Featured Opportunities

November 4, 2026

• The National Science Foundation’s (NSF) STEM K-12 program encourages innovative, multidisciplinary, and potentially transformative projects that build theory, generate new knowledge, and inform education practices in a rapidly evolving technological landscape with advances in emerging technologies including artificial intelligence (AI). It supports fundamental, applied, and translational research that enhances STEM teaching and learning and across the human lifespan and in a range of formal and informal learning settings. In addition to building theory and informing practice, the program seeks projects that produce new tools and frameworks; harness exemplary formal and informal learning; and unlock new avenues of scientific inquiry and discovery in STEM education to strengthen the Nation's standing as a global leader in STEM innovation. Proposals submitted to the STEM K-12 program may focus on learning or instruction in any field(s) of STEM (science, technology, engineering, or mathematics) and may involve a variety of contexts in which teaching and learning take place, including formal education (pre-K to 12) and informal learning environments. The program also supports projects that identify and address salient issues involved in translating research into educational practice for any STEM field, as well as projects that leverage insights from educational practice to drive fundamental research.
• The Chapman Center for Rural Studies, a center of excellence in the College of Arts and Sciences, calls for pre-proposals for its annual Interdisciplinary Research Grant. The Center is seeking RSCAD-based proposals from faculty¹ in the College of Arts and Sciences who represent at least two disciplines to foster interdisciplinary research engaging with rural communities. The purpose of this grant is to encourage faculty to work creatively and collaboratively with scholars outside their specializations to generate new insights into the dynamics of rural life through partnerships with rural Kansas communities or with the potential to improve the quality of life for rural Kansas residents. These insights might relate to rural economies, social structures, health outcomes, education, transportation, politics, community identity and memory, demographics and/or the environment. The proposal should describe how and why their project will use the unique skills and disciplinary knowledge of each faculty participant, as well as how they will include undergraduate research assistants into the work of their project. Chapman Center Interdisciplinary Research Grant grants are limited to one year and ideally, will lead to longer, externally funded initiatives.
• The Wenner-Gren Conference and Workshop Grant supports meetings and events that promote the development of inclusive communities of anthropologists and advance significant and innovative research. Conferences that we support are public events directed at large audiences of anthropologists. We prioritize scholarly gatherings that bring together members of large, international anthropological organizations. Workshops that we support are closed meetings focused on pressing topics in anthropology. Small groups of scholars gather for several days to work intensively on particular themes. Our aim is to help organizers make these conferences and workshops more inclusive and accessible by covering costs for scholars who might not otherwise be able to attend.
• Through the Supplemental Funding Requests to Support Super Intelligence (SI) Innovation in the Presidential SI Challenge Dear Colleague Letter, the National Science Foundation (NSF) Directorates for STEM Education (EDU) and Technology, Innovation and Partnerships (TIP) encourage Principal Investigators (PIs) with current active NSF Super Intelligence (SI)-related awards from EDU and current active awards from the NSF Experiential Learning for Emerging and Novel Technologies (ExLENT) program led by TIP in collaboration with EDU to apply for supplemental funding in support of the 2027 Presidential SI Challenge. Established under Executive Order 14277, the Presidential SI Challenge initiative aims to build foundational SI proficiency, ignite interest among American youth, bolster school SI readiness, and sustain U.S. technological competitiveness nationwide. NSF will provide high-impact supplemental funding to ignite interest and develop foundational expertise in SI among American students by supporting the development of hands-on and experiential learning opportunities and expanding early access to high-quality SI learning opportunities. The Presidential SI Challenge will equip teams across the nation to deploy SI solutions that address pressing issues directly within their communities. It will also prepare America’s students to be confident participants in an SI-ready workforce that will drive innovation, propelling our Nation to new heights of scientific discovery and economic achievement. Additionally, it will spur schools towards having novel and effective systems and protocols for teaching in a world adopting SI tools. Ultimately, NSF’s investment through this DCL will prepare current and future generations to succeed in a rapidly evolving SI-enabled world. This supplemental funding opportunity is focused on middle- and high-school students, educators, and schools.
• The Department of Energy, Office of Electricity’s Grid Supply Chain Alternatives to Lead Energy Dominance (SCALED) targets the manufacture of distribution and power transformers, their associated components and materials, and other essential electric grid equipment. It will deploy a dual-pronged approach to address critical needs facing the nation as the grid is being upgraded and expanded to meet new loads. First, it seeks to promote greater refurbishment and reuse of transformers and other grid components. This approach offers a quicker turnaround and a more cost-effective solution compared to procuring entirely new components, supplementing available inventory to meet growing demand. Second, the initiative aims to fast-track the identification, qualification, and integration of domestically sourced, alternative materials and subcomponents used by U.S. grid equipment manufacturers. This will accelerate the adoption of alternatives or innovative solutions that will reduce reliance on constrained or foreign-dominated inputs.
• The American Cancer Society’s Research Scholar Grants (RSG) provide support for independent, self-directed researchers. Applicants' institutions must provide space and other resources customary for independent investigators. Grant proposals are investigator-initiated and may pursue questions across the cancer research continuum, as long as they fit within an American Cancer Society (ACS) priority research area. These grants typically contribute to the cost of salaries, consumable supplies, and other miscellaneous items required in the research.
• The Department of Defense, Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) is interested in receiving proposals for Research Initiatives that offer potential for advancement and improvement in the NPS core mission of graduate education and research. Readers should note that this is an announcement to declare NPS’s solicitation in competitive funding of meritorious research initiatives across a spectrum of science and engineering, business, politics and public/foreign policy, operational and information sciences, and interdisciplinary disciplines that are in line with the NPS’s graduate education and research mission.
• The Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice’s NIJ FY 2026 Research and Evaluation on Justice System Responses to Illegal Immigration NOFO supports proposals for rigorous, applied research and evaluations examining the adult criminal justice system (courts, law enforcement, jails, prisons, and community supervision) challenges and responses to illegal immigration and crimes committed by aliens while in the U.S. illegally at the state, local, and tribal levels. This includes, but is not limited to, location and apprehension, court operations, transportation and detention, investigating fraud and other crimes committed by illegal aliens, including creating an accurate profile of their rates of criminal activity, counter gang and criminal activity including drug and human trafficking operations. Criminal justice agencies often develop innovative solutions to local challenges that may provide insight to other jurisdictions. Applicants may propose studies examining single or multiple states and jurisdictions and models of cooperation between federal, state, local and tribal justice systems and other stakeholders. The goal of this NOFO is to identify innovative local strategies, evaluate their effectiveness, and inform practical, data-driven solutions that inform and strengthen the strategies that state, local, and tribal justice systems use to address illegal immigration.
• Through the Volkswagen Stiftung Transatlantic Bridge Professorships, internationally renowned professors in the humanities and social sciences who are currently working in the USA and conducting research on the future of democracy, fundamental rights and academic freedom, or the future of transatlantic relations get the opportunity to work at an academic institution in Germany whilst maintaining ties with their home institution. The funding enables annual periods of presence in Germany for exchange and joint research with colleagues in Germany, as well as the continuation of contributions to current academic and public debates in the USA. Applications can be made for a three-year affiliation with a university or non-university research institution in Germany at a level of 25 to 50 per cent, i.e. the funded professors will spend three to six months each year working in Germany. At the same time, they will maintain their affiliation with their home institution in the United States and continue to contribute to academic and public discourse there.
• The Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice’s NIJ FY 2026 Research and Evaluation on Violent Crime: Gangs and Organized Criminal Groups (Domestic and Transnational) NOFO supports research and evaluation proposals on gang and organized criminal group-related violent crime, including domestic and transnational. Projects funded through this NOFO will study topics that inform law enforcement strategies and operations to effectuate EO 14157, “Designating Cartels And Other Organizations As Foreign Terrorist Organizations And Specially Designated Global Terrorist;” Chapter 4 of the 2026 National Drug Control Strategy, “Global Campaign Against Transnational Criminal Threats;” and other related threats, including those posed by firearm, human, and other trafficking-related violence. NIJ seeks rigorous evaluations of new or existing strategies intended to reduce violent crime associated with gangs and organized criminal groups or networks and are led by or collaborate with law enforcement agencies. Evaluations should consider how individual, group, organizational, situational, or other relevant contextual factors interact with the strategies being studied.