member of an on-going collaborative project first– Start thinking about broad questions of general interest that particularly interest

you

Submitting applications for review and securing funding is a means of “peer reviewing” projects that are

difficult to assess through traditional peer review channels

Collaboration is a means to an end, not an end in itself. It is one of many tools one can use to achieve a desired outcome

• Insincere collaboration is usually evident to funders• “The Reality Underneath the Buzz of Partnerships: The Potentials and

Pitfalls of Partnering” by Francie Ostrower (Stanford Social Innovation Review, Spring 2005)– Creating a partnership in response to a funding opportunity rarely

works– Partnerships should be enduring– The reward is the research/project, not the money

• Focus should be on the “value added” of a partnership or collaboration• The proposed research should be as intellectually rigorous and relevant as

an individual project a scholar might undertake

Why are you interested in collaboration and pursuing

collaborative funding opportunities?

When should you seek collaborative research funding?

When is the right time in your career?

• Issues relating to P&T for junior faculty– ACLS Collaborative Research Fellowships: “Collaborations that involve

the participation of assistant and associate faculty members are particularly encouraged.”

• Everyone faces time issue– Is collaboration an “extra” on top of everything else you do?– Does it take as much or more time than does an individual project?– What level of commitment do your partners except of you and of

themselves?• How long do you expect this project will last? (it will usually take longer!)

When is the right time within the project?

• Larger, long-term projects probably won’t be funded start to finish by one award from one agency– Seed funding available for starting project• Hall Center Collaborative Research Seed Grant

http://www.hallcenter.ku.edu/~hallcenter/grants/support/• NEH Digital Humanities Start-Up Grants

http://www.neh.gov/grants/guidelines/digitalhumanitiesstartup.html• Both for planning, creating proto-types, testing

When is the right time within the project?

• Break project down into smaller phases– Different awards can fund several self-contained elements

within the larger project• Explain how the completion of one element contributes to

the overall project• Many agencies like the NEH and NSF have a track record of

funding the same project over several stages or iterations, so that first award is crucial

– If it makes sense, project participants can apply for individual awards to undertake their portions of the project

– Once you have used either seed funding or smaller awards and have the groundwork down, go big!

How should you go about seeking collaborative funding?

Identify project participants/partners and clearly define roles within the project itself and the search for funding

• It is a good idea to have a “lead,” even if it is only for administrative purposes

• Outline expected roles and responsibilities throughout the course of the project, including intellectual contributions

• For funding, clearly articulate each collaborator’s scope of work and requested compensation

• Make sure everyone is aware of funding plans and the associated responsibilities

Timeline

• Collaborative proposals take more coordination and documentation than individual proposals

• If institutional, work 6 months ahead• Even if individual, you will need extra time to

coordinate application components and have partners vet them

• Use most recent guidelines if the new ones aren’t yet available

Identify potential funding sources• Internal: Hall Center Collaborative Research Seed Grant

http://www.hallcenter.ku.edu/~hallcenter/grants/support/– Deadline: March 14

• Major External: NEH, NSF, ACLS• Opportunities Lists complied by HGDO

http://www.hallcenter.ku.edu/~hallcenter/grants/external/ or by email

• Awards that aren’t expressly collaborative may fund a collaborative project (a regular NSF award, NEH ODH or Public Programs/Preservation and Access, for example)

• Two or more individuals can apply for the same award for different aspects of the same project = risky, but there is potential

Review Deadlines and Application Requirements

• Collaborative proposals often require letters of commitment, CVs or résumés, staff bios and scope of work in the narrative – alert all partners

• If institutional, determine which partner institution will submit/administer the award

• Each partner institution will have its own requirements for application approval– Subcontract agreements, letters of commitment, internal

deadlines, review/sign off procedures, F&A rates, etc.– HGDO helps KU applicants achieve institutional sign-off

Request successful proposals as examples

• Federal agencies are required to provide access to non-sensitive parts of funded proposals

• For ACLS, I contacted individuals and asked for their proposals

• Resist the urge to simply copy a successful proposal (especially if it isn’t good)– Look for how it portrays collaboration– Look for the description of the project’s significance/broader

impact– Look at the timeline detail and level of funding (if total

award amount is available)

ACLS Collaborative Research Fellowships Requirements (last year)

• This is an individual proposal – subcontract necessary as collaborator will be paid through his/her institution

• ACLS online form (includes information normally on a CV, project information)

• 2 Reference letters for each project participant• Publications list for each project participant• 10-page project description• Bibliography• Detailed research plan• Itemized budget (stipends based on academic rank + up to

$20,000 in additional project funds)

National Science Foundation

• Institutional proposals• Most follow the NSF guidelines; exceptions will be

noted on the target program’s announcement page• Common elements if collaborators involved:

– Narrative explaining roles/responsibilities of collaborators– 2-page NSF formatted bio sketches for all collaborators– KU and NSF requires letters of commitment (outline scope of

work, timeline, compensation; needs to match rest of application)

– All materials must be in English or be accompanied by an authorized translation

NEH Collaborative Research Grants (last year)

• Institutional proposal• 1-page abstract• Detailed list of participants (must match staff

section in narrative)• 25-page narrative• Detailed budget (between $25,000 and $100,000)• Appendices (up to 35-pages; must include 2-page

résumés for all participants, letters of commitment if doing a conference, bibliography [if applicable])

Final Questions

• What questions and concerns do you have regarding funding applications for collaborative projects?

• What can the Hall Center and HGDO do to help you through this process?