Grant News

2019 Seed Grants and Public Outreach Grants Awarded

May 02, 2019

The Center for Science and Society has awarded its second round of Public Outreach Grants and its fifth round of Seed Grants. 

Learn more about the 2019 Public Outreach Grants and the 2019 Seed Grants via their respective webpages. 

Public Outreach: 

These grants fund projects that have one or more of the following aims:

  • Help boost public understanding of societal concerns surrounding science, technology, or medicine;
  • Teach K-12 students about current issues in science and society; or
  • Work with communities to respond to issues that affect or are affected by science.

Out of the many qualified applications, two projects have been selected for funding: 

  • Formerly Incarcerated Reintegration Science Training (FIRST) Program led by Christopher Medina-Kirchner (PhD Student in Psychology). The program trains formerly incarcerated students in conducting scientific research that addresses social justice issues. The recipient of a 2018 Public Outreach Grant, the FIRST program will include an additional round of scholars in the 2019-2020 year. Read our feature article about Christopher's project.
  • Confluence: The History of North American Rivers led by Scot McFarlane (PhD Student; Department of History). This project will a publicly accessible digital platform for mapping and narrating lived history along North American rivers. Maps will be overlayed with archival documents, interviews, images, and timelines, to help show how scientific thought is influenced. 

Seed Grants:

Seed grants are awarded to innovative interdisciplinary projects involving the study of science in society that require modest amounts of seed money to initiate collaborative research and programming.

Our 2019 Seed Grant recipients are: 

  • Serendipity and Epiphany in Scientific Research led by Jeffrey Benjamin (PhD Student; Department of Anthropology). This group will explore the concepts of 'serendipity' and 'epiphany' (in its colloquial, secular sense) in scientific research and discourse. A first step will be a "mini-conference" for researchers to present and discuss ideas and stories. 
  • The Meaning of Craft in Postindustrial Society led by Yuan Yi (PhD Student; Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures). This December 2019 interdisciplinary conference will investigate the meaning of craft in postindustrial society, where manufacturing, the long-time opponent to craft, no longer constitutes a major economic sector.