HRC Humanities & Arts NTT Summer Fellowships
Deadline: Monday, November 16, 2026
The Humanities Research Center offers two summer fellowships to support non-tenure-track faculty in the School of Humanities and Arts. These fellowships are competitively awarded to facilitate research and creative projects from conception through development and completion.
Fellowship Structure
We award two fellowships annually, each providing $5,000 in award funds.
Faculty with projects at any stage may apply. Please be mindful of which stage of your project this fellowship would be most helpful for, as the HRC is unlikely to fund more than one fellowship per project.
Eligibility
- Non-tenure-track faculty members in the Rice University School of Humanities and Arts—lecturer, professor in the practice, or assistant, associate, or full teaching professor—are eligible to apply.
- Applicants must have held a non-tenure-track position at Rice for at least three academic years prior to academic year 2027–28.
Fellowship Terms and Expectations
Each fellowship includes a $5,000 award.
These fellowships are non-residential, with fellows expected to work on their project primarily during the summer.
Fellows will be invited to join the monthly Fellows Fridays meetings at the Humanities Research Center in academic year 2027–28, including to present their own work-in-progress.
While the review committee understands applicants may be pursuing several projects simultaneously, it will give preference to applicants whose demonstrated focus during the fellowship summer will be the project supported by the fellowship.
The application must be accompanied by an endorsement from the applicant’s department chair or center or program director. We do not require lengthy letters of recommendation from chairs or directors; we are most interested in hearing about the faculty member’s service to the unit and the broader School and Rice community.
Awards will be available by April 15, 2027.
Fellows are expected to submit a progress report by April 15, 2028. The report should briefly describe what was accomplished during the year and outline the current status and remaining project timeline. While the fellowship centers on the summer, funds carry over and we recognize that project work may continue into the following academic year; the report is our means of understanding each project's progress rather than a certification of completion.
Award funds can be used through September 1, 2028.
We encourage all applicants to review the award funds guidelines: https://rice.box.com/s/0j0ij7ogdytye5lp8vd5etye3iu60tgs. We will prioritize applications that foreground research and/or creative projects. For projects primarily focused on pedagogical enhancement, please visit this HRC spreadsheet listing other Rice funding opportunities for faculty in the School of Humanities and Arts: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/14nlGuihcY4T4Pq6GDE4QXKIPfxOiGg07OZ-uAkl9xFI.
All travel must adhere to Rice’s Policy 806 on travel. All international travel must adhere to Policy 852 and be registered. Please note that use of award funds toward travel may be subject to approval from the Dean’s Office.
Application Materials
All applicants must submit:
1. Project title and abstract
2. Project proposal (5 pages maximum): Provide a clear overview of your proposed research or creative project and a rationale for the fellowship. The proposal should address the following:
- Nature and significance of the ongoing project
- Clear description of the project’s current state and the work completed or preliminary steps taken to date
- Current stage of development and the specific scholarly, creative, or capacity-building aims requiring support, including, where relevant, skills, training, or resources the fellowship would help you acquire to advance the project
- Clear goals for the summer (for text-based works, chapters to complete, analyses to conduct, etc.; for visual and time-based works, the image, audio, video, or sound recording, development of work(s) in studio, etc.)
- Project prioritization: How you plan to focus on the project during the fellowship summer and manage any other teaching, research, and/or creative commitments
- Relationship of the project to published and ongoing work in the field and potential impact on relevant scholarly/artistic communities or the broader public
3. Fellowship plan and timeline (2 pages maximum): Include a brief description of how you plan to use your fellowship time, including what you hope to accomplish in the summer and the following academic year. Also include a timeline showing remaining project phases and completion milestones, including information on project completion beyond the fellowship period (we do not expect you to complete the project during or immediately after the fellowship period, but you should outline your estimated completion timeline).
4. CV (most recent; no more than 3 pages)
5. Course history: a list of all courses and enrollment numbers per course over the past three years, specifying course level, semester/year taught, and enrollment numbers from Spring 2024 through Fall 2026 (inclusive).
6. Other Fellowships & Grants: Information on any external grants or fellowships recently applied for which you have received or are currently pending
Submission Requirements
Application materials should be submitted through our online application form: https://forms.gle/xocAgnFNeB8y6TNL6
Endorsement Letters should be directly uploaded to the following Box folder by the application deadline: https://rice.app.box.com/f/12f2a3414db84804bddbb23136a310e4
Review and Selection Process
Proposals are evaluated by the HRC Faculty Council according to the following criteria:
- The intellectual significance of the research or creative project within relevant disciplinary or interdisciplinary arenas
- The clarity of conceptual framing, methods, and significance of the project in the applicant's scholarly or artistic trajectory
- Evidence of substantial progress to date, clear articulation of project substance, stakes, and remaining work to be done, and feasibility of proposed fellowship goals
- The number of courses and students taught over the past three years (Spring 2024 through Fall 2026, inclusive)
- The history of contributions to service, community, and leadership at Rice
Selected finalists are subject to approval by the Dean of Humanities and Arts.
Application Deadline: Monday, November 16, 2026
Expected Notification Date: January 15, 2027
APPLICATION FORM
https://forms.gle/xocAgnFNeB8y6TNL6
Questions? Contact Dr. Gabriela Garcia at gabriela.garcia@rice.edu