GRANTS IN THE SOCIAL SCIENCES

Paul SpicerCenter for Applied Social Research

Department of Anthropology

The Social Sciences

There are broad similarities across most social science disciplines

There is a continuum of approaches ranging from the more humanistic and

interpretive to the experimental There is also a sizable body of

observational research

Social Sciences Matter

There is growing recognition that the human dimensions of most problems are among the most intractable

Indexed in a huge popular social science literature (and TED talks!)

Increasing interest in social science research, even from within science and technology

Longstanding opportunities within medicine

And stand-alone opportunities to advance social science itself (primarily at NSF)

Why Seek Funding?

Many of you can do your dissertation research with no extra money

In many social science disciplines your research can be embedded in faculty research

The University provides nominal research support through various mechanisms

Experiments can be run with undergraduates fairly easily

Or you can run up some debt

Funding Matters

But much of the most interesting work will cost money

The ability to secure external resources may help win jobs

Applications of your work engendered in grant writing will open new possibilities

Funding provides some autonomy Grant writing is a useful skill Projects can be a lot of fun

What Are Your Options?

The NSF provides basic funding in most social science disciplines

Unfortunately it does not generally fund your salary

The NIH funds your salary But it generally assumes you are working on

faculty-funded research Foundations may be more or less relevant

depending on your discipline Faculty can submit proposals (or supplements)

to support your work (if it overlaps with theirs)

NSF Fellowships

Apply for an NSF fellowship as soon as you get here

These are very competitive, but are designed to support new graduate students

And are available across the broad set of social sciences that NSF funds

They free you up from working for three years!

Pressures

There are new pressures to get through graduate school

The waiver limits assistantships for those who have them

And a lack of assistantships adds pressure to finish for those who don’t

Please do not extend your education just to keep taking student loans!

Articulate Your Research Early

Sure there are lots of interesting books to read and ideas to try out

And many of us are drawn to academic work precisely because we like to do this

But we can’t get paid for it until we have done original research

All graduate seminars provide opportunity to refine thesis and dissertation research

Everything you do should be connected to your research It cannot be something you do only under thesis or

dissertation hours You’ve had your liberal education, now’s the time to get

real

But Your Learning Does Not End Here

The dissertation or thesis is a beginning, not an end The most deadly faculty members are the ones who

stopped learning in graduate school We all should be professional learners A thesis or dissertation provides us with an

opportunity to learn skills that you can apply in multiple new ways once you’re done

The road is littered with ABDs A long-term perspective is crucial to maintaining

your focus now And moving on in a productive way once you’re

done here

So How Do You Write A Grant?

You need a problem You need to be the one(s) to do this You need an approach You need a budget You need an opportunity

How I Write Grants

I need an opportunity I need a budget I need an approach I need to be the one(s) to do this I need a problem

But Let’s Pretend It Works the First Way!

And for students it really should There are few funds for dissertation

research that require a specific problem Most dissertation funding is designed to

support investigator-initiated research

Why?

In all cases, the most important question is why?

For NIH, the review criteria of significance and innovation speak to this question directly

At NSF, both intellectual merit and broader impact are crucially concerned with this

You have to begin with why your research matters

And it does not matter just because it’s never been done!

Funders Are Conservative

They emphasize innovation and transformation precisely because they don’t know what it is or how to support it

Successful grant getters recognize the incremental nature of science

Reviewers know BS (they are often experts themselves)

What you propose has to be attainable And the logical next step for you, your

sponsor, and the field But this means your grant could be uninspiring

Risks and Excitement

Your research should be exciting Not to most of your friends, probably, but certainly to

your “peers” Your grant needs to convey this enthusiasm And show how your approach provides an important

advance If you’re not excited about your grant, nobody is going

to be The trick is to share that enthusiasm in a measured

way Do not promise too much or too little! If you err, err on the side of promising a bit too much Then, when they cut your budget you can get real

Know Who You Are

People are funding you Grants are never reviewed blindly The investigator is inevitably a focus in any

review Especially for students, your funding is an

investment in you For fellowships, the near exclusive attention is

on you You need to be able to demonstrate why you

can do this research And why it fits the work of your faculty sponsor

Know Where You Are

You need to know the strengths of your program and University

You need to recognize the opportunities we have

And you need to be cognizant of our limitations

Graduate school is not the time to strike out completely on your own

You need to build on what we have which is presumably why you came here

Know The Literature

If your research matters at all, it matters in a specific literature

You need to take every opportunity to master this literature

And you need to be able to position your research within that literature

This can be done quickly, however, so don’t use this as an excuse to delay

Broad overviews of most areas exist Big questions tend to emerge early and often as

you read And please don’t strain to rewrite high theory!

Know What You Can Do

Your approach is the heart of the matter Are there methods available to you that

can answer your question? All social research is multi-method But most is not cognized as such Even the most careful surveys and

experimental designs are grounded in some rather limited inductive work

which is often why they work less well in other people’s lives!

Truth Matters

Certainly in my own discipline of anthropology truth claims are very suspect

They often are imperialist But people will not fund you to only tell them

what they cannot know You need to have a question that can be

answered with methods you command Even if your methods are primarily

qualitative and certainly if your methods are primarily

quantitative

Qualitative Approaches

In qualitative research we often seek to improve conceptualizations

We sample purposively We code inductively But this is also science! We just need to be wary of causal language and guard against overgeneralizing Anthropologists can be quite lazy about

sampling

Quantitative Approaches

These can be experimental or observational

Here the goal is often explicitly to examine cause

And to provide generalizable results But we need to recognize how tricky

determining cause is And how generalizable such tightly

controlled work can ever be

Some of Your Ideas?

Budgeting

This is not boring This is where you get real about what you can

actually accomplish Budgeting is an invaluable skill At the heart of strategic planning in any organization For me, beginning with the budget provides me with

an opportunity to see what is possible before I get too far down the road of dreaming stuff up

And in the real world of professional research, these activities consume much of our time

So you should learn to embrace it

Opportunities

Working with CRPDE and your faculty is key I couldn’t pretend to know all of the

opportunities that are relevant to your work This kind of match making is probably one of

the more enjoyable parts of Alicia, Todd, and Nancy’s jobs

But certainly you should all seek funding from NSF

And you should all explore the possibilities of leveraging your advisor’s research (or other opportunities) to support your work

Interdisciplinary Work

You are all here to train in a discipline Unless, of course, you are in an interdisciplinary

degree But once you leave graduate school most of the

funding is available to solve complex problems which require respect and tolerance for other

approaches I would encourage all of you to think not only about

how your work advances your field, but also how it may ultimately matter

And how you can take advantage of the opportunity your research presents to learn to play well with others

Questions?