The Office of Postdoctoral Education (OPE) and the Graduate School have established an incentive plan designed to encourage more postdocs to apply for individual fellowships.

Details

The OPE will provide a monetary incentive for postdocs to apply for individual fellowships funded by extramural agencies or foundations. Postdocs who apply for an individual fellowship (e.g. NSF Individual, NIH NRSA, Foundation Fellowships, or other) will be awarded $500 for submitting the application. It is given for first submissions only.

To qualify, the application must be reviewed by your mentor, prior to submission. Your mentor must provide written verification to the OPE that the application is considered competitive. After submission of the grant application, you will provide a PDF of the application to the OPE. The incentive reward will be authorized when you provide evidence that the application has been received by the granting agency.

If the application is funded, you will receive an additional financial reward of $1,500 per year for the term that the grant is funded. The supplemental funding will be provided by the OPE and the Graduate School. You will provide a copy of the award notice and the Request for Individual Fellowship Supplement Funding Form in order to receive the additional financial reward.

Eligibility & Requirements

This program is available to all postdoctoral scholars through the OPE. GME-appointed postdoctoral residents are not eligible. To be eligible for both the submission reward and the $1,500 supplement, the awarded funding must provide more than half of your current base stipend. Your eligibility for the supplement is contingent on your appointmetn as a status code 20 postdoc trainee.

Applications for and receipt of travel and other small grants are not eligible for an incentive award under this program.

Application Materials

To receive the application incentive of $500, the following materials are required:

• a letter from the postdoc’s advisor verifying that the advisor reviewed the application and believes that it is competitive
• documentation that the amount of the fellowship provides greater than half of the postdoc’s current base stipend
• a PDF of the application
• verification of receipt of the application by the funding agency

These materials may be submitted through the form below.

Application Incentive Submission Form

Note: Applications submitted prior to December 1, 2020 will not be eligible for the $500 application incentive, but active Individual Fellowships are eligible for the $1,500 annual inventive.