Extramural Funding Opportunities
The School of Social Sciences encourages all graduate students to apply for extramural funding opportunities (grants, fellowships, etc.) available through a variety of funding agencies. Before you begin applying for any external funding opportunities, please take a moment to review the application steps.
Applying for Extramural Funding
Please confer with your academic advisor well in advance of applying to any of these agencies to determine whether you are academically prepared to do so. All decisions regarding grant and fellowship applications should be made in consultation with the student's advisor. Such consultation should occur well in advance of the grant deadlines, including the internal UC Irvine deadlines.
Step 1: Identifying Sources and Types of Funding
To begin the process for applying for external funding opportunities, you must first determine the agency and grant/fellowship to which you will be applying. The Graduate Student Extramural Opportunities website provides a host of available opportunities.
As you are researching different types of funding opportunities, you will find that there are two categories in which your grant/fellowship will fall:
Type 1
Monetary awards are directly paid to the student. You, the student, communicate directly with the granting agency/sponsor. Ex.: American Sociological AssociationType 2
Monetary awards are made to the university, rather than the student, and distributed through the Office of Contracts and Grants. You communicate with the agency via the Social Sciences Office of Contracts and Grants. Ex.: National Science Foundation, National Institutes of Health, grants.gov
To determine the type of funding to which you are applying, please contact Julie Hoigaard, Social Sciences Graduate Grants Facilitator, 949-824-8498 or jhoigaar@uci.edu.
This information is important to determine at the beginning of the process as it will dictate how your funds will be distributed and tracked.
Step 2: The Application Process
Type 1
If you are applying for a Type 1 grant/fellowship, contact the agency directly and follow their application process. Contact Julie Hoigaard with any questions.Type 2
If you are applying for a Type 2 grant/fellowship, you will need to contact your appropriate department manager at least one month prior to the grant application due date to begin the application/proposal process. Your department manager will work with you on the pre-award details for your grant/fellowship (budget, budget justification, compilation of proposal components) and provide university application cover materials.
Department Department Manager Anthropology Norma Miranda [Ext. 7602; nmiranda@uci.edu] Economics Nancy Ford [Ext. 3655; nvford@uci.edu] Chicano/Latino Studies Debbie Michel [Ext. 1424; dmichel@uci.edu] Cognitive Sciences Clara Schultheiss [Ext. 7569; clara@uci.edu] LPS Patty Jones [Ext. 1520; patty.jones@uci.edu] Political Science Natalie Cook [Ext. 1491; natcook@uci.edu] Sociology and DASA Brenda Fitzjarrald [Ext. 7637; bfitzjar@uci.edu]
For all other programs, centers, etc., please contact Shelly Bennett-Burns for assistance.
Step 3: Notification of Awards
Type 1
If you applied for a Type 1 grant/fellowship, you will be contacted directly by the grant agency/sponsor concerning any awards.Type 2
If you applied for a Type 2 grant/fellowship, you and the Principal Investigator (PI) will receive notification concerning any awarded funds through Shelly Bennett-Burns, Manager, Social Sciences Contracts and Grants Liasion;shelly.bennettburns@uci.edu; 949-824-8266.Occasionally, students receiving Type 2 grants/fellowships are contacted directly by the funding agency regarding awards. If this happens, please contact Shelly Bennett-Burns to let her know you have received notification.
After receiving notification of your award, you will need to schedule a meeting with Shelly Bennett-Burns to fill out the necessary paperwork required to receive funds.
Your award is not official until you have received an award synopsis. DO NOT begin working on your funded project or begin spending funds until you have received your award synopsis and subsequent account number from Shelly. You will NOT be reimbursed for any funds spent prior to receiving your account number.
Step 4: Receiving Your Funds
Type 1
If you applied for a Type 1 grant/fellowship, you will be contacted directly by the grant agency/sponsor concerning the manner in which you will receive the actual funds. Some agencies prefer to give money all at one time while others prefer to pay in installments. In either case, the funds will be distributed directly to you.Type 2
Contact Shelly Bennett-Burns for details on the distribution of your Type 2 award funding.
Step 5: Post-Award Details
Type 1
Follow awarding agency guidelines.Type 2
You will receive a monthly statement detailing your account activity for all Type 2 funds. If you have questions at any point in the post-award phase, please contact Shelly Bennett-Burns, shelly.bennettburns@uci.edu or 949-824-8266


