Congressional Research Grants

Congressional Research Awards from the Dirksen Congressional Center - deadline February 1, 2009.

Here's some info adapted from the Dirksen Center website:

The Dirksen Congressional Center invites applications for grants to fund research on congressional leadership and the U.S. Congress.  The Center, named for the late Senate Minority Leader Everett M. Dirksen, is a private, nonpartisan, nonprofit research and educational organization devoted to the study of Congress and its leaders.  Since 1978, the Congressional Research Awards (formerly the Congressional Research Grants) program has paid out $747,465 to support 369 projects. Applications are accepted at any time, but the deadline is February 1 for the annual selections, which are announced in March.  A total of up to $30,000 were available in 2009.

The competition is open to individuals with a serious interest in studying Congress.  Political scientists, historians, biographers, scholars of public administration or American studies, and journalists are among those eligible.  The Center encourages graduate students who have successfully defended their dissertation prospectus to apply and awards a significant portion of the funds for dissertation research.  Applicants must be U.S. citizens who reside in the United States.

Research topics could include external factors shaping the exercise of congressional leadership, institutional conditions affecting it, resources and techniques used by leaders, or the prospects for change or continuity in the patterns of leadership.  In addition, The Center invites proposals about congressional procedures, such as committee operation or mechanisms for institutional change, and Congress and the electoral process. The Center also encourages proposals that link Congress and congressional leadership with the creation, implementation, and oversight of public policy.  Proposals must demonstrate that Congress, not the specific policy, is the central research interest.   The research for which assistance is sought must be original, culminating in new findings or new interpretation, or both.  The awards program was developed to support work intended for publication in some form or for application in a teaching or policy-making setting.  Research produced by previous grant recipients has resulted in books, papers, articles, videotapes, and computer software.

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