Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies

RWJF Health & Society Seed Grant Program

Note: When the next call for applications is announced, deadlines and other important information will be updated on this page.

Purpose

The RWJF Health & Society Scholars Program at Harvard trains scholars in the social determinants of health through a tightly knit, interdisciplinary program integrating social, behavioral, and biological sciences leavened with a rich historical perspective.

The program is an interdisciplinary university initiative that integrates activities from four schools: The School of Public Health, the John F. Kennedy School of Government, the Medical School and the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Our training program is based on a foundation of four core disciplines that guide our vision of the emerging field of population health. These are: social epidemiology, public policy, history of science, and biological pathways.

Through the RWJ HSS, we are able to sponsor this competitive seed grant program. Priority will be given to (1) pilot projects with a high potential for integrating the theories, questions, and methods of two or more disciplines [e.g., epidemiology and economics, or psychology and neuroscience]; (2) projects that involve high payoff in terms of opening new areas of inquiry, or that provide crucial preliminary data for preparing larger grant proposals [e.g., to the NIH]; and (3) projects with identifiable outcomes in terms of linking faculty and scholars across Departments and Schools.

*This program funds domestic (U.S.) research ONLY pursuant
to the guidelines laid out by RWJF*

Eligibility

This is a competitive grant program with a limited amount of funding available. It is open to all Harvard University faculty and affiliated post-doctoral research scholars. Students are not eligible to apply for these funds. If you are unsure about your eligibility please contact Laura Price at lprice@hsph.harvard.edu.

Use of Funds:

We will fund individual investigators or teams of investigators for pilot research consistent with the aims of the Health & Society Scholars Program as described briefly above and in the pages of this website.Again, we can only fund domestic research.

Selection criteria include: 1) relevance to the aims of the Scholars program; 2) presence of a multidisciplinary approach; 3) development of a research emphasis not currently prominent; 4) potential for knowledge transfer; 5) and the likelihood of success in a one-year period.

Proposals must identify a product such as a grant proposal, pilot research report, or other specific deliverable(s). Funded investigators will be expected to present in an upcoming RWJ Health & Society Scholars Seminar and to provide a short report on activity at the end of the grant period. Multiple proposals will be funded with awards in two categories: (1) small pilot grants up to $10,000 or (2) larger grants up to $30,000. Note that international travel is prohibited with RWJ seed grant funds regardless of the reason.

Application Procedure:

To apply for either category of award, please submit a one page letter of intent by Wed, March 28, 2012 via email that includes the following information:

  • Proposal Title
  • Name and Information of Principal Investigator (name, position title, degrees, phone and email)
  • Name and Affiliation of Co-investigators
  • Abstract of Proposed Research
  • Award Category–Small pilot up to $10,000 or larger grant up to $30,000

This is a highly competitive grant program. Upon review, we will notify you as to whether you will be invited to submit a full proposal.

Deadlines:

Your letter of intent should be emailed as a Word attachment by Wed, March 28, 2012 to Laura Price at lprice@hsph.harvard.edu. The subject line for your email should be: “RWJ-Letter of Intent-Spring 2012.”

For those who are subsequently invited to submit a full proposal, the deadline for submission of the full proposal will be on Mon, April 30, 2012. The page-limit for the full proposal is five pages. Appendices that include relevant CVs and citations will also be requested.

Other Information:

If you are eventually awarded a seed grant, we will need your IRB protocol number OR exemption number before an account can be set-up and you can begin charging to it. At that point you will have until August 15, 2013 to complete the project.

All questions should be directed to Laura Price at lprice@hsph.harvard.edu