Funding Resources for Research

The Calvin Alumni Association Board offers these grants to promote and encourage Calvin College faculty in their service and research interests, further Christian scholarship, and to add value to the classroom and benefit Calvin students.
What is offered: Awards up to $5,000 per project to support expenses related to faculty research or service projects. Preference is given to projects that do not fit the criteria of other Calvin grants.
Who is Eligible: Full-time teaching faculty (may include request for student research assistance) 
Program description and online application

Calvin Center Working Group is composed of 8-15 participants, from a variety of academic disciplines or professional fields, who meet monthly for one year to discuss common readings and to explore from interdisciplinary perspectives a particular issue, problem, or topic.
What is offered: Partial funding for rigorous interdisciplinary scholarship of a distinctively Christian nature on important theoretical or practical issues.
Who is Eligible: Calvin faculty as individuals or in self-selected groups of two or more, with other scholars as appropriate.
Program description and online application

The Calvin Center for Christian Scholarship is inaugurating a Small Grants program to encourage the initiation, continuation, and completion of scholarly projects related to the mission of the Center. These grants are in addition to the Major Grants and Working Group programs, which remain intact. Faculty are invited to apply for grants of up to $5000 in the following categories »

CCCS funds several Working Groups for faculty, staff, and alumni each academic year. The purpose of these groups is to bring together an interdisciplinary collection of colleagues who together will concentrate upon a particular issue, problem, or topic by meeting monthly and discussing texts they have chosen and read in common.
What is offered: While CCCS projects must have a Calvin faculty member as principal investigator, the Center has the liberty, the experience, and the commitment to bring together believers from many institutions to work on issues of common concern from a shared body of Christian insight.
Who is Eligible: All faculty.
Program description and online application

Calvin Research Fellowships are intended to help faculty pursue projects of independent scholarship and to aid them in ongoing, continuing, independent research.
What is offered: A reduction of faculty teaching load.
Who is Eligible: Faculty members with a record of solid scholarly or artistic achievement (or unusual promise of such achievement).
Online application

All sabbatical proposals should be creative and/or scholarly, have a public benefit, and be a project of sufficient size and worth to merit a full semester's work.
What is offered: Leave of absence to engage in creative, scholarly, or professional activities of demonstrable worth to the applicant and the College.
Who is Eligible: Full-time faculty, rank of assistant professor or higher, with at least 6 years full-time service.
Online application

The program is intended to make available funds for research purposes that would not be covered by Calvin Research Fellowships and Alumni Association grants.
What is offered: This program makes limited funding available for social science research projects. Generally, awards above $1,000 are not given; in rare cases an award slightly above that amount might be approved for an exceptionally important project.
Who is Eligible:The projects must be by social scientists, or employ research methods typical of scholars in the social sciences.
Program description and online application

Small grants are offered to improve teaching and learning at Calvin College.
What is offered:The maximum award is $1000.00.
Who is Eligible: Applications are accepted from a department, several faculty together, or an individual faculty member.
Program description and online application

Awards are granted for support expenses related to faculty research and community-based service projects. Faculty who form meaningful educational and/or academic partnerships with community organizations are eligible.
What is offered: This program makes limited funding available for social science research projects. Generally, awards above $1,000 are not given; in rare cases an award slightly above that amount might be approved for an exceptionally important project.
Who is Eligible: The projects must be by social scientists, or employ research methods typical of scholars in the social sciences.
Program description and online application

The purpose of this endowment fund is to facilitate the development of international programs at Calvin College. Specifically, this endowment allows Calvin to enhance existing international programs and launch new and creative international programs and initiatives. A major focus of such programs and initiatives should be on partnering with other educational institutions and with agencies of the Christian Reformed Church. These programs should benefit Calvin—its programs, students, and faculty—as well as institutions abroad.
Who is Eligible: All faculty.
Program description and online application

McGregor Fellowships have been established to support summer research by students working with faculty partners in the arts, humanities, and the social sciences. Funding is available for both the student and the faculty mentor.
What is offered: Faculty may receive a stipend and the assistance of an undergraduate Fellow for a summer research project in the humanities and social sciences.
Who is Eligible: Full-time faculty in the humanities and or social sciences.
Program description and online application

The Mellema Program provides grants for research and course development by faculty in departments such as History, Literature, Religion, and Geology. The Mellema Program also funds and hosts annual lectures, purchases library materials, and sponsors cultural events such as concerts, film series, readings by writers, and dance recitals.
Who is Eligible: All faculty.
Program description and online application

These grants exist to support scholarly work that addresses at least one of the major aims of the Nagel Institute. Scholarly aims of the Nagel Institute, include conducting a study of some aspect of world Christianity, partnering with Christian scholars and study centers in the global south or east on a project of Christian scholarship, or turning the attention and commitments of northern Christian scholars toward the priorities of Christianity in the global south and east.
What is offered: Research awards between $2,000 and $6,000 to support faculty scholarship pertaining to the study of world Christianity. 
Who is Eligible: Calvin College and Calvin Theological Seminary tenure-track and term-appointed faculty.
Program description and online application

Calvin's Science Division offers student/faculty summer research fellowships for scientific research. Funds from a variety of sources support enhancing and expanding inquiry-based learning opportunities for undergraduate students in the sciences.
Application Deadline: Faculty applications are due in early February. Once all faculty projects are collected, students apply to work on the proposed faculty projects.
What is offered: Stipend for faculty supervision undergraduate summer research in the sciences
Who is Eligible: Full-time faculty in the sciences
Program description and online application

The Office of the Dean for Research and Scholarship administers a reserve travel fund for the purpose of assisting those faculty members who are engaged to speak at important professional meetings and whose departmental travel budgets are insufficient to cover the cost.
What is offered: All faculty are eligible for one travel grant of up to $1,500 per academic year.
Who is Eligible: Funding is presently restricted to faculty participating (speaking or presenting) in the program; funding is not available to attend an event if you are not participating. Priority is also given to faculty participating in international programs over (in descending order) national meetings, regional meetings, state meetings, or local meetings of a professional nature
Program description and online application

Calvin faculty who are pursuing research on a worship-related topic should contact the Calvin Institute of Christian Worship office (cicwdir@calvin.edu) to explore funding possibilities.  While we are interested in receiving a wide range of proposals, we are especially interested in projects related to intergenerational worship practices and projects related to the Psalms. 
Who is Eligible: All faculty.
Program description and online application